Unfortunately for film fans afflicted with franchise fatigue, Hollywood’s obsession with expanded movie universes is not going to end soon. Every major studio wants to follow Marvel‘s cross-platform success, and so the arms race is on, with “Star Wars,” “Transformers,” Universal‘s monster properties and ones that only exist via pitches made in elevators across the Greater Los Angeles area each chasing cinematic expansions that see characters in multi-film sagas that unfold forward and backward narratively, forever and ever. And now Paramount is throwing its hat in the ring, with an ambitious plan to bring five Hasbro properties together, because… why the hell not?
THR reports that the studio is developing an interconnected universe of movies featuring G.I. Joe, Micronauts, Visionairies, M.A.S.K., and ROM. You know the drill: a writers’ room will be assembled to spin material for all these toy brands to explode together on screen, so that multiple movies can be made, and Hasbro can generate licensing opportunities, so the big wheel of money can spin around and around, until audiences decide they’ve had enough.
I’ll leave to the diehard fans out there to figure out how exactly all these properties will crossover organically, but let’s face it, this isn’t Shakespeare. Just make up some dumb reason G.I. Joe needs Micronauts to save the world from [insert peril] and away you go….