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thanksjro · 4 years

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Everyday Is Like Sunday: Everyone Hates Huffer

This is technically a Christmas story, modeled after A Christmas Carol, but I’m covering it now because time is an illusion, god has abandoned his creations to chaos, and I’m on the downswing of a depressive episode so nothing actually matters!

I’m kidding. It’s mainly because some of this stuff is very difficult to find, and trying to save this thing for a later date isn’t going to work with how the lineup’s currently looking. In that I don’t have anything prior to Roberts’ stint with IDW available to me at the moment that hasn’t already been gone over.

This isn’t even the only Christmassy story Roberts did back in the TMUK days- there’s a comic out there that he worked on with Jack Lawrence that’s meant to be another sort of holiday special starring Optimus Prime. He just really likes Christmas, I guess.

Anyway, let’s get into Everyday is Like Sunday!

Oof, that font. My inner graphic design nerd is screaming.

It’s the return of Matt Dallas! Dallas was the artist Roberts worked with for Liars, A-to-D, the prequel comic to Eugenesis. Having looked into the guy a bit since I covered that, I found that he was everywhere during the TMUK days, and even headed the Transtrip publications. His credits are impressive, to say the least.

Our story begins with Kup fighting Unicron.

Would you look at all that detail! Check out that six pack, dude’s ripped. It’s a good thing this is the only time we’ll see the Chaos Bringer, because that must have taken ages.

Yep, this Unicron is an illusion, and not even one that’s diegetic to the characters. Well, except Kup. Huffer, the resident stick-in-the-mud, glass-half-empty, complete-and-total grump, has taken it upon himself to mess around with Kup while he’s passed out in his easy chair after a few too many, because what the hell else his there to do on this starship? That cord in Huffer’s hand is plugged into the side of Sup’s head, so he’s just pouring this dream narrative straight into his brain. Hot Rod is, understandably, a little weirded out by this, and invites Huffer to instead enjoy the day, because it’s Christmas!

He does have a bit of a point- Christmas isn’t exactly a thing on Cybertron, and just because they have it on Earth, doesn’t mean it’s necessarily stuck with everyone as much as it has with you, Hot Rod. I doubt Huffer would care, even if it was a Cybertronian holiday.

If that last little line reads a bit oddly, that would be because it’s actually a song lyric that’s wormed its way into the dialogue. This comic is named after a song by Morrissey called- what else?- Everyday is Like Sunday. It’s a pretty good listen, I recommend you take a listen. It really matches the tone for Huffer’s whole situation.

The situation that is his personality.

Huffer’s in a mood. He’s always in a mood, but he’s particularly incensed now, because they’ve been scooting around in space for almost a year and haven’t actually done anything. Arcee listed off all the things they’ve accomplished, because she wants him to either lighten up or shut up, but he brushes all that off, because he can’t stand to be wrong, either. And then Bluestreak has to go and open his mouth, having the audacity to suggest that Huffer might actually have an emotion other than general displeasure and perhaps even- gasp!- MISS Earth.

This sets Huffer off, and he goes on a brief tirade on how he doesn’t give two hoots about the Earth. The only reason the tirade is brief is because Ebony decides that enough is enough and outright attacks him.

You probably don’t know Ebony, and that’s okay. From what I can gather, she’s someone’s OC. Not sure who, but she’s got to belong to someone. She looks like she turns either into a wolf or some sort of big cat, and she’s had enough of Huffer’s bad attitude. She says what everyone’s been thinking, and offers to kill him in a sort of roundabout way if life is really that fucking terrible.

Huffer decides he’s had enough, and asks where the escape pod is. This ship doesn’t have an escape pod, but Hot Rod offers to drop him off at the first planet they pass. Bumblebee suggests they just go ahead and let him off here. Everyone’s about had it with Huffer, and trust me when I say the feeling seems to be mutual. There’s literally an entire page devoted to him just insulting everyone and listing off all the reasons he can’t stand them.

Bluestreak looks genuinely offended, like he can’t believe Huffer would even go there.

Huffer fights dirty, too. He goes after things people have zero control over, like their age and how they’re built. Just flat-out rude. He attacks folks who aren’t even present, calling Prowl uptight and Nightbeat a lackey.

We cut over to the two of them having a discussion about the order of the shuttle they’re on, and how things are going to have to change, then it’s back to Huffer acting like a jackass.

You’re just saying that to be hurtful and ridiculous.

Huffer storms off into the darkened hallway, wishing a sarcastic Merry Christmas to everyone. The door shuts behind him, and then everything promptly explodes.

There’s a lot going on here, but let’s try to break this down a bit. We’ve got some full-stasis off in the corner, with Eric Cartman and He-Man’s Oracle featured as pieces, the vacuum from Teletubbies, what might be a porno mag in the lower right corner, and a TI-83 calculator. Damn, guess Huffer got what he wanted.

No, what’s really happened is that the shuttle’s been hit by an asteroid. Considering I haven’t seen anyone actually manning this rig, I suppose it was only a matter of time before they floated into something big enough to hurt. Prowl intercoms for everyone to head for the bridge and pull up the defense shielding.

Off in the hall, Huffer’s face down on the ground. He tries to get up, but the shuttle keeps hitting things, even with Bluestreak at the wheel now.

That’s what I want to know! Look at our detective, asking all the right questions! However, we don’t have time to answer that, because, unfortunately, Nightbeat isn’t our main character this go around.

Huffer is.

Our little bastard man is looking a bit crispy, but seems otherwise okay. He certainly isn’t feeling bad enough to not make a stink when someone has the utter gall to try and help him to his feet. His tune changes though, when he sees just who this kind samaritan is.

Fusion’s a dude who’s only claim to fame is biting it. I suppose that it’s fitting he be our Ghost of Christmas Time-Is-A-Perception-Based-Concept.

Fun little detail about Dallas’ work- he makes everyone outrageously shiny. These sons of guns have been at war for millions of years, and should probably be scuffed all to hell, but Dallas is just like “haha, nope! Break out the polish!” and everyone is glossy enough to apply lipstick with. It doesn’t even stop at characters; in Liars, A-to-D, Mirage fires a missile that you can see Sixshot’s reflection in as it flies towards him.

Fusion, when asked if he’s a hallucination, simply says that he’s as solid as Huffer, and when their hands touch, THIS happens:

Which I suppose means they’re embarking on a journey of the spiritual variety. That, or Huffer’s FINALLY proposing.

The pair materialize on Cybertron, 50,000 vorns in the past, which is well over 4 million years. A vorn is equal to 83 years, which is oddly specific if you ask me, but now you know! Huffer, of course, wants to know how all this nonsense is possible, and just what the hell Fusion’s deal is.

Huffer’s not one for mystical bullshit.

Being a bit short on time, Fusion has Huffer look through a window at a meeting with all the bigwigs. They’re discussing Huffer’s Ark designs, and just who exactly is going to man this thing once it’s ready. Emirate Xaaron suggests that Huffer come along, and strikes just the cutest little pose while he does.

Seriously, look at this, he’s precious, even with his funky grate mouth.

Nobody can mistake Huffer as being inexperienced or stupid, but the problem is nobody friggin’ likes him. Huffer, of course, takes issue with that, grumbling to himself and completely missing Fusion’s departure. When he finally takes notice, his new guide is already in place: Grimlock. The star wipe makes a return, and they’re off to the next scene.

Meanwhile, back on the shuttle, Bluestreak’s having some trouble with maneuvering around all these asteroids. Hopefully they’ll be okay until Huffer’s done with his Christmas special shenanigans.

Huffer and Grimlock arrive at Earthbase in the present day, in the middle of a rip-roaring good party.

Dammit, who let Cosmos into the booze? You know he can’t hold his liquor.

Everyone hates Huffer so fucking much, and I honestly can’t fault them for that. He’s kind of a festering wound of a person.

Grimlock disappears while Huffer’s busy watching everyone’s testament to their dislike for him. Huffer star-wipes out onto the next scene, interrupting him before he can say the fuck-word.

Back with Bluestreak, he’s nearly gotten them out of the asteroid field.

Huffer appears on what might be a moon, and meets his final guide.

Fuck, he’s become aware of the narrative! Shut the comic down, quick, before another Swearth happens!

Our ghost reveals himself to be Huffer, roughly 200 years in the future, and he’s looking ROUGH.

Oh no, he’s dehydrated.

Because he never learned to act like a decent person, the shuttle crew is going to dump him on a uninhabited moon in a couple weeks time, and then that’ll be it.

And then we get into the character study portion of the comic.

Huffer only bitches as much as he does because he’s self-conscious and doesn’t want to let people in, for fear that they’ll see what a useless hunk of junk he is.

Of course, current Huffer still can’t get over himself- even when it’s just he, himself, and him- and has to continue poking holes in this revelation, claiming it to be no more than a dream that’s presenting him with a fundamental personal truth in an easy-to-swallow pill.

These couple of panels are very dialogue-heavy, taking up a majority of the space available, but in the end, Huffer’s last little biting remark is that none of this is real and none of it matters, so just get it over with and send me back. Which Ghost-Huffer does.

Back at the shuttle, they’ve cleared the asteroid field, and it looks like it’ll be smooth sailing from here on. Huffer wakes up, in just a foul a mood as ever, as he stews over all the horrible things he heard about himself during his dreams. It looks like he’s about to return to status-quo, perhaps dooming himself to the fate of Ghost-Huffer, when he overhears Prowl chewing out the rest of the crew. Because no one had bothered to watch the radar, thus nearly killing everyone, he’s going to start tightening his belt and imposing some rules and regulations, as opposed to letting people do whatever they please. He names Nightbeat as his second-in-command, which everyone seems okay with (except Kup, for whatever reason).

Just something about this interaction Roberts really enjoys, I guess.

As part of this little crackdown, Prowl’s ordering a round-the-clock manning of the shuttle- half-day shifts. There’s quite a bit of groaning about this, but honestly? I’m not exactly sure how they’ve gotten away with not doing this for as long as they have.

Huffer, in a show of what I assume is the closest thing to kindness he’s performed in years, offers to take the first shift. Nobody fights him on that, and he takes a seat. In the background, Kup asks to have a word with Prowl.

Huffer decides that he ought to lighten up, just a touch, and maybe at least consider not being such a massive jerk.

That decision lasts roughly twenty seconds, and then he gets bored.

Personal growth is for suckers! IDW Whirl WISHES he was this disconnected from his own conscience.

As he runs off to go be a jackass elsewhere, the shuttle drifts back towards the asteroid field, surely dooming everyone aboard. The end!

This was a fun, somewhat bitter little story that tried its hand at picking apart a narrative that’s been run into the ground. Sorry, Roberts, but nobody’s gonna do it better than A Muppet’s Christmas Carol.

Up next, we’ll be looking at something a little different. Something not written by Roberts, but based on his work.

We’re going to read Eugenesis fanfiction.

#transformers #jro #everyday is like sunday #maccadam #Hannzreads #text post #long post #comic script writing

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konnosaya · 5 years

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A Tale of Tree-mendous Terror!

One night, a couple years back, my truck broke down just outside of a run-down junk yard that overflowed with rusted out beaters and used up engine blocks. As the rain began to fall, I quickly hustled over to a run-down shack where the “Office” sign hung from a board with cracked paint and weathered wood. As I pounded on the door, there was no movement inside nor sign of life. Seeing as I was just looking for a battery to jump start my truck, I figured I could jump the fence, grab a spare battery and jump my, truck and then return the battery with a couple bucks slipped under the door. Easy enough, right? I hopped the fence and kept my eyes peeled for any dogs or other surveillance, but there was nothing to be seen. I slowly walked around until I discovered a battery sitting in the backseat of an old Chevy pickup truck that had seen far better days. I cracked the door open when something fell from front seat of the truck and landed right in the mud at my feet. I bent over and picked up what was an old notebook. It sent a small shock through my fingertips, up my arms and down my spine as I touched it. It was crusty and strange, and had numbers and addresses written all over it. The rain picked up even harder so I hopped in the front seat of the Chevy, hoping to stay dry for a bit. As the rain pounded on the windshield, I looked down and realized I was still holding the notebook and that it had opened on my lap. I began reading the scribbled addresses that sprawled across the coffee stained pages. Mrs. Jones 44 Carolina Ave, 2 Spruce trees, $200. Pete 4534 Elmwood, 1 Maple, $400. With nothing else to do, I kept flipping through the pages of the notebook. I remembered keeping a notebook like this when I first started my tree service, so it was amusing to go through and see someone else’s work laid out in front of me. As I slowly turned the pages, I noticed the writing was becoming more and more erratic. Eventually the pages only contained a a single scratchy line of ink that stretched from page to page to page until finally developing into an illustration of the roots of an enormous tree spread out over two pages. The tree was super detailed with deep bark, long limbs, and an ominous broken top that gazed back at me with jagged broken fibers sticking skyward like the teeth of an evil demon. As I studied the tree illustration, a crack of lightning lit up the sky and enveloped the area with the roar of thunder! As I looked up from the lightning crack, I swore I saw a quick flash of a massive silhouette of a tree with long limbs that reached out toward me and my old Chevy. But after sitting in the amber glow of the cab light, I wondered if it was just my imagination getting the best of me.

That’s when it happened.

With a thunderous smash, something hit the hood of the truck! I looked out the shattered windshield to see Oak leaves slowly sliding down onto my hood. Now this is where it gets strange, as the leaves slid down off the windshield they also lifted up into the air. That’s not how gravity works! I jumped out of the truck to see what was going on and to make sure my eyes weren’t deceiving me! I wiped the beating rain from my face and looked up at the behemoth in front of me. It was a massive Oak tree that was swaying its long reaching limbs in the vicious winds that whipped at my skin. The rain was pelting me in the face and the eyes, but I could make out all the parts of the tree from the glow of the shack’s light. It was peculiar how the tree moved as if the wind wasn’t moving the limbs move but instead, they had a life of their own. I began to see jagged cuts and scars that had been made on this beast of a tree. Big stub cuts had been left four feet out from the trunk, which had now grown into giant clubs of snarled sucker growth. Some of the long limbs had been incorrectly stubbed off as well, leaving long medieval looking clubs ready for battle. Multiple scars ran down the trunk of the tree where some inexperienced climber had kicked out in their spurs leaving deep gashes in the bark that made the tree look like a wounded soldier ready for more war. This tree had been through a battle with some hack tree trimmers once or twice. That’s when the next scary thing happened. As I stood in the rain staring at this monster looming over me, a giant bolt of lightning lit up the junkyard. It made my high-vis Bartlett shirt glow in the immense light. That’s when the tree really started to move! I know it sounds crazy but it was almost like the tree saw that my shirt had “arborist” on it and came alive! One of the tree’s large clubbed branches swung down and crushed the rest of the Chevy I had just been sitting in. Another limb took a swing and the truck was thrown across the parking area like a cat toy. I couldn’t believe my eyes! Just then I saw a cable in the tree that had been installed way too low. It snapped right in the middle and swung wildly back and forth lashing out at me like an evil whip. It ripped across the roof of the office, ripping sheet metal from the roof and throwing it into the air. The tree lurched forward, almost as if being pushed forward by hurricane-force winds. As the tree leaned, one of its clubbed arms swung forward, using the many suckers to trip me up as I tried to run. The large limb slowly pushed against my body, trapping me to the ground. I could feel the air being pushed out of me as the mud and water started to flow down the back of my shirt and into my pants. I thought this was the end!

The tree leaned further and further forward until all of its mass was directly over me. The top of the tree was full of jagged, splintered fibers that looked like a grin, which began moving toward my face. The fibers slowly flexed back and forth like the jaws of a shark or dragon getting ready to bite down on its helpless prey. As the hollow, massive mouth and throat of the tree moved closer to me, I spotted broken and frayed climb lines dangling from branches like flesh hanging out of the mouth of a rabid beast. Inside the throat I could make out spurs that had been bent and crushed--still holding leg bones and dried leather boots! Deep in the throat laid a shirt with dark crimson stains on it that read “I hugged it first.” This tree was a killer! I screamed for help to no avail, I was trapped and the tree just kept moving its splintered fibers closer and closer to my face. Rain was in my eyes and it was hard to see. I choked from the onslaught of never-ending rain that now poured straight into my face. Surely this tree was going to crush me into the ground and then slowly ingest me either through its rows of jagged splintered teeth or up through its roots once it pushed me into the ground with its enormous weight. Out of the corner of my rain drenched eyes I caught a fluttering movement next to my head. I could see the white light of unconsciousness slowly creeping into my peripheral vision. I turned my head to see the crusty old notebook I had been reading earlier laying open in the mud. The page was no longer on the drawing of the tree, but on a page with just a few words scrawled across the parchment. The words looked as if they were written in blood, seeing as the ink ran a dark red as the rain splattered the letters. I squinted my eyes to see what the words were before the water washed them away. I slowly made out

“SHOW THE TREE RESPECT

tell the Tree what you are and will be set free.”

I had no idea what this was supposed to mean but as the tree leaned harder on my chest I had no other choice but to try.

I yelled to the massive tree, “Your limbs are enormous and capable of reaching towards the gods. Your trunk can withstand any wind the earth throws your way. Your vigor is so great that any harm humans show towards you is covered with bark and mass. You are a great and majestic tree!”

I could feel a small tremble throughout the limbs as the last word came out of my lips. I felt a bit of reprieve from the never-ending weight of the tree. Maybe it worked?!?! Just as the thought crossed my mind the tree shuddered again and pushed harder than ever upon my chest. I could hear ribs cracking and the pressure in my head was building. Slowly the tree pushed harder and harder until I could take no more. The sweet white light of unconsciousness was creeping ever closer to the center of my vision. This was it. The tree was going to crush me into the earth.

With the last bit of air that was held deep within my lungs, I uttered not much more than a whisper, “I’m a Certified Arborist” and let the white light pass over my vision before everything faded to black.

Slowly I opened my eyes to bright sunlight filtering through the leaves of a large tree that stood over top of me. My chest ached and my head pounded, but I was alive! I definitely looked worse for the wear. My body was covered in mud and leaves and my clothes were soaked, but the warm sunshine felt good against my skin. I tried to search through the fog of memories that floated through my head but couldn’t make sense of what had happened the night before. I slowly stood up and took in everything that was around me. I was in the middle of some sort of junkyard. It had rained the night before. My battery had died. That’s when I saw the shadow that sprawled out before me on the dirt lot. I spun around with fear in my throat, ready to run from the beast that had tried to crush me the night before!

What stood before me was a majestic Oak tree that once long ago had been full of life and had stood tall above the other trees in the area. Now its limbs were overgrown with epicormic growth, and the top was a jagged stub from being topped and having the shoots break off from weak attachments. This tree was once a sentinel that stood tall over the neighborhood, but now it’s stunted and haggard growth was an eyesore to all those that used to bask in its beauty.

This is the story of what happens when uneducated hacks come knocking on doors, promising the cheapest price around and destroy beautiful trees with bad pruning practices. This tree is a warning to all those that dare spike their prunes, to all those that leave hideous stubs instead of proper pruning cuts, this tree is a warning to everyone that tops trees. The trees will come looking for you and hopefully you know the right things to say and the right things to do when they do!

Happy Halloween and hopefully you get as much of a laugh out of this as we did!

Written by Certified Arborist, Jake Carufel

source https://www.bartlettman.com/A-Tale-of-Tree-mendous-Terror_b_1180.html

#tree #climbing #arborist #rock climbing

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clashofthekhaleesi · 5 years

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