Ready Player One’s Zak Penn to write ROM for Hasbro & Paramount

Last Updated on August 2, 2021

With the TRANSFORMERS franchise reportedly due for a reboot following the release of BUMBLEBEE, the other Hasbro properties are beginning to take shape in order to fill the temporary void. In 2015, Hasbro's Allspark Pictures and Paramount assembled a writers room to help develop their non-TRANSFORMERS franchises, such as G.I. Joe, M.A.S.K., Micronauts, Visionaries, and ROM, but little has been revealed over the years, but Deadline has reported that Zak Penn (READY PLAYER ONE) has now signed on to adapt ROM for the studios.

Known as Rom the Spaceknight, the character originated as a toy before being featured in a Marvel comic-book series developed to build interest in said toy, but while the action-figure failed, the comic was successful for several years. Hailing from the peaceful planet known as Galador, Rom volunteered to be transformed into a cyborg warrior in order to defend his planet from the Dire Wraiths. Although he was successful, Rom was inadvertently responsible for spreading Wraiths across the universe and swore that he would not reclaim his humanity until all Dire Wraiths had been vanquished. Zak Penn has worked on a number of comic-book adaptations over the years, including X2, THE INCREDIBLE HULK, and THE AVENGERS, so it's easy to see why Hasbro/Paramount recruited him. It's not certain when ROM would debut, but Hasbro/Paramount does have an untitled event film on the schedule for October 1, 2021.

In addition to ROM, Zak Penn is also hard at work bringing THE MATRIX franchise back to life, which he seems to be quite passionate about, recently telling ScreenRant that THE MATRIX is "a franchise I desperately want to see brought back and, I can’t go in to too much detail, but I’ve been harassing Warner Bros. for years to try to get it going again." I'll believe it when I see it.

READY PLAYER ONE will hit theaters on March 29th.