The first day of the annual San Diego Comic-Con is starting out strong. Back in the 1980s the very idea of live-action fantasy that even remotely achieved visual spectacle status was nil. Space fantasy like Star Wars was one thing, as were the Ray Harryhausen stop-motion movies of the past. Then there was a true visionary–Jim Henson–with The Dark Crystal and nothing else… something promising now and then like Willow. Flash forward to July 2022 and we have three big properties stepping forward, first The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, then The Game of Thrones: House of the Dragon, and now from Hasbro, Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves. All three look to be worth the time, but this one clearly ranks high on fun potential.
Check out Chris Pine, Michelle Rodriguez, Hugh Grant, Sophia Lillis, Justice Smith, Daisy Head, Chloe Coleman, and Regé-Jean Page starring in Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves:
Normally this would be the kind of news you’d find at San Diego Comic-Con, which was canceled this year again because of the pandemic. Hasbro is farming out to action figure and pop culture collectible company Super7 to deliver two new action figure lines, rebooting the classic small-scale action figures based on the 1980s G.I. Joe animated series. One line will he a step down from the original articulated figures from the 1980s, and the other will be a step up. The step up is the Ultimates line, articulated 7-inch scale figures with extra arms, heads, and a variety of other accessories. The step down is the Kenner-style 3.75-inch ReAction line, with less articulation than the original line, but with more series-accurate designs and still more variety–including new figures–to come.
See detailed views of each figure below. You can order the Ultimates line now and pre-order all the ReAction figures from the first wave via the above links.
Ok, I confess: I’ve never been a big fan of the movie Clue. It took the smart, suspenseful, iconic game of my childhood and turned it into a silly farce, disregarding the beautiful conventions of the color-coded characters, and making the measured, thoughtful play a frantic slapstick comedy. Clue (originally called Cluedo in Britain) is about mystery and deduction and the Golden Age of British country house mysteries. Well, Diana Peterfreund has restored my faith in the franchise, and channeled a bit of classic Christopher Pike in the mix! Her new release In the Hall with the Knife: A Clue Mystery, the first novel from the Clue franchise (Hasbro and IDW introduced comic book versions in 2017 and 2019), reimagines the characters and game play in a contemporary New England boarding school. Six students are stranded in a spooky Victorian mansion-turned-dorm when their remote, coastal village is besieged by a freak winter ice storm. The campus is flooded, power, phones, and internet are down—and somebody has it in for Headmaster Boddy, the school’s beloved principal.
Is it blue-haired Beth “Peacock” Picach, the school’s perpetually angry tennis star? Or maybe brooding townie Vaughn Green? What about the school’s “power couple,” ambitious geniuses Scarlett Mistry and Phineas Plum? New kid Mustard, just transferred in from a military academy? Even sweet, bookish Orchid McKee has her secrets… and Peterfreund slowly doles them out, keeping the pacing taut and the plot clipping along until the Big Reveal.
Like the classic gameplay, each character takes a turn, in alternating, third person point-of-view chapters. Like the game, they all suspect each other, pointing their fingers as the story goes on. Rooms are explored, secret passages revealed, familiar weapons appear in characters’ hands… and the ultimate culprit is finally exposed. Peterfreund gives the reader enough clues to play along and solve the mystery with (or slightly before) the characters. And just like the game itself, the worldbuilding, scene setting, and backstory leave you wishing for more of this world and its secrets.
Getting a jumpstart on Hasbro‘s announcement from New York Toy Fair 2019 of a new, retro line of classic 3.75-inch Kenner-branded action figures, Target has listed the first figures on its website. It’s no surprise that the franchise is the classic Kenner Star Wars, and they are being re-released on vintage style cards (with a new retro designating logo), but with original style sculpts as the Star Wars Retro Collection. So at a minimum look for Luke, Han, Leia, Chewbacca, Darth Vader, and a Stormtrooper coming to your Target soon.
The figures look identical to the originals from the marketing images, including the weapon accessories. In addition to the new retro logo, the bubble cards appear to have a weathered design. Here are the details for the Luke figure, with similar details listed at the Target website for each figure:
INSPIRED BY STAR WARS 70s-STYLE ACTION FIGURES – Star Wars Retro Collection 3.75-inch-scale Star Wars figures feature original Kenner figure design and detail and Star Wars movie-inspired back cards (Each sold separately. Subject to availability)!
CLASSIC LUKE SKYWALKER FIGURE – This 3.75-inch scale collectible Luke Skywalker figure features sculpting and design inspired by the original Kenner figures from the 70s and the Tatooine farmboy who joined the Rebels from Star Wars: A New Hope.
STAR WARS MOVIE-INSPIRED ACCESSORY – Includes a Luke Skywalker-inspired action Lightsaber that is great for display in any Star Wars collection.
5 POINTS OF ARTICULATION – with the basic articulation of the classic Kenner figures, this Star Wars Retro Collection Luke Skywalker figure is a great addition to any Star Wars action figure and vehicle collection.
THE LEGACY CONTINUED – Look for other Star Wars Retro Collection figures to continue the collection from a galaxy far, far away! (Figures each sold separately. Subject to availability.)
If you’re not a player of Dungeons & Dragons, a new journey through the hills and valleys of the roleplay game that started it all will get you up to speed quickly. Dungeons & Dragons Art & Arcana: A Visual History is a comprehensive, authoritative, and licensed look back at nearly 50 years of gaming, storytelling, and artwork. If you grew up with the game you are certain to find both nostalgia and page-after-page of new information in its more than 700 color images from the past, images of heroes and villains, monsters and other creatures, that brought in some 40 million players over the years. Boasting some 10-15 million active players today, D&D now features the results of writers/D&D celebrity fans Michael Witwer (D&D historian), Kyle Newman (director of the movie Fanboys), Jon Peterson (game historian) and Sam Witwer (actor, Being Human, Smallville, Battlestar Galactica) pulling together published images and source art from each edition of D&D’s core books, supplements, and modules, magazines, advertisements, tie-in products, sketches, and draft rules. Their sources include the archives at Wizards of the Coast, private collectors, and more than 40 designers and artists from every era of the game’s history. Released in two editions, fans old and new can choose from the standard 448-page hardcover alone or a special edition Hydro74-designed boxed set with some intriguing extras. You’ll find a 14-page preview below courtesy of publisher Ten Speed Press.
This… treatise… this behemoth of a book is smartly designed so readers can approach it for a quick burst of throwback fun or a detailed dive behind the creation and many changes of the game and the companies behind it. You can find a side-by-side evolution and comparison of monsters and other characters, soak in old maps and character sheets, and compare the covers and key art across all editions. Possibly the best contribution is comparative images showing specific pop culture sources for many of the designs that made it into the early books and supplements, everything from Frank Frazetta Conan the Barbarian paintings to panels of comic book art from Marvel Comics’ Strange Tales.
From Guidon Games’ Chainmail to TSR to Wizards of the Coast and Hasbro and the latest 5th Edition rule books, the D&D story is one of corporate takeovers, failures, successes and strategies, all to survive and ultimately consolidate with games including Magic: The Gathering, Pokémon, World of Warcraft, and the entire Milton Bradley tabletop game catalog, all under one umbrella. It all started with creators Gary Gygax and David Arneson, and their efforts to build on miniature figure battle games from centuries past, and modern rules for gaming that had a historic source: sci-fi/fantasy author H.G. Wells first penned a gaming rulebook for miniatures titled Little Wars: a game for boys from twelve years of age to one hundred and fifty and for that more intelligent sort of girl who likes boys’ games and books, an influential book inspiring gaming to this day. The founders would pull in amateur artists and eventually professional artists, sprouting from a small headquarters in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, ultimately the source of Gen Con, the gaming convention that has been tied to D&D since the beginning.
You wouldn’t think it would be that much of a challenge. Transformers movies are about Transformers, right? And yet, how often have the movies tended to gloss their way over each transformation to or from a car or jet or other vehicle? The latest trailer for Bumblebee looks like Hasbro and Paramount are scrapping the Michael Bay style and about to deliver the goods. And not just once or twice. Great transformations happen all over the new trailer released this morning for the film heading to theaters this December. Jet and helicopter to cars and then Transformers and you can actually see the components change instead of a magic CGI flash?
At last.
Everybody who has ever loved a car can see something of themselves in the trailer for the latest film in the Transformers movie series. If you’ve ever seen an old car on its last wheel and thought there was something more to be brought back, then the young Oscar-nominated actor Hailee Steinfeld is you as we meet more of the film’s human star in the second trailer. In the same way that R2-D2 and BB-8, or Number Five, or WALL-E, or CHAPPiE, or Marvin, or Iron Giant were made lovable in their iconic sci-fi films, Paramount and Hasbro are turning back the clock, and at first glance they may finally get it right. More heart. More Transformers!
It’s a car, but it might as well be alive. And better yet, BumbleBee–that classic toy yellow Volkswagen Beetle turned Optimus Prime-protector–is returning to its VW roots as this film shows him back in 1987, instead of the Camaro incarnation we saw in the movies. And if your favorite Transformer is Optimus Prime, this trailer won’t disappoint.
As we wait for December’s release of the prequel Transformers story Bumblebee coming to life in theaters, the largest and most comprehensive reference guide to the classic toys, comic strips, and comic books of the Transformers franchise is on its way. Transform and Roll Out: The Unofficial and Unauthorized Guide to the Transformers Franchise (1984-1992)takes the deepest dive yet offered into the early days of the favorite toys and comics of a generation. Meticulously compiled by Ryan Frost, the book will take you back like never before as he dissects each story with summaries and cross-references. The result is a massive 820-page historical document that Transformers fans will return to again and again.
Divided into large sections on the toys, the comics, and the cartoon series, the book breaks down the toys by their release and characters, and the comics chronologically based on release. The greatest effort is in the third section, where the author provides production information and describes plot points of the animated series, identifying characters, creators, writers, and voice actors, and he even pulls key quotes from the episodes. Did you know the popular tie-in novelist and comic book writer Donald F. Glut wrote for the animated series? The original actor for Emperor Palpatine in The Empire Strikes Back—Clive Revill–provided voices on the series. Frost even attempts to locate the early story’s likely location for Mount St. Hillary, Oregon.
Frost recounts how Hasbro tapped then-Marvel Comics staff editor Denny O’Neil to be the next Larry Hama–the renowned writer he took the G.I. Joe toy line from toy to comic book form. Marvel editor-in-chief Jim Shooter didn’t like O’Neil’s story treatment so staff writer Bud Budiansky stepped in, ultimately naming most of the characters and assigning them their memorable personalities, powers, and abilities. Budiansky would edit the series, with well-known writers taking on the stories, including Ben Mentlo, Ralph Macchio, and Jim Salicrup. Other creators would add to the series, including Bill Sienkiewicz, Michael Golden, Herb Trimpe, Mark Texeira, Charles Vess, Alan Kupperberg, Tom Morgan, and Mike Zeck.
Everybody who has ever loved a car can see something of themselves in the trailer for the latest film in the Hasbro Transformers movie series. If you’ve ever seen an old car on its last wheel and thought there was something more to be brought back, then the young Oscar-nominated actor Hailee Steinfeld is you in the first trailer for this year’s Christmas release of BumbleBee. In the same way that R2-D2 and BB-8, or Number Five, or WALL-E, or CHAPPiE, or Marvin, or Iron Giant, were made lovable in their iconic sci-fi films, Paramount and Hasbro are turning back the clock, scrapping the Michael Bay model that audiences have been tiring of, based on box office trending in the franchise. Less action, more heart.
It’s a car, but it might as well be alive. And better yet, BumbleBee–that classic toy yellow Volkswagen Beetle turned Optimus Prime-protector–is returning to its VW roots as this film shows him back in 1987, instead of the Camaro incarnation we saw in the movies. Whether he is your favorite Transformer or whether that honor falls to Optimus Prime, this new film may be just the thing to jumpstart the franchise.
Steven Spielberg is again executive producer. This entry looks more like a Spielberg picture than more recent sequels. In case you missed it, here’s the trailer for BumbleBee:
Hasbro has successfully launched several toys and games like Transformers, G.I. Joe, Battleship, and My Little Pony into new media territory including tie-in movies and comic books. Everyone’s favorite detective board game is making its way to a five-issue comic book series this year from IDW Publishing. IDW has licensed Clue (or Cluedo for British readers) and is planning some fun tying together elements of the game and the 1985 movie Clue that starred Tim Curry, Madeline Kahn, and Christopher Lloyd. The new comic book series was announced this weekend at Emerald City Comicon 2017 in Seattle.
The classic cast everyone knows: Colonel Mustard, Miss Scarlett (or Scarlet in the U.S.), Professor Plum, Miss Peacock, Mr. Green, Miss White, and victim Mr. Boddy, are all here. Of course, over the years other characters have entered the fold–like Miss Peach, Monsieur Brunette, Madame Rose, and Sergeant Grey–via spinoff board games like Master Detective and video game versions of Clue. Will they make an appearance in the new series? Two new characters immediately stand-out from the initial artwork released: a young man and woman, the woman a red-headed starlet. One obvious update to the original cast is Colonel Mustard, the classic “great white hunter” and colonial imperialist of the original game story, is now portrayed as a black officer. Also, Miss White doesn’t have the dated servant maid attire of past versions of the game and the movie.
Writer Paul Allor (Guardians of the Galaxy, G.I. Joe) will be scripting the series, with artwork by Nelson Dániel (Dungeons & Dragons, The Cape). They are putting a humorous twist on the game into their new story, similar to that found in the movie version. Also like the movie, the first issue will have three alternate endings, plus three variant covers. Depending on which variant cover edition you read, a unique conclusion unfolds. Is it a clue, or a red herring? Readers can collect all the variants (and clues), as well as the main cover by Eisner award-winning artist Gabriel Rodriguez (the classic game board image above).
