Bumblebee is isolated and pursued by a group of Decepticons.

Synopsis[]

Shockwave intends to capture the Autobot Bumblebee and install a device that will make Bumblebee his slave. Shockwave's plans are made even simpler when Bumblebee decides to abandon the Autobots, feeling that they would be better off without him. Bumblebee is quickly located and attacked, and in his attempts to escape, is "picked up" by a couple of car thieves that think a Volkswagen Beetle is a better choice for car stealing than any of the other vehicles in the yard in which Bumblebee is hiding. Bumblebee goes along with the theft, actually enjoying the ability to show off his better-than-average driving abilities, but is soon rediscovered by the Decepticons. Prepared to sacrifice himself (and fellow Autobot Jetfire) to save his new human friends, Bumblebee is saved at the last moment by the arrival of Optimus Prime and a convoy of Autobots.

Credits[]

Script: Len Kaminski
Pencils: Graham Nolan
Inks: Tom Morgan
Colors: Nelson Yomtov
Lettering: Bill Oakley
Editor: Michael Carlin

• Originally published: May, 1986

Major characters[]

(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

Errors[]

• "Laserbeak" is consistently misspelled as "Lazerbeak", and his colors are consistently those of Buzzsaw.
• "Volkswagen" is repeatedly misspelled as "Volkswagon".
• As Bumblebee leaves the Autobots, he passes a sign on which Mount St. Hilary is misspelled "Hillary".
• The cover bears the blurb, "Bumblebee's last stand!" Actually, he had lots more stands after this one.

Items of note[]

• This is the first issue not written by Bob Budiansky since Budiansky started writing the US Marvel series with Issue #5.
• Comic book writer Peter David stated in an interview that he originally turned in a draft for this fill-in-story featuring Bumblebee, but the script was somehow lost, so Marvel commissioned this issue to take its place instead.
• This issue was reprinted as issue 4 of IDW Publishing's Generations series.
• There's an online game on Hasbro.com called "Flight of the Bumblebee" based on the live-action movies.
• On the first page, the schematics of Bumblebee that Shockwave examines are based on his toy, not his comic book design.
• The issue's title is a pun on the famous piece of music, Flight of the Bumblebee.
• It's nearly impossible to tell whether the non-Starscream jet is Thundercracker or Skywarp. He is never named, and both their Marvel Color models were solid dark blue, though the lack of red stripes on his wings tips the odds towards Skywarp.
• Laserbeak and Buzzsaw's presence in this issue raises interesting questions, explored further in the notes for "The Bridge to Nowhere!".
• In the Transformers movie game (2007), one of the chapters playing as the Decepticons is called "Plight of the Bumblebee".

Covers (3)[]

UK 57 cover

UK 58 cover

US 16 cover

• U.S. cover: Bumblebee attacked by the Decepticons by Herb Trimpe
• UK issue 57 cover: Shockwave examining Bumblebee's schematics by John Stokes
• UK issue 58 cover: reuse of art from U.S. cover with some judicious editing

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