Galvatron's Air Attack



Galvatron's Air Attack is the fifth in the Ladybird Books series of Transformers storybooks.

Written by: John Grant Illustrated by: Richard Dunn


 * Cast (in order of appearance): Ratchet, Hot Rod, Wheeljack, Ultra Magnus, Kup, Hoist, Grapple, Spike Witwicky, Starscream, Thrust, Cyclonus, Scourge, Dirge, Silverbolt, Galvatron, Slingshot, Skydive, Fireflight, Air Raid, Superion, Soundwave, Cosmos, Hound, Swerve, Blitzwing

Summary
Supplies of Cybertronian materials like cybernite necessary to repair damaged Autobots are running low in the city of Metroplex, and the Autobots are unable to return to Cybertron to replenish them. Kup recalls a battle fought in a valley on Earth that left wreckage strewn all around, and with Ultra Magnus’s permission, leads a squad to investigate, hoping to find any useful materials. While searching, however, they are attacked by a squad of Decepticon jets, but manage to force them back by firing upon them from the narrowest portion of the gorge, with the flying Decepticons cannot reach.

Concerned as to how the Decepticons became aware of their movements, Ultra Magnus has the Aerialbots investigate the possibility of a new Decepticon surveillance system. The team fail to locate anything from the air, and merge into Superion to gain even greater height. Reaching the fringes of space, the super robot picks up a faint radar signal - the Aerialbots have just discovered Decepticon Space Station Argon, one of three Decepticon spy satellites able to view the entire Earth at once.



Ten hours later, Soundwave complete and activates the station’s refraction shield to conceal it from prying Autobot eyes, specifically those of Cosmos, who has been dispatched into space to investigate. Cosmos does, however, detect the radio transmissions running between the stations and the Decepticon base. Use Cosmos’s recordings, Hound is able to deduce what the villains are up to, and Kup and Spike put together a plan to stop them.

After ten days of construction work, the Autobots complete an electrical transmit that unleashes a megavolt charge into the atmosphere, generating a display of Northern Lights that blows out the Decepticons’ radio transmissions. Hound poses and Soundwave and sends transmissions to space stations Argon, Krypton and Xenon, instructing them to relocate to new co-ordinates. Galvatron can only watch as the three space stations, invisible to each other due to their refraction shields, collide and explode, raining down all the Cybertronian materials the Autobots will need for a long time.

Errors

 * Kup speaks of a battle on Earth that he participated in when he was a “young Autobot,” which really doesn’t make any sense at all.


 * As in previous Ladybird books, the Autobots place a heavy emphasis on keeping their existence secret from humans, to the extent that they only leave to conduct their search of the valley after dark. And yet... they’re now living in Metroplex. A Transformer city isn’t going to draw some attention?

Items of note

 * Beginning with this book, Optimus Prime and Megatron are replaced as leaders of their respective factions by Ultra Magnus and Galvatron. While the story itself occurs when they are already established as commanders, the introductory blurb prior to the title page explain this shift in command with the following:


 * "Leaders come and go. Galvatron travels back from the 21st century to take over from Megatron, commander of the Decepticons. Then the strange disappearance of Optimus Prime leaves the Autobots without a leader, and Ultra Magnus arrives from Cybertron to take his place, as the Autobots’ new commander."


 * These events are taken from the early stages of the Marvel UK serial, Target 2006. Things were back to normal by the time that story ended, of course, but that doesn’t seem to have happened in the Ladybird universe. Note, however, that no explanation is offered for where the other new post-1984 characters come from, having not appeared in any of the previous books.