Transformers Legacy toyline

[Shadewing]

I'd say that Skybound does it properly. One, they're not flooding the market with concepts and titles.
Two, because of this they've just focused on Transformers and GI Joe (as far as Hasbro properties go, I know there's also original IP in the Energon Universe).
Three, because the focus is just on those two, each can tell its own story. You don't need to read the GI Joe stuff to follow the Transformers ongoing. It's there. They do tie in now and then, but you can skip all the GI Joe comics and still fully follow the Transformers stuff.
IDW tied so many things together and tried to make so many things interconnected and relevant and it's like... if you're just there for Transformers then no you don't care about the Space Knights or Matt Tracker's vigilante urban infrastructure repair crew (I'm not kidding) and the rest is just unwanted noise.

The era of big event crossovers in comics really did a number on "shared universes" because Marvel and DC kept pumping out mega crossover events to the point that they lost all meaning and the comic industry is, ultimately, one of follow the leader(s).

The reality is that the best way to handle a shared universe is just let different titles exist in the same fictional world but let them do their own things. Have an overall editor to make sure there aren't any huge contradictions across multiple creative teams, but let each title just exist and tell its own story, with a few connective bits here and there for the people who dig that thing.

This is especially true where Hasbro is concerned. The list of potential IPs for a shared universe is long, but it's a mile wide and an inch deep. Most of these IPs- Visionaries, Rom, MASK- are dead brands that can't be revived just by welding them to Transformers.

If you're going to do a shaded Hasbro universe then you need to start small. Transformers (their most viable and visible brand) and GI Joe (struggling but probably #2 by default) are the best choices. And just let them grow on their own.

And MAYBE, if things break right, you try a Rom comic down the line or something, and see how that does as a self-contained story before having him meet Optimus Prime.

I could pretty easily see Rom working with Void Rivals and the Space stuff if done right. Set up the Space Knights as something like the Green Lanterns or Nova Corps; and them be kinda law enforcement for space. Have them slowly get pulled into things through other missions they are on. Like maybe ROM is investigating Skuxxoid's dealings, which leads him to the VR main characters which also ends up leading him to Springer and eventually Hot Rod.


Heck, with Cobra-La being a thing, I could see them maybe working in Inhumanoids or Visionaries and saying Cobra-La is part of that, like a rogue faction or something. Not saying I would want it; just that I think Cobra-La could be a natural door to introducing one or both of them with out them feeling out of left feild or too forced.

 

[Sabrblade]

Matt Tracker's vigilante urban infrastructure repair crew (I'm not kidding)

V.U.I.R.C.?

 

[LordGigaIce]

V.U.I.R.C.?

Someone get ToyHax on it.

I could pretty easily see Rom working with Void Rivals and the Space stuff if done right. Set up the Space Knights as something like the Green Lanterns or Nova Corps; and them be kinda law enforcement for space. Have them slowly get pulled into things through other missions they are on. Like maybe ROM is investigating Skuxxoid's dealings, which leads him to the VR main characters which also ends up leading him to Springer and eventually Hot Rod.


Heck, with Cobra-La being a thing, I could see them maybe working in Inhumanoids or Visionaries and saying Cobra-La is part of that, like a rogue faction or something. Not saying I would want it; just that I think Cobra-La could be a natural door to introducing one or both of them with out them feeling out of left feild or too forced.

I agree with all of this.... I'd just like to see them take their time. IDW pushed the Revolution-verse out at once and in retrospect there were too many IPs not enough people cared about.
I think making Visionaries or Inhumanoids or Rom and the Space Knights work would require it taking time, and rolling them out slowly to let them feel established first.

 

[unluckiness]

Late stage IDW was when it became very apparent that somebody at the company desperately needed to tell the writers no.

 

[Sabrblade]

Maybe after the failure of Unit:E and the Aligned continuity Rik Alvarez snuck into the backdoor of IDW and clandestinely planted the idea of Revolution into everyone's minds there, just so he could finally get his stealth M.A.S.K comeback one way or another.

 

[Shadewing]

I agree with all of this.... I'd just like to see them take their time. IDW pushed the Revolution-verse out at once and in retrospect there were too many IPs not enough people cared about.
I think making Visionaries or Inhumanoids or Rom and the Space Knights work would require it taking time, and rolling them out slowly to let them feel established first.

Oh I agree it needs to be a slow and staggered release, just that unlike IDW, I can see how these properties could get folded in without feeling forced. IDW's TF and Joe books were completely seperate, till they decided to do this shared world. Then they also forced everything else in. But with EU, you have things like Skuxxoid and his black market-esque dealings, and secret underground society that is very anti-tech and otherworldly. Both of which can be doors to intro other stuff, it jsut feels like there is natural room for things to slot in if they wanted to use them. It could be interesting seeing Cobra-La as part of Inhumanoids lore considering how monsterous some of them can look.

 

[lastmaximal]

Maybe after the failure of Unit:E and the Aligned continuity Rik Alvarez snuck into the backdoor of IDW and clandestinely planted the idea of Revolution into everyone's minds there, just so he could finally get his stealth M.A.S.K comeback one way or another.

It stings because I really really wanted a MASK comeback. But it always made more sense as something that could happen as a subset of GI Joe (an impression helped along by the Matt Trakker they did for 25th) rather than as one of many things they spun up out of nothing and then expected people to care about.

 

[Sabrblade]

It stings because I really really wanted a MASK comeback. But it always made more sense as something that could happen as a subset of GI Joe (an impression helped along by the Matt Trakker they did for 25th) rather than as one of many things they spun up out of nothing and then expected people to care about.

It might sting more to hear that Alvarez's plans for MASK as a subset of Unit:E actually changed the acronym for seemingly no reason. Instead of the "Mobile Armored Strike Kommand", the were to have been the "Mechanically Advanced Secret Knights".

Or at least, that's what he claimed at one of his TFcon panels among many other bonkers claims pertaining to the Aligned continuity.

 

[lastmaximal]

Oh, that doesn't affect me at all. I've long known to try and keep Alvarez' ideas at arms' length. He might as well have come up with "Muscular Aardvark Saves Kalamazoo" and I'd be like of course he did.

That might actually be less dumb than this one.

 

[Shadewing]

Oh, that doesn't affect me at all. I've long known to try and keep Alvarez' ideas at arms' length. He might as well have come up with "Muscular Aardvark Saves Kalamazoo" and I'd be like of course he did.

That might actually be less dumb than this one.

It may be me, but how is Alvarez's one more dumb the forced original?

 

[lastmaximal]

I'll be honest, that was almost entirely facetious.

I mainly don't like the replacement, with an immediate distaste for it that isn't strictly rational. But here's my current entirely subjective best effort at pinning down why.

I mean, the idea alone that you have to go back and "fix" this thing so that it's cool enough to bring back, rather than just leaving it be this quirky inherited bit, is silly enough. The original is forced in order to spell MASK, but coming up with any new backronym is still conforming to the need to spell that word, so at most it'd be a lateral move. Just lampshade it and move on, maybe.

Mobile, armored, "strike c/kommand" - strong words that hearken to a military squad or strike force with special equipment (masks that are actually helmets) and vehicles (so they're mobile) in particular. The original's main flaw is kludging the spelling of Command so it fits.

Mechanically-advanced, secret knights - the first, compound word is too broad to speak to the specific brand or identity of this group, and can just as easily describe a theme park animatronic or a Rube Goldberg machine. "Secret" just about works; I don't think their agent work was public, since they had day jobs and ducked out to do MASK stuff. So it applies.

And Knights, well. I like knights as an aesthetic and it's a cool word, and "Mobile Armored Strike Knights" is perhaps a decent compromise, if only just to avoid the "Xtreme Kool Letterz" raps. But "Secret Knights" doesn't really click for me with MASK; the sudden swerve into metaphor seems like an attempt to make the first half of the name seem cooler than it is.

But all that's just me, and I'm the sort of weirdo who puts a bit of effort into working "aardvark" into a backronym.

 

[Sabrblade]

"Muscular Aardvark Saves Kalamazoo"

News at 11!

 

[LordGigaIce]

It may be me, but how is Alvarez's one more dumb the forced original?

I guess it's not any worse, but it's a totally unnecessary change.

 

[Undead Scottsman]

Revolution came out in 2016, in the middle of the MCU hypetrain when EVERYONE was chasing a shared universe. (And nearly every one crashed and burned)

I don't really see the Hasbroverse as anything more than an extension of that idea, IDW thinks people love seeing stuff they recognize cross over and thus they merge their TF books with their GI Joe book and then added in whatever else they could to try and goose sales, as well as get several more books out a month.

 

[Shadewing]

I'll be honest, that was almost entirely facetious.

I mainly don't like the replacement, with an immediate distaste for it that isn't strictly rational. But here's my current entirely subjective best effort at pinning down why.

I mean, the idea alone that you have to go back and "fix" this thing so that it's cool enough to bring back, rather than just leaving it be this quirky inherited bit, is silly enough. The original is forced in order to spell MASK, but coming up with any new backronym is still conforming to the need to spell that word, so at most it'd be a lateral move. Just lampshade it and move on, maybe.

Mobile, armored, "strike c/kommand" - strong words that hearken to a military squad or strike force with special equipment (masks that are actually helmets) and vehicles (so they're mobile) in particular. The original's main flaw is kludging the spelling of Command so it fits.

Mechanically-advanced, secret knights - the first, compound word is too broad to speak to the specific brand or identity of this group, and can just as easily describe a theme park animatronic or a Rube Goldberg machine. "Secret" just about works; I don't think their agent work was public, since they had day jobs and ducked out to do MASK stuff. So it applies.

And Knights, well. I like knights as an aesthetic and it's a cool word, and "Mobile Armored Strike Knights" is perhaps a decent compromise, if only just to avoid the "Xtreme Kool Letterz" raps. But "Secret Knights" doesn't really click for me with MASK; the sudden swerve into metaphor seems like an attempt to make the first half of the name seem cooler than it is.

But all that's just me, and I'm the sort of weirdo who puts a bit of effort into working "aardvark" into a backronym.

And to me, as long as its two factions of people in vehicles the change from one form to another, that wear teched out masks/helmets... then what does it matter what works make up MASK? Personally I do agree 'Knight' works better since in the broad sense you have "mounted" armored warriors, just those mounts are vehicles and not animals. But I feel Armored is kinda redundant with "knight" there.

 

[Sabrblade]

And the theme song did refer to them as "crusaders".

Spoiler

Batman/MASK crossover comic story when?

 

[LordGigaIce]

I don't really see the Hasbroverse as anything more than an extension of that idea, IDW thinks people love seeing stuff they recognize cross over and thus they merge their TF books with their GI Joe book and then added in whatever else they could to try and goose sales, as well as get several more books out a month.

The reasoning was sound.
"Hasbro has these properties why not do a shared universe?"

Problem was, as I said earlier, Hasbro's IP list is deep on paper, less so in reality. Transformers and MAYBE GI Joe are the only ones with any pop culture currency. They hadn't even bought Power Ranger yet.

So the result was IDW trying to use Transformers to revive a bunch of brands no one cared about. You can't just say "oh yeah MASK exists in the same universe as Optimus Prime, here's Matt Tracker making an off hand reference to him" and expect people to care.
Revolution hinged on Transformers' pop culture relevancy and the fanbase of their Transformers comics being enough to carry a bunch of IPs that hadn't had much of anything since the 80s. And that's one of many wrong ways to establish a shared universe. You can't bluff your way into making something with nothing popular.

I don't think the idea of a "Hasbro universe" is a bad one, but it's going to take a slow build, which is why I'm cautiously optimistic about Skybound's approach.

 

[Shadewing]

Your basically need to make people care. Conceptionally, I can see why you'd want to slot MASK into TF and Joe as an example, as its a mix of both. Two factions, humans with vehicles, vehicles that change form. But it doesn't matter if the characters or story isn't interesting. Though the other side of the coin is how do you make them stand out from the other group(s) of human heroes fighting wars with villianous organizations? Like I could maybe see VENOM as a rival organization to Cobra. I feel like the Destro mini kinda shows such a thing could be a possibility since we know there are other arms manufactures out there. Like some random country gets ahold of cybertronian tech or energon and doesn't want to play nice with Cobra. But MASK as an organization seems harder, without completely changing it.

Regardless, I feel like they would need to do exactly what they are doing with GIJoe to get other properties going, start with singular characters give them a story and build up from there without goinr right into everything established.

 

[lastmaximal]

It's always tricky having GI Joe and Transformers coexist in the same universe because the latter element escalates things immediately. It's hard to isolate and ignore it for the sake of telling GI Joe stories. They're the elephant in the room that always has to be acknowledged because why would a special military strike force not be deployed to deal with this sort of thing?

Unless you keep it to early stages of Infiltration protocol, and culminate with the GI Joes or Cobra or both stumbling upon the facsimiles used by the Decepticons. But from there the state of play has to change. Transformers becomes the Poochie of the world GI Joe inhabits.

Which isn't bad per se because there's plenty of stories to be told with that interaction, but it's a pervasive undercurrent for GI Joe stories that will have to be accounted for. Just shared universe things.

 

[Darth_Prime]

What if this is the Titan version? I’d pay $200.