M.A.S.K. #1 Review: The Energon Universe Hits Full Throttle

WEPA! Now this is how you take a classic toy-line thunderbolt, strap rockets to the nostalgia, and launch it straight into the modern comic-book battlefield with enough velocity to make your pull list check its mirrors. M.A.S.K. #1 is not just another “remember this?” revival trying to live off the fumes of Saturday morning cartoons and plastic-aisle mythology. Nah, fam. Dan Watters, Pye Parr, Pierluigi Casolino, and Rus Wooton roll into the Energon Universe like a high-speed getaway car with government secrets in the trunk, alien tech under the hood, and a whole lot of bad decisions riding shotgun. This thing moves.

Right from the opening stretch in the Nevada Desert, the book lets you know exactly what kind of ride you bought a ticket for. Matt Trakker is tearing across the landscape in that iconic red beast of a vehicle, pushing speed, ego, and engineering past the safety line while armed forces chase him like they just realized they’re not in the same league. It is pure “Brooklyn kid saw Knight Rider, Top Gun, Transformers, and a G.I. Joe mission file in the same weekend” energy. Parr’s linework gives the vehicles weight and swagger, but also motion. You can feel tires bite the road. You can hear engines screaming. You can smell the dust. The chase is clean, kinetic, and smartly staged, not a cluttered mess of mechanical nonsense. That matters, because a book like M.A.S.K. lives or dies on whether the machines feel cool. Here? They feel dangerously cool. Like, “your insurance company just blocked your number” cool.

Dan Watters understands something very important about this franchise: the mask is not just a gimmick. The vehicle is not just a toy. The transformation is not just fan service. In this version, M.A.S.K. becomes a response to a world that is already broken open by the larger Energon Universe. Cybertronians exist. Alien technology exists. Governments are scrambling. Soldiers are afraid. Scientists are being swallowed by secrets bigger than their funding. And in the middle of that mess, Matt Trakker is not presented as some flawless golden-boy hero. He’s sharp, gifted, cocky, wounded, and dangerous in that “I built the solution, but I may also be part of the problem” kind of way. That is where the book gets its voltage. It is not simply asking, “Wouldn’t it be cool if cars turned into weapons?” It is asking, “What happens when desperate people build weapons because the universe stopped playing fair?”

That’s the sauce right there!

The issue also does a strong job of positioning Miles Mayhem and V.E.N.O.M. as more than cartoon villains twirling mustaches in a volcano lair. Mayhem comes off like a man whose paranoia might be madness, prophecy, or both. He believes the world is under threat from things most people are too scared, too arrogant, or too bureaucratic to admit exist. That makes him frightening because the book doesn’t reduce him to “evil old dude wants power.” He is a collector of dangerous people, broken technologies, and apocalyptic possibilities. Vanessa Warfield and Sly Rax slide into the narrative with that perfect “these folks are trouble, but stylish trouble” vibe. Warfield, especially, gets a slick introduction that blends cruelty, competence, and attitude. She doesn’t just walk into the story; she kicks the door open and checks the room for exits.

The Energon Universe connections are also handled with real confidence. General Flagg’s presence gives the issue a strong G.I. Joe connective tissue without making M.A.S.K. feel like a guest star in its own debut. That is a tricky balance, and Watters mostly nails it. The book makes it clear that M.A.S.K. is operating in the shadow of larger military and alien conflicts, but it also carves out its own lane. This is espionage, tech warfare, recruitment drama, mad science, and vehicular mayhem all blended into a tight first issue that feels like a mission briefing got into a street race with a conspiracy board. And yes, I mean that as a compliment.

What really surprised me is how much body horror and weird science sneaks into the issue. The Alaska/Frusenland material brings in a wormhole-generator mystery that feels nasty, eerie, and wonderfully unclean. The image of strange portals and alien consequences being written directly into human flesh gives the comic a darker sci-fi bite than some readers may expect. That is a bold move. It says this book is not content to be only shiny helmets and cool cars. There is rot under the tech. There is pain under the mission. There are people who got chewed up by secrets before the superheroes and soldiers even arrived. That extra layer gives M.A.S.K. more flavor than a simple action launch would have had.

Pye Parr’s art deserves a loud horn blast here. Parr gives the book a look that feels toyetic without becoming plastic, animated without becoming flat, and explosive without losing storytelling discipline. The characters have exaggerated shapes and strong expressions, but the emotional beats still land. Trakker’s arrogance, Flagg’s stone-faced military control, Mayhem’s cold fanaticism, Warfield’s calculated menace it all reads clean. The vehicle designs are where Parr really starts cooking with gas. The Thunderhawk sequences are money. The car has personality before it even reveals everything it can do. When it shifts, lifts, launches, or tears through an environment, it has that exact “I need the figure, the poster, and maybe a garage I can’t afford” energy.

Pierluigi Casolino’s colors bring major heat to the page. The Nevada sequences pop with burnt oranges, desert blues, and hot-road brightness. The New Jersey scenes shift into grimier purples and interior shadows. The Alaska scenes cool everything down with icy blues and alien orange surges, making the wormhole tech feel like something the planet is rejecting. The color storytelling is not just decorative; it guides the emotional weather of the book. Every location has its own mood. Every tech burst feels dangerous. Every mask beam looks like it came with consequences.

Rus Wooton’s lettering keeps the whole engine from overheating. This is a busy comic with military chatter, interrogation-room tension, action beats, sound effects, and big sci-fi reveals, yet the flow stays readable. The sound effects are especially fun. They don’t just sit on the page; they move with the scene. In a book about speed and impact, that matters. Lettering can be the unsung turbocharger in comics, and Wooton gives this issue that extra growl.

Now, keeping it real like a bodega coffee at 6 a.m., the issue does have a lot on its dashboard. It is launching a team, defining the tech, tying into the Energon Universe, positioning Mayhem, folding in G.I. Joe, establishing Trakker’s baggage, and teasing bigger cosmic trouble. That is a lot of cargo for one issue. A few sections lean heavier on exposition than pure character breathing room. Some readers may want more time sitting with Matt as a person before the mission machine fully snaps into place. But for a #1 designed to kick down the door and declare “the next phase starts now,” the density feels understandable. This is not a lazy issue. It is packed. Maybe almost overpacked but overpacked like a road-trip trunk full of weapons, snacks, and bad ideas. You still want to see where it goes.

And then there is the collector-side chaos: the blind-bag program. Let’s talk about it because this is not small potatoes. The first Energon Universe blind-bag rollout is already a big comic-shop conversation starter, but the introduction of ROM through the surprise blind-bag variants turns this into a genuine “yo, did that really just happen?” moment. ROM entering the Energon Universe is not just a neat bonus. It changes the temperature of the whole line. Suddenly, the cosmic ceiling gets higher. The connective tissue gets stranger. The Energon Universe, which already had Transformers, G.I. Joe, Void Rivals, and now M.A.S.K., just opened another door and behind that door is a Space Knight with decades of fan hunger behind him. That is a boss-level reveal. Skybound knows exactly how to weaponize surprise, and this one hits like a secret track on a classic album.

What makes M.A.S.K. work is that it respects the old-school thrill without being trapped by it. It knows fans want helmets, vehicles, code names, betrayals, and wild tech. It gives us that. But it also modernizes the stakes by embedding the concept into a world where alien invasion is not theoretical anymore. That gives the entire premise a stronger reason to exist. M.A.S.K. is no longer just a cool team with cool rides. It is an emergency response to a planet realizing it is underarmed, underinformed, and very much not alone.

This debut has speed, swagger, menace, mystery, and enough “oh snap” energy to keep the Energon faithful buzzing. It is a muscular opening chapter with a sharp visual identity and a clever understanding of how to make legacy IP feel urgent again. M.A.S.K. does not simply revive the brand; it retools it, arms it, points it toward the cosmic war ahead, and dares readers to buckle up.

M.A.S.K. #1 is a loud, stylish, high-octane launch that proves the Energon Universe still has plenty of fuel in the tank. It is part spy thriller, part sci-fi arms race, part vehicular power fantasy, and part “what the hell is hiding under the ice?” nightmare. A few exposition-heavy turns keep it from being flawless, but the creative team brings so much energy, craft, and forward momentum that the issue still burns rubber across the finish line. WEPA approved.

CRUSADERS SCORE:
4.5 out of 5

Writer: Dan Watters
Artist: Pye Parr
Colorist: Pierluigi Casolino
Letterer: Rus Wooton
Editor: Ben Abernathy
Cover A: Pye Parr
Variant Covers: J. Scott Campbell & Sabine Rich, Cedric Poulat, Mark Spears, Tom Reilly & Adriano Lucas, Tom Reilly, Kael Ngu, E.J. Su, Jonboy Meyers, Joshua Cassara & Romulo Fajardo Jr., Daniel Warren Johnson & Mike Spicer, Pye Parr, Luke Preece & Andres Juarez, Michael Watkins, Skan Srisuwan, Joseph Schmalke, Elias Chatzoudis, Kevin Tolibao, Marcelo Matere, Taurin Clarke
Publisher: Skybound / Image Comics / Hasbro