Micronauts (franchise)

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This article is about the franchise. For the titular fictional team of heroes, see Micronaut{{#switch:{{#sub:Micronaut|-1}} != .= ?= .

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In a move to boost sales, the next character to join the Micronauts will be Snake-Eyes.

Micronauts was a 1977 toyline by [[wikipedia:{{#if:|:}}Mego Corporation|{{#if:Mego|Mego|Mego Corporation}}]] made up of toys licensed from Takara's Microman line. Like The Transformers this line created entirely new fiction for the toys, namely the (micro)cosmic adventures of various aliens in the tiny "Microverse".

History

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The Micronauts line debuted in 1977 as Mego's first original series (albeit using toys licensed from Takara's Microman line) after finding success with licensed properties; it ran successfully until around 1980, when Mego began to lose sales and ultimately shut down in 1983, though the popular Marvel comic series by Bill Mantlo (who would also write the comic adaptation of ROM: Spaceknight) outlived it, running until 1986. However, there was one particular influence that the toys had: much of their engineering was borrowed by Hasbro for their G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero line.

By 2009, Hasbro had acquired Micronauts and announced that they were planning a revival, with a new toyline and film series. Nothing new came of it until 2011, when the Micronauts characters were used as the key players in Hasbro's Unit:E crossover, which sought to merge a number of Hasbro properties, including Transformers, into a shared universe. Unfortunately, for reasons likely involving the change of direction with the Transformers: Prime cartoon, Unit:E was never followed up on.

However, during Hasbro's 2015 Investor Day event, the company unveiled Transformers: Micronauts under their "New Brands" slides, along with a mysterious figure that appeared to be a new toy of Micronauts character Biotron.<ref>http://news.tfw2005.com/2015/11/16/tfw2005-coverage-of-hasbro-investor-day-2015-305388</ref> Later in 2015, IDW Publishing announced plans for a new Micronauts series, which debuted in March 2016; IDW later revealed that Micronauts would be folded into their new shared Hasbro Universe as part of the Revolution event. The Micronauts characters were tied into the previously established Transformers continuity in the Micronauts: Revolution one-shot, which revealed that the Micronauts' home universe of Microspace was actually created by one of the Thirteen original Primes, Micronus Prime.

IDW comic

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The straightforwardly titled Micronauts was a 2016 ongoing comic series by IDW Publishing, based on the 1977 toyline by [[wikipedia:{{#if:|:}}Mego Corporation|{{#if:Mego|Mego|Mego Corporation}}]]. Though it wasn't the first licensed Micronauts comic, the Marvel Comics [[wikipedia:{{#if:|:}}Micronauts (comics)|{{#if:Micronauts|Micronauts|Micronauts (comics)}}]] series coming before it, it used a different cast of characters and characterisations thanks to Marvel's ownership of the characters they created for their series.<ref>Unlike the Transformers license, which gave Hasbro ownership of any characters that debuted in the comic, the Micronauts and ROM: Spaceknight licenses gave the rights to any characters originating in the comics to Marvel.</ref>

The series crossed over with IDW's Transformers titles in 2016 as part of the Revolution event, with the titular characters travelling from their universe to normal space.

Micronauts focuses on the titular team; a group of misfits from the tiny universe of Microspace, who aim to save their world from the entropy storm while dealing with the war between Baron Daegon's Ministry of Science and Baron Karza's Ministry of Defense.

Animated series

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A Micronauts animated series was produced by Boulder Media to tie in with a potential live action film originally scheduled for 2021, but when the film was pulled, the series was shelved indefinitely despite being fully complete. Thankfully, an anonymous leaker uploaded the full series to the Internet Archive in 2025, with all 52 episodes available for viewing.

Outside of the involvement of various Transformers creatives, including writers like Adam Beechen and actors like Clancy Brown, Danny Pudi, and Kevin Michael Richardson, the show features a decent number of Transformers nods. Some are more overt, such as multiple episodes featuring the eponymous team traveling between Microsia and Earth via space bridge; others are more subtle, like titling episode 23 "Rescue 'Nauts". Showrunner Eric Rogers noted that the team had always intended for Transformers to be part of their show's world, with later episodes setting up events that could lead to a larger potential connection "if Hasbro had ever wanted to run with it."<ref>{{#if: Some inside baseball here since you are a Transformers fan -- our universe was definitely going to be connected to the TF one. We worked hard toward the end of Season 2 to have the events there be something that could have a TF connection if Hasbro had ever wanted to run with it. |"Some inside baseball here since you are a Transformers fan -- our universe was definitely going to be connected to the TF one. We worked hard toward the end of Season 2 to have the events there be something that could have a TF connection if Hasbro had ever wanted to run with it."—|}}{{#if: https://bsky.app/profile/ericrogers.bsky.social/post/3lulhh4hxo22w |Eric Rogers|Eric Rogers}}{{#if: BlueSky |, BlueSky|}}{{#if: |, ""|}}{{#if: 2025 |, 2025{{#if: 07 |/{{#switch:{{#len:07}}|1=007|07}}{{#if: 22|/{{#switch:{{#len:22}}|1=022|22}}|}}}}|}}{{#if: https://bsky.app/profile/ericrogers.bsky.social/post/3lulhh4hxo22w ||}}{{#switch:{{#sub:https://bsky.app/profile/ericrogers.bsky.social/post/3lulhh4hxo22w%7C7%7C11}}%7Cweb.archive= (archive link)|}}{{#switch:{{#sub:https://bsky.app/profile/ericrogers.bsky.social/post/3lulhh4hxo22w%7C8%7C11}}%7Cweb.archive= (archive link)|}}{{#switch:{{#sub:https://bsky.app/profile/ericrogers.bsky.social/post/3lulhh4hxo22w%7C7%7C10}}%7Carchive.is= (archive link)|}}{{#switch:{{#sub:https://bsky.app/profile/ericrogers.bsky.social/post/3lulhh4hxo22w%7C8%7C10}}%7Carchive.is= (archive link)|}}{{#if: | (dead link)}}</ref> Considering those later episodes involve strange purple crystals that grant otherworldly powers being found on Earth...feel free to draw your own conclusions.

Trivia

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References

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