Trivia / The Transformers: Robots in Disguise

• Author's Saving Throw: The series features a stab at addressing Arcee's controversial backstory from Scott Furman's previous run in the IDW Transformers canon, which stated that Arcee was subject to a forced sex change by a Mad Scientist as part of a curious effort (both in-universe and out) to "introduce gender" to Cybertronians, portrayed as a traumatic experience for Arcee that led to her instability and rage. Writer Mairghread Scott was an especially vocal opponent of the story, calling it out for framing any gender-blending as a shameful affliction, as well as implying that "women" as a concept is inherently aberrant, announcing preemptively that the writing team was making efforts to fix the story. In the series itself, Arcee is reworked as having been greatly insecure about her male identity before her transition (strongly implying she suffered from gender dysphoria), and that among the torturous experimentation she went through that fuelled her berserker past, her sex change was not part of it, as it was both willing and consensual. This bridged further changes in The Transformers: More than Meets the Eye that established female-coded Cybertronians as always having existed, and that Arcee would be considered transgender.
• Executive Meddling: The series dropped the Robots in Disguise subtitle starting in issue #35 in order not to be mistaken with the show of the same name.

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