Transformers vs. Visionaries

The sequel to First Strike, Transformers vs Visionaries picks up from the finale of First Strike and focuses on the Cybertronians dealing with magical organic refugees in the underground of their planet while introducing the Visionaries into the Hasbro Comic Universe.

And things go from bad to worse when it's found that Prysmosian magic has necrotic symptoms on Cybertronian systems and metal.

Tropes used in Transformers vs. Visionaries include:

• Adaptational Villainy: Continuing on from First Strike, Merklynn is a Complete Monster who not only caused Prysmos to revert to a feudal state but he's 100% on board with a complete Cybertronian genocide because he's disgusted at the thought of sentient mechanical lifeforms.
• All for Nothing: As Merklynn bitterly reflects, it didn't matter that he failed. Unicron is coming.
• An Arm and a Leg: Breakdown loses his right arm to a portion of Talisman energy.
• Butt Monkey: Waspinator of course.
• Days of Future Past: Merklynn's goal. To wipe away all technology and restore magic on a galaxy wide scale.
• Death by Adaptation: Darkstorm didn't make it off Prysmos in time.
• Depending on the Writer:
  • Merklynn himself. He's an absolute monster but his nature is jossed heavily. Revolutionaries paints "Kreiger" as something of a Pragmatic Villainy who mainly saw the Tailsman as a source of profit (we can write this off as the details of his true nature not yet being finalized). First Strike made him a Visionary Villain (no pun intended) with a god complex. This series has him as a sadistic and spiteful Evil Is Petty Well-Intentioned Extremist.
  • New Prysmos. First Strike has its forcefield being created to keep the Cybertronians out, while this series treats it as something the Cybertronians established to keep the Prysmosians in. This is probably due to the series being written before the details of First Strike‍'‍s finale were sorted out.
• Easily Forgiven: Leoric welcomes back all the defected Spectral Knights noting he's guilty of abandoning them.
• Fantastic Racism: The Cybertronians look down on the Prysmosians for being organic while the Prysmosians don't view the Cybertronians as alive.
• Freudian Excuse: All Prysmosian technology was rendered inactive by the Trinary Re-Alignment causing them to hold all technology, even the Cybertronians, in contempt.
• Green-Eyed Monster: In the opening of issue 3, Virulina is openly outraged that Cybertron has a galaxy-spanning society.
• Hostile Terraforming: The Talisman's energy is transforming the Cybertronian caverns around New Prysmos into Prysmosian rock while the device itself is burrowing down to Vector Sigma. In the end, Cybertron grants the Prysmosians 100 square feet of land for their colony.
• It's All About Me: Merklynn sent his people back to a feudal state all because he wasn't being worshipped for his magical power.
• Just a Machine: Most Prysmosians regard the Cybertronians as "animate horse chariots".
• Karma Houdini: Virulina doesn't face any huge consequences for her actions.
• The Magic Comes Back: Merklynn tries to do this but the Cybertronians will be having none of it.
• Magic Is Evil: Considering that it's being used to enact a Cybertronian genocide for petty reasons, yeah it's pretty vile.
• Magic Versus Science: The central conflict. Prysmosian magic is extremely corrosive to technology, even living technology like Cybertronians. Wheeljack eventually finds that all magic leading to this exact same result is hugely suspicious and does an in-depth analysis, finding a way to neutralize its baseline frequency. Eventually this technology is mass-produced to neuter Merklynn.
• Moral Myopia: The Prysmosians view the Cybertronians as tyrants for oppressing them and forcing them to live by their rules. Never mind the fact that New Prysmos is on Cybertron and the Prysmosians invaded the planet. As Ironhide points out, they should be grateful they're getting anything.
• Mythology Gag:
  • The three suns of Prysmos aligning and disabling all technology. Unlike the original comic and cartoon, Merklynn caused this alignment.
  • After Waspinator is mutated by magic, he becomes a visual composite between himself and Thrust.
  • The Prysmosians worship the goddess Heskedor, a minor character from the original cartoon. Leoric later mentions the old capital of  Valorak.
• Not So Different:
  • Kup and Leoric realize this with regards to Cybertronians and Prysmosians. The former eventually learned from their civil war and mistakes while the latter never got the chance since they lost their planet.
  • Even worse with Merklynn. He views Cybertronians as abominations who are unworthy of life and seeks to remake their world into one perfect for his kind. Take a wild guess how the Decepticons viewed organics like Merklynn.
• Reality Ensues: With resources for them being scarce, the Visionaries have ditched their Middle Ages style armor for a more steampunk barbarian style.
• Spanner in the Works: Merklynn's entire plan is derailed by Galadria casting a largely unused healing spell to try and save Ironhide's life.
• Sufficiently Analyzed Magic: Wheeljack's analysis of magic reveals it to be basically gamma radiation but with all sorts of variances riding it like system code on a carrier wave.
• Taking the Bullet: When Virulina tries to kill Ironhide, Kup takes the attack and dies.
• Utopia Justifies the Means: Merklynn's justification for everything he does. So what if the Cybertronians will be extinct? At least Prysmos will come back.
• The Worf Effect: Quickswitch, established as a dangerously powerful Autobot in the 1980s, dies in the issue that introduces him to display the effects of Talisman magic.