BW Media Spotlight

Energon Universe 2026 Free Comic Book Day Special

Image Comics/Skybound (May, 2026)

COVER: Pve Parr

LETTERER: Rus Wooton

EDITOR: Ben Abernathy

Even taking time away from Golden Age comics I still have an anthology. The main story takes up the bulk of the comic with three short side stories. This adds MASK to the Energon Universe, the latest attempt at a Hasbro shared universe. I already have a separate article about my problems with trying to shove MASK and VENOM in the same universe as Transformers and G.I. Joe, and maybe I will some day. For now I’m going to focus on the presentations we’re given.

MASK

[WRITER: Dan Watters| ARTIST/COLORIST: Pve Parr]

The focus on the story is Miles Mayhem recruiting for VENOM (I wonder what the “E” will stand for now, given how “evil” is treated by modern writers?). His first recruit is Vanessa Warfield, a former CIA agent cut for violent tendencies, which as Matt Trakker points out means they sent their own enemy to blow themselves up by giving her a reason. I’m actually not against this addition to her backstory and she’s less of a man-hating bitch in this story. As Matt and Alex Sector (now a master hacker but they kept his age–that also works) discuss his previous hiring attempts we get Sly Rax in a Russian prison, an expert sharpshooter and psycho. That last part I’m not buying. Rax was more of a greedy snark machine, with a Jack Nicholson style of speaking in the cartoon. He’s not supposed to be Bullseye from the Marvel Universe. There’s no sign of Cliff Dagger, which is disappointing.

Mayhem’s goal is changed here as well. Originally he was just a terrorist in the DC Comics and a criminal gang leader in the cartoon. Matt is of course race swapped again (why Hasbro keeps doing this when Hondo keeps getting the Rhodey treatment I don’t understand), but unlike the IDW take isn’t some taken-in street kid, at least when we meet him, though again Miles was his former mentor and there’s still no sign of his son or his kid brother designing MASK and VENOM’s vehicles and masks until Mayhem’s betrayal. Instead, Mayhem now wants to protect the world from aliens, convinced only he can do it, and we can assume he means the Transformers. Like we haven’t seen that before. Matt summons the other MASK members from around the world, and I’m concerned how that’s going to work. The original team was multiracial but all Americans who lived close enough to keep civilian jobs between missions. Matt comes off better than the IDW version but so much is different from what I already liked, and given how violent Skybound’s other adaptations are (Super Dinosaur was a fluke, I guess, but I really liked that comic) I can guess I wouldn’t like this one, either.

Transformers

[WRITER: Robert Kirkman | ARTIST: Jason  Howard| COLORIST: Sarah Stern]

I’m not even sure why they bothered with this one. It’s so short nothing is able to happen. (Something else I get from the Golden Age reviews.) In what I assume is the Amazon we see a woman fight a giant snake before returning to her dwelling…within the chest of a dead Ironhide. Already I have problems with Skybound’s take on Transformers due to killing off my favorite Autobot in the first story arc. Kirkman took over recently and decided to have Optimus just hand the Matrix Of Leadership over to Elita-One, in a move that made him look weaker than Simon Furman writes him and made Alita into a real bitch, and Arcee is now “Arcee Magnus” because that’s a title now and not just Ultra Magnus’ name. Even TJOmega didn’t like these changes, partly for different reasons than me (you can be important without being the Most Important Ever, but writers can’t seem to grasp that). This is barely a Transformers story, if not for Ironhide’s “shock” reveal as a dead house and frankly didn’t even need to be here. It tells you nothing that would get you interested if you didn’t already like Ironhide. It’s another example of Kirkman using gimmicks instead of continuing a story that had a decent fan following.

Void Rivals

[WRITER/CO-CREATOR:  Robert Kirkman (Lorenzo D Fellici as the other creator)| ARTIST: Conor Hughes| COLORIST: Patricio Delpeche

This is the original series Kirkman shoved into Hasbro’s shared universe for some reason and the only thing I’ve seen link them as an outsider. Some aliens crashland on Junkion, one of the pilots being a sycophant to his mentor. There they meet Arkonus of Cobra-La, who was taken in by the Junkions but will work with the newcomers in favor for a ride back to Earth. How did he get here? Are the Junkions okay with this? Historically they never start out that friendly. In the end I just don’t care, which has been my response to Void Rivals in general.

G.I. Joe

[WRITER: Joshua Williamson| ARTIST: Tom Reilly| COLORIST: Lee Loughridge]

It’s Zartan’s backstory in this continuity, how experimenting with Energon led to his mimicry abilities but turns his skin blue in sunlight. Okay, sure. I guess it works for this continuity. Making him part of some secret shadow group within GI Joe now seeking revenge feels unnecessary. And while a story of Zartan replacing General Hawk sounds good in theory I have trust issues with this whole continuity as it is.

overall

Yeah, I’m still not invested in this universe. While there are crossovers I like, this isn’t one of them.