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King of the Hill! - Transformers Wiki

️Sat Sep 11 2021

As the Autobots attempt to choose a new leader, the Decepticons send the giant Trypticon to capture the Ark.

Synopsis

"That bot ain't right, I'll tell ya hwat."

Rachel Becker, a student at Pacific Northwest University, is deep in the Oregon woods on a search for fossils, and finds a strange footprint. Her professor quickly dismisses the footprint as a hoax, since the edges are clearly mechanically carved. However, none of them can deny the shadowy Pterodactyl-like figure that flies past. They decide to set up camp.

The Dinobots have learned of Optimus Prime's death, and prepare to return to the Ark. Grimlock intends to forcibly seize leadership of the Autobots.

The various commanders among the Autobots gather to select a new leader. Grimlock arrives and demands the position be given to him; the Autobots argue that they need a leader who demonstrates wisdom, compassion, kindness, and courage, in addition to being a strong warrior. But Grimlock doesn't care. He departs, and the Dinobots prepare to attack their fellow Autobots.

Meanwhile, Shockwave, now leader of the Decepticons, persuades Cybertronian fuel auditor Ratbat to use the space bridge to send the Decepticons' deadliest soldier, Trypticon, to launch a surprise attack on the Ark, in hopes of seizing control of its vast resources. Ratbat agrees, but warns that the use of the space bridge is too costly to allow such uses in the future.

When Trypticon arrives in the middle of the night, Rachel is awakened and goes out to investigate. She manages to avoid being seen, but loses her flashlight while running from the enormous Decepticon, and is unable to find her way back to camp.

"You called in a fake propane emergency? That's a $50 fine after I report it."

The Dinobots arrive back at the Ark to find that the Autobots are already under attack. As Trypticon is easily defeating the Autobots, most of the Dinobots think that the Decepticon is doing their job for them, but Grimlock has misgivings. As he steps back to consider his options, he is confronted by Rachel, and is impressed when the human fails to flee from him in terror. He leaves her in peace.

Unfortunately for Rachel, she is soon discovered by Trypticon's foot soldier Wipe-Out, who takes her captive and brings her to Trypticon. Grimlock, recognizing the human who had previously impressed him, single-handedly attacks Trypticon. The other Dinobots soon join in, and Trypticon is distracted from his attack upon the Ark. Eventually, Ratbat determines that Trypticon has exceeded his energy budget, and recalls Trypticon back to Cybertron. The Dinobots return to the Ark, leaving Rachel Becker as the sole witness to what has just transpired.

The Autobots, believing that Grimlock has displayed all the qualities one would desire in an Autobot leader by Grimlock's selfless actions against Trypticon, proclaim him their leader.

Featured characters

(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

Autobots	Decepticons	Humans	Others
Swoop (4) Sludge (5) Slag (6) Snarl (7) Grimlock (8) Jetfire (13) Perceptor (14) Blaster (15) Hot Spot (16) Ratchet (17) Silverbolt (18) Omega Supreme (19) Powerglide (22) Warpath (23) Beachcomber (24) Cosmos (25) Seaspray (26) Wheeljack (28)	Shockwave (9) Soundwave (10) Drag Strip (11) Ratbat (12) Trypticon (20) Wipe-Out (21)	Robert Paaswell (1) Rachel Becker (2) Marty Cooper (3)	Bunny rabbit (27)

Quotes

"Forget the humans! They are weak! They are cowardly! They are nothing!"

—Grimlock, misanthrope.

"The Autobots are our concern! Swoop has been spying on them -- he says their leader, Optimus Prime, is dead! That is good."

—Tell us how you really feel, Grimlock

"There it is -- the Ark, headquarters of the wretched Autobots! ...A temporary situation, at best."

—Trypticon prepares for battle

"Yes, Trypticon. Anything you say, Commander. As you wish, exalted--"
"Just shut up and go!"

—Wipe-Out and Trypticon

"This is no good. Sure, I wanted to become a leader...I even expected I'd have to knock around a few Autobots to get it...but I didn't want them slaughtered!"

—Grimlock experiences a crisis

"Trypticon, your immenseness, sir -- I found this native life form skulking about."
"Very appetizing, Wipe-Out!...I've never destroyed an organic lifeform! This should be a most enlightening experience!"

—Wipe-Out and the highly eloquent Trypticon

"When it comes to fighting, we always share!"
"Then you will all share in the dying, fools!"

—Sludge and Trypticon

Notes

Artwork and technical errors

My forehead grew a few more angles.

Swoop's creature mode is consistently colored with a red head, face and beak; it should be silver (or gold).
Snarl's dino head is colored blue; it too should be gold.
While artist Don Perlin had previously drawn Grimlock with a head design based on a non-final character model (Grimlock's standard design in the Marvel run), starting with this issue Perlin instead draws Grimlock with the head design from his toy. The animation models that were provided to Perlin did not usually include the characters' backs, so he sometimes requested the actual toys from Hasbro to draw from. Perlin would continue to draw Grimlock with his toy head into issue 28, return to the non-final animation model head for issue 32, then finish out his run on issue 35 by drawing the toy head again.
Page 7: Hot Spot's name is spelled as one word.
Page 12, Wipe-Out calls his master "Tyrpticon". (Corrected in Transformers: Classics)
Page 17: Trypticon's whole upper head is colored gold, rather than just the flip-plate that covers his head-mounted laser.

Continuity errors

Grimlock speaks normally, as opposed to his cartoon incarnation's simpler style of speech - consistent with his debut in #8, but contradicting both issue #19 and pretty much every issue going forward.
In issue #25, Shockwave's plan was to move the Decepticon base to an actual existing island already on the map. In this issue, the new base is shown to be a Decepticon-created artificial island.
What happened to all those crazy guns Omega Supreme installed around the Ark just last issue?

Continuity notes

Bob chose Grimlock as leader "for contrast [with Prime], as much as anything else... I thought his different approach would shake up the direction of the book in an exciting way and confound readers’ expectations, which it did". Based on the letters the comic got, some of the readers found Grimlock's rise to power distressing! ^[1]
The debut of Trypticon in this issue can sometimes overshadow that it is also the debut of a much more important character: Ratbat. As with Grimlock, Bob made him a leader to mess with reader expectations.^[2] The idea of a high-ranking cassette has proven too controversial for later publishers.
It also marks the debut of the Decepticon island/underwater base/spaceship/vacation resort later known as Club Con; Shockwave reveals it was transported to Earth via space bridge from Cybertron.
Prowl is not among the gathered Autobots, despite being reactivated last issue; evidently it wasn't a full repair job.
Sludge makes reference to watching a sport involving Turboworms wrestle in grease pits on Rigel 6. While this isn't a huge revelation by today's standards, the early Marvel Comic depicted the Transformers as being unaware of organic life, and as such likely not as space-faring as they were later depicted. Given that Sludge spent four million years dormant on Earth, this is early confirmation that he had been off-world before or during the war on Cybertron, a point that was quite rare in the comic at the time.

Real-life references

Settings include the Cascades in rural Oregon, and the Florida Keys.

UK printing

Issue #111

Back-up strips: The Inhumanoids - "The Battle Down Below!" and Robo-Capers
The issue featured a Grimlock cover by Lee Sullivan. On it Grimlock shouts "Vote for me!". In the real world the issue was on sale during the campaign for the 1987 local council elections and came only a month before the general election.
In Grim Grams, Grimlock advises a US reader where to buy the UK comic.
The cliffhanger for issue #111 is one of the most effective in the UK reprints of US stories — it ends with the sequence of Trypticon emerging from the space bridge, finishing with a massive splash page of the evil Decepticon.

Issue #112

Back-up strips: The Inhumanoids - "The Battle Down Below!" and Robo-Capers
The issue used an extensively recolored version of US issue #27's cover, with a new word caption. The cover was cropped to de-emphasize the human element, and emphasize the dinosaur-battle going on. Unfortunately this also served to remove a lot of the menace from the cover.
While this is the US début of Ratbat, in the UK comics he first appeared back during the "Prey!" story arc.

Other trivia

This is the last Marvel US issue to be sold for 75 cents.

Bot Roster

Autobots: 32 active as the Dinobots finally come in from the cold; 14 in repair bay. (46 total)
Decepticons: 31 active; 9 offline. (40 total)

Courtesy of my...

Weirdly, despite them being clearly depicted in the artwork, neither Trypticon's plasma bombs nor his particle beam cannon get called out in the dialogue or narration, which instead highlight him firing missiles that lay sonic-scrambler mines.
Swoop retaliates with an air-to-air missile.
Wipe-Out has a gun that fires grease.

Covers (3)

US cover: Trypticon vs the Dinobots, by Herb Trimpe.
UK issue #111 cover: Grimlock, by Lee Sullivan.
UK issue #112 cover: extensively recolored version of US cover.

US issue #27 - What's better than a giant robot dinosaur? Nothing!
UK issue #111 - Ironically Grimlock's policies were more sound than Margaret Thatcher's.
UK issue #112 - The UK wants MORE DINOSAURS!

US

M&M's - inside front cover
Brach's candy - between pages 4 & 5
MPC Model Kits - between pages 5 & 6
The Amazing Spider-Man Free the Cap'n Mystery - between pages 7 & 8
Sales Leadership Club - between pages 8 & 9
Various comics dealers - between pages 16 & 17
Brach's candy - between pages 17 & 18
Century Martial Art Supply, Inc. / Marvel Super Mart - between pages 19 & 20
The 'Nam comic - between pages 20 & 21
Transmissions
Marvel subscription service
Dungeons & Dragons Set #1: Basic Rules - inside back cover
TSR Marvel Super Heroes RPG (back cover)

UK: #111

Action Force (toy range)
The incredible New Teams

UK: #112

Autobot Heroes (Rodimus Prime and Wreck-Gar)

Reprints

Transformers: Breakdown TPB: Predaking, Megatron, Ratchet and half of Ratbat, by Andrew Wildman.
Transformers: Breakdown HC: Grimlock fighting Trypticon, by Kev Walker, Simon Coleby and Chris Blythe.
The Transformers: Generations #9 cover A: Trypticon fighting the Dinobots, art by Nick Roche and colors by Josh Burcham.
The Transformers: Generations #9 cover B: line-art version of cover A.
The Transformers: Generations #9 incentive cover: reuse of a panel from this issue.