The Secret of the Space Warp

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Planet Terry in The Secret of the Space Warp
Publisher	Marvel Comics
Published in	The Transformers issue 24
First published	10th August, 1985
Writer	Lennie Herman
Pencils	Warren Kremer
Inks	Jon D'Agostino
Colours	Peter Kremer
Letterer	Grace Kremer
Editor	Sid Jacobson
Executive editor	Tom DeFalco
Editor-in-chief	Jim Shooter

"The Space Warp is discovered! Has Terry finally found his parents?"

Synopsis

Having spent years of his life looking for parents he has never known, Planet Terry has stumbled across his most hopeful lead yet. After having crashed his ship on Gorkel – and following a diversion in which he had to rescue the Gorkels' princess – he has been informed that among the many derelict rockets that litter the planet is the wreck of his father's ship, the Space Warp. Princess Ugly explains that the ship crash-landed there years ago with no-one on board, and the simple Gorkels were too afraid of its advanced technology to approach it.

Terry has no such fear and, with his friends Robota and Omnus shifting the heavy debris, ventures onto the ship on which he was born. Soon, they uncover the Space Warp's video log; though the video component has been damaged by age, the audio allows an overwhelmed Terry to hear his father's voice for the first time. The final log reveals that the Space Warp was once under attack by alien forces, and its crew were forced to abandon ship for the nearest hospitable world, Planetoid 17-Z.

Outside, Terry solemnly explains to Princess Ugly that he has to journey to 17-Z to find his parents... if they're still alive after all this time. Robota interrupts the two of them with a huff that they better get going, eliciting a sly smile out of Omnus. The fearsome alien leads the charge to Terry's ship, determined that no-one will get in their way. Princess Ugly sheds a single tear and wishes for Terry's safe return.

Terry plots a course for 17-Z, his special pilotting earning him a kiss on the cheek from Robota. Omnus gets a rise out of her by reminding her of Princess Ugly's play for Terry's affections. Terry splits up their squabbling and navigates to 17-Z. They find no signs of life... until Terry catches sight of a pair of squirrelly aliens, who hightail it. Terry chases after them and tries to convince them that they are friendly visitors. A decidedly less friendly presence crests the hill in front of them, growling intimidatingly and bearing its jagged teeth!

Featured characters

Planet Terry's crew	Antagonists	Incidentals
Planet Terry Robota Omnus	Devourer	Princess Ugly Wise One Gorkels Terry's dad (voice recording) Two Chippas

Quotes

Robota: "You're my hero, Terry!" (she kisses him on the cheek)
Omnus: "I don't think Princess Ugly would like that, tin miss!
Robota: "Well, Princess Ugly can just take a long walk on a short planet!"
Omnus: "Haw haw!"

Notes

Planet Terry issue 3 on Marvel Database, an external wiki

Original printing

• Planet Terry issue 3, 26 February 1985

Transformation refers to this story simply as "The Secret Of The Space Warp"; the next issue implies it to be a fifth part of "The Saga of Princess Ugly".

For the purpose of wrapping Planet Terry up as quickly as possible before The Transformers relaunches as a full-colour weekly with issue 27, this version of "The Secret of the Space Warp" is edited substantially to race through most of Planet Terry issue 3, abridging not only its story of the same name but also the same issue's "Deadly Games" and the first half of "Found". See below...

Edits

In Planet Terry, the journey from the opening page with the Space Warp to the point where Terry is attacked by the Devourer takes 19 pages. Here in TFUK, it happens across five. So with 14 pages excised, it's probably more straightforward to break down what actually is printed in this abridged strip. Note that only the fifth page retains its colour, with the rest in black and white.

• Page 1: The first page of "The Secret of the Space Warp", with the only edit being to change Peter Kremer's "colors" credit to "colours".
• Page 2: The second page of "The Secret of the Space Warp" with no notable edits.
• Page 3: Six panels from the third page of "The Secret of the Space Warp". The seventh panel, of Princess Ugly and the Gorkels waving as Terry's ship taxies before taking off, is replaced by a similar panel of Princess Ugly shedding a single tear at the ship launching, taken from the start of the fourth page of "The Secret of the Space Warp".
• Page 4:
  • The first two panels are the second and third panel from the fourth page of "The Secret of the Space Warp"; Terry has newly lettered dialogue here regarding his "special Planet Terry pilotting", replacing a gag about Planetoid 17-Z being in uncharted space and thus requiring uncharts.
  • The rest of the page is comprised of the third to final panels from the third page of "Found". Terry and Robota receive newly lettered dialogue about Terry's determination to navigate them to 17-Z, whereas in the original, Robota was giving him a kiss on the cheek for saving them from being the playthings of the deadly Gamesfolk.
• Page 5: This is the complete fourth page of "Found". The reveal of the Devourer, which had escaped from a trial of the Gamesfolk in "Deadly Games", is repurposed here into a cliffhanger, necessitating the addition of a "[Autobot symbol] NEXT:" box.

Artwork and technical errors

• Warren Kremer's credit is listed as "penciler", rather than "penciller".
• Marvel UK's lettering on the fourth page refers to the planetoid as "17Z", omitting the hyphen.
• "Pilotting" is a misspelling of "piloting", if you're a pedant or prescriptivist.

Continuity errors

• If the Gorkels are so frightened of advanced technology, how were they able to fix Terry's ship in "The Doom of the Domed City"?
• Unlike previous instalments, none of the "mums" are edited into "moms" in this issue. This is less of a big deal in dialogue, but Terry's signed photo frame has flip-flopped between spellings, reading "Mom & Dad" in "A Clue", "Mum & Dad" in "The Saga of Princess Ugly", and "Mom & Dad" again here.

Continuity notes

• The opening narration of this page reveals that the "world of the Gorkels" is also called Gorkel.
• The Chippas are named as such by Terry in Planet Terry issue 4. 

Other notes

• As with background aliens from other stories, at least one of the Chippas goes on to appear in the 2009-2010 miniseries X-Babies,  specifically the second issue.