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Yesterday I went over the basic approach for how I would do a run on Transformers comics if I was given open season to do what I want. Granted this is a bit limiting since I can’t really do whatever I want. The fans have to like the story or I might as well be making a fan comic in a spiral bound notebook. These things have to sell and while I won’t pander to any one group, including nostalgists, I do have a lot more freedom in this imaginary scenario to put my own spin on this new entry into the Transformer multiverse. My philosophy came down to one sentence:

Transformers is a kids toyline that adults also enjoy about living alien robots at war.

The emphasised parts are what’s important here. In the approach I would do an all-ages comic.

ALL-AGES MEANS ALL AGES, CHILD AND ADULT!

I used Beast Wars as my example of how this would work. The story would be dark when it needed to be and light when it needed to be. I also would base personalities and if possible designs a bit more on the toys and tech specs, but would keep note of iconic traits in order to not be a hypocrite. So now comes the fun part.

In this final installment we’ll go over the lore of this new Transformers universe I’d like to make, though not in great detail so nothing specific gets stolen on the off chance certain parties who will work on the continuity after IDW loses the license (rumors point to Skybound being in talks, which I also went into yesterday), get an idea stuck in their head, and forget where they saw it. This time we’ll lean more on the “living alien robots at war” part as well as one other philosophy I’ve brought up before: periodicals are like TV series, graphic novels are like movies.

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The rumor out there is that Robert Kirkman and his Image imprint Skybound are in talks to take over the Transformers license. This concerns some because they’re mostly known for rather violent stuff like Invincible or The Walking Dead, projects not really made for kids. Consider that IDW wasn’t exactly making kid-friendly comics at all during their run. Transformers Prime had a few comics as a separate continuity but wasn’t even as light as the show, which was already the darkest kid-targeted Transformers cartoon. (I think only the Machinima and Netflix shows went darker.) Meanwhile the second Robots In Disguise, the Rescue Bots lines, and Cyberverse were all ignored by IDW, which is another reason I wonder why they did the Marvel Kids line.

On the other hand Skybound did make Super Dinosaur, an all-ages title that I think would have had more sales if they were also sold places kids would find comics outside of a comic store. They have to be introduced to comics to want to visit a store that sells them, which has been one of the problems of modern comics. Super Dinosaur did have a one season cartoon but I only learned about it recently so that wasn’t marketed very well either. This is Transformers so I would imagine the marketing would be easier. Hasbro might be smarter in pointing kids to the comics. I would hope, anyway.

So how should Skybound handle the Transformers brand? Granted I can only speak for what I would like to see them do. I’ve had an idea ever since I lost all interest in IDW’s take (which was before I lost my income) as to what I would do with a Transformers comic series, so let me run an imaginary scenario past you.

KIRKMAN: “Okay, Troy, the floor is yours. You can go ahead and run these comics any way you want and make the Transformers comic you’d want to see…and if it actually sells we’ll keep everything going the way you want to go.”

Unlikely, I know, but if you think that’s unlikely wait until I get the time to do the same thing with the DC Universe. So if I had carte blanche to do a Transformers comic run the way I’d like to we start the planning with one simple acknowledgement: Transformers is a kids toyline that adults also enjoy about living alien robots at war. “Well obviously” says you, but this will affect my story approach to the whole universe.

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