Snow Fun!

« The Transformers (UK) #267 »
"Me Grimlock wonder where these humans are!"
"Snow Fun!"
Publisher	Marvel Comics
First published	21st April 1990
Cover date	28th April 1990
Writer	Simon Furman
Art	Jeff Anderson
Letters	Stuart Bartlett
Cover	John Marshall
Continuity	Marvel Comics continuity/Earthforce

Grimlock discovers what the date means...

Synopsis

1st April 1990. Grimlock is in the middle of a snowstorm, some three hundred and fifty miles to the east of the Earthforce shuttle. He has travelled all this way for a one-on-one fight with Shockwave who has challenged him. Grimlock is frustrated with the location and starts calling out for Shockwave to come and face him.

Nearby, the Predacons Razorclaw and Rampage are patrolling. Shockwave has sent them to try and find the Autobot shuttle but, personally, they feel, if the Autobots have landed in the wilderness, they are welcome to it.

Meanwhile, at the Autobot shuttle, the other four Dinobots still can't believe Grimlock fell for it. Slag created a computer simulation of Shockwave for the challenge to Grimlock, who the others felt needed to lighten up a bit after taking his role as Earthforce commander too seriously.

In the wilderness, Grimlock's mood gets even worse when he discovers a snowman of Shockwave and a sign saying "April Fool" signed by the other Dinobots. Razorclaw and Rampage see this and start laughing that Grimlock fell for it. Grimlock's mood finds new depths to sink to and he attacks them.

Later, the Dinobots are patrolling outside the shuttle, awaiting Grimlock's return, and start wondering if Grimlock has taken it the right way. But they console themselves that Grimlock has a great sense of humour... whilst Grimlock lifts up the largest snowball of all time...

Featured characters

(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

Quotes

"Aaahh! I hate this stuff!"

—Grimlock tries to punch some snow.

"C'mon - we'd better check out that sound. We miss 'em, he'll have our hides!"
"[Sigh] Get real, Razorclaw! I mean...what Autobot would be dumb enough to come out here?"

—Razorclaw and Rampage

Notes

Artwork and technical errors

• The scene of Grimlock fighting the Predacons has a bar across it saying "Censored".

Continuity errors

• TBD

Continuity notes

• The year is given as 1990, another clue to help or hinder attempts to work out where the Earthforce stories fit into continuity.

Real-life references

• TBD

Other trivia

• The issue came out three weeks after April Fools' Day.

Back-up material

• Additional Transformers story: "Blood on the Tracks"
• Other strips: G.I. Joe the Action Force - "Shuttle Complex" and Combat Colin Combat Kate
• AtoZ: Shrapnel and Sideswipe

Cover

• Issue #267 cover: Grimlock charges at some hunters, by John Marshall.

• 

  Issue #267

Reprints

• Transformers: Earthforce cover: Grimlock thumps a table — crop of the cover to UK issue #263, by Stephen Baskerville.
• Transformers: The Definitive G1 Collection: Volume 20: End of the Road: Bludgeon (art reused from Dreamwave's More than Meets the Eye profiles) above an interior scene of Grimlock punching through Fangry (from US issue #80), by Andrew Wildman.

• 

  Transformers: Earthforce
  (Titan Books, 2005)

• 

  The Definitive G1 Collection: Volume 20: End of the Road
  (Hachette Partworks, 2018)