Visionaries

Sadly cancelled before they got a Hector Ramirez cameo.

Visionaries: Knights of the Magical Light was a short-lived toyline released by Hasbro in 1987. The series was set on the alien world of Prysmos, a technological utopia which was suddenly plunged into a feudal, medieval state when the "Age of Science" came to an end and the new "Age of Magic" began. The heroic Spectral Knights and villainous Darkling Lords struggled for control of his new world using magical powers gifted to them by the wizard Merklynn, famously represented in the toyline as colourful holograms on the figures' chests and weapons.

As a contemporary of Transformers, Visionaries received a similar dual-pronged advertising push. The line was given an animated series (lasting only one season of thirteen episodes) co-produced by Sunbow Productions and TMS Entertainment, featuring many voice actors who also worked on Transformers and scripted by Flint Dille, Buzz Dixon, and Douglas Booth, and most importantly as far as this article is concerned, a comic book from Marvel Comics. Like everything else to do with the line, the comic book did not last long, running to only six issues and being cancelled halfway through a four-part story. Regardless of this failure, the UK branch of Marvel Comics reprinted the series, but it performed even worse there, and their comic only managed to reprint four of the six issues before folding. They also reprinted the first issue again in an annual released in 1988. The final two issues of the original comic were then split into eight smaller parts, and printed as back-up strips in the UK Transformers comic, running from #183 to #190, during which time the series was branded The Transformers & Visionaries. A few months later, Visionaries returned to the UK comic when the first issue alone was reprinted yet again, this time split up into seven parts and included in issues #213 through #219.

Years later, Visionaries would share another unusual connection with Transformers when Hasbro reused the name of the brawny Spectral Knight Cryotek for a new Robots in Disguise character.

In 2017, after some heavy foreshadowing, Visionaries joined the ongoing Hasbro Universe, receiving a crossover comic that pits the characters against the Transformers.

Fiction

Animated continuity

Swindle thinks the Darkling Lords of Prysmos might be good customers, and plans to use his experience with the Angry Archer as a primer to speaking their quasi-medieval lingo. AllSpark Almanac

2005 IDW continuity

A shape resembling that of the Visionaries' hexagonal chestplates appeared on a wall inside the Tomb of Amtoltec in Dahshur, Egypt alongside other hieroglyphs, some of which depicted Shockwave and the Micronauts Acroyear and Biotron. The Secret of the Mummy's Tomb

Marvel UK Reprints

Issues	Story	Visionaries at Marvel Database
#183 - #186	"Quest of the Four Talismans Part 1"	Visionaries Vol 1 5
#187 - #190	"Quest of the Four Talismans Part 2"	Visionaries Vol 1 6
#213 - #219	"The End -- -- The Beginning!"	Visionaries Vol 1 1

Toys

Revolution

"G.I. Joe vs the Transformers! Action Man and MASK fight for humanity, but where do Rom and the Micronauts stand?" So what am I, chopped liver?

• Revolution Set (SDCC Gift Set, 2017)
  • Accessories: Staff, whip

Released as part of a San Diego Comic-Con 2017 exclusive set, Leoric is an action figure made up of redecoed parts from various G.I. Joe action figures, with a new head, torso and weapon based on Leoric's classic design. He was packed with several other Hasbro Universe action figures: Jetfire, Matt Trakker of M.A.S.K., Action Man, Roadblock of G.I. Joe, Rom and a Dire Wraith, and nine Micronauts mini-figurines. Unlike his original toy, he doesn't have a hologram on the chest.

Leoric is included in the set despite the lack of Visionaries in the Revolution comic; he was presumably added to promote the upcoming Visionaries comic, which was officially revealed at the convention.

External links

• Visionaries at the IDW Hasbro Wiki
• Visionaries at Wikipedia
• Prysmos Wiki - A Visionaries Wiki
• Visionaries scripts at the Sunbow Marvel Archive