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The revitalized Transformer & G.I. Joe universe that Robert Kirkman & friends are creating came out of pandemic-era splurge purchases of "very expensive, very complicated Transformer statues"
Robert Kirkman had so much fun building Transformers statues that he decided to have his company Skybound Entertainment pursue a licensing deal with Hasbro
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What did you do during the pandemic? If you spent your time ordering and building Transformers statues, you’re not alone, because that’s also what Skybound Entertainment founder Robert Kirkman did.
“In the pandemic I got bored, and I got sad, and I found myself wanting to go back to simpler times,” Robert Kirkman says during a keynote speech at ComicsPRO 2026. “I bought an embarrassing number of very expensive, very complicated Transformer statues. They would sometimes take the better part of a full day to assemble them, and I would just stare at them for hours after I was done. Thinking back to my love of G.I. Joe and Transformers in that dark period of time was a beacon of powerful nostalgia that helped me immensely.”
The only difference between Kirkman and you is that Kirkman had the power to acquire the license to publish Transformer comics, and that’s just what he did. He even threw in G.I. Joe for good measure.
“When I heard that the licenses were up for grabs and Hasbro was taking pitches, I scrambled the team at Skybound, and a few short months later we were hard at work on what became the Energon Universe.”
The Energon Universe is a shared continuity of Skybound comics featuring their Hasbro licensed characters from G.I. Joe, Transformers, M.A.S.K., and an original series titled Void Rivals. It’s been a critical and commercial success, and Kirkman says the team at Hasbro is thrilled with what Skybound has done with the characters.
“The work that we as a company have done in this line of books is something I’m very proud of. What we’ve accomplished is right up there with Walking Dead and Invincible, in my opinion. Taking those well-known, well-worn franchises and turning them into something new, a deeply interconnected universe that is woven together with very tight continuity, injected with new characters in Void Rivals, is honestly something I’m as excited to work on as I would be as a fan to read it. I just love it.”
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About ComicsPRO Industry Conference
Every year, the giants of the North American comic industry congregate behind closed doors for a closed-door conference to talk about the changing landscape of comics, what they've learned, and what they are all planning to do in the future. It's not a comic convention for fans, though - it's in a B2B event called the ComicsPRO Annual Meeting, and this year Popverse is going there to bring it all to you. At the 2026 Comics PRO Annual Meeting, Popverse will be covering the announcements, the conversations, and the insight from the likes of Marvel Comics, DC Comics, VIZ Media, Yen Press, Image Comics, Skybound Entertainment, and more.
Dates
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Location
Glendale, California
United States
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