Micronauts

In the latest of our galleries celebrating the best covers of the year, we're looking at the best covers from IDW. IDW maintained its impressive and diverse line of licensed properties in 2016, from Ninja Turtles to Little Ponies, as well as ambitiously expanding and collating its Hasbro properties under the "Revolution" banner, and reviving and reinventing the Micronauts, M.A.S.K., and Rom.

IDW's Revolution crossover might be coming to a close, but that doesn't mean that things are slowing down for the Hasbro properties that have all been thrown into the same universe. In March, the Revolutionaries are faced with Cobra Commander, the secrets behind the Mobile Armored Strike Kommand will finally be revealed, the crew of the Lost Light are trapped with no choice but to save the universe (again), and --- perhaps most importantly --- we're finally getting to see Art Baltazar and Franco do a story with Storm Shadow and Snake Eyes. That's right, y'all: Revolution is getting the Aw Yeah! treatment with a story where Micronauts foe Baron Karza reads a bunch of GI Joe comics and then finds out that Snake Eyes is very real. Check out all the IDW/Hasbro solicits for more information!

On November 9, 1951, one of the purest superhero comics writers of all time was born: William ‘Bill’ Mantlo. Best known for his work at Marvel, Mantlo was a talent whose persistence, hard work, and knack for character saw him rise up the ranks to take on a succession of Marvel’s most iconic superheroes --- and co-create several new icons in the process.

In all honesty, I don't know if there's anything going on in comics right now that's more exciting to me than IDW's Revolution event. It's the unification of most of the Hasbro properties into a single universe that finds the Transformers, GI Joe, ROM the Space Knight, MASK and more being thrown together into a unified story, and for someone like me, it's a pop cultural dream come true. But the one big question I've had since it was announced is "okay, but how's it going to work?" We have, after all, been assured that this wasn't a rebooting of the continuity for Transformers or GI Joe, but since one of those book is about giant robots from space coming to Earth and the other isn't, it seems like that would be something of a game-changer when it comes to world-building. But now, we have an exclusive video from IDW where John Barber, the editor and writer spearheading the new direction, explains it --- and it sounds pretty awesome.

The thing about doing comics based on toy properties is that eventually you're going to want to play with all the toys, and today, it looks like that's exactly what IDW has set out to do. After years of keeping them separated into their own universes --- with exceptions like the senses-shattering, soon-to-be-finished Transformers vs. GI Joe --- IDW is combining almost all of its Hasbro toy properties into a single universe. The shakeup comes in a biweekly event called Revolution, co-written by Cullen Bunn and John Barber, with art by Fico Ossio, which will combine GI Joe, Transformers, MASK, ROM the Space Knight, Action Man and Micronauts into one permanent shared universe.

Even movies about toys need writers. That’s why Hasbro, in an effort to compete with Marvel, DC, and every other company out there trying to create an integrated multiproperty cinematic universe has assembled a writer’s room of talent to figure out how to merge their assorted toy brands, including G.I. Joe, M.A.S.K., ROM, Micronauts, and Visionaries, into one streamlined movie continuity. The Hollywood Reporter says the Hasbro writer’s room will meet for the first time on Monday with an impressive roster of talent.

Remember when you were a kid, and you would play with all your different toys at the same time? You’d have the Ninja Turtles team up with the Ghostbusters to take down Hulk Hogan and Ultimate Warrior, and then they’d all get transported to the land of the Thundercats.

From the Department of Things That We All New Would Happen Eventually, it looks like this is the year that the inevitable finally happens. At Comic-Con International in San Diego, IDW editor-in-chief Chris Ryall announced that ROM and Micronauts will finally be making their long-awaited return in 2016.

Never let it be said that Dave Johnson isn't good to his Twitter followers. After last week's reveal of the five connected covers for Vertigo's 100 Bullets Omnibuses, today the artist, who promised something special when he reached 10,000 followers, posted his designs for a criminally unproduced animated version of Micronauts, inspired by the 1980s Marvel comic from Bill Mantlo and Michael Golden