Tomb Raider Announces Return With Major Crossover Nobody Expected

The Tomb Raider franchise is making a big comeback, and not only in the video game medium with Tomb Raider: Legacy of Atlantis. The Tomb Raider franchise has reinvented Lara Croft several times in its thirty-year history. The original Core Design games established Lara as an almost mythic adventurer before Crystal Dynamics expanded the formula by emphasizing cinematic storytelling and fluid traversal in titles such as Legend, Anniversary, and Underworld. In 2013, the Tomb Raider reboot reimagined Lara as an inexperienced survivor who gradually evolved into a seasoned explorer.

Lara Croft's adaptability has also made her one of gaming's most prolific crossover protagonists. Over the years, Tomb Raider's iconic protagonist has appeared in an unusually diverse range of franchises. Lara joined Fortnite as part of the Gaming Legends Series, and Dead by Daylight added Lara as a survivor. Lara Croft has even appeared in Nintendo's Animal Crossing: New Horizons, which introduced promotional outfits inspired by Lara. Besides these games, Tomb Raider has also crossed over with franchises like Magic: The Gathering, Brawlhalla, Fall Guys, Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon Breakpoint, Final Fantasy Brave Exvius, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II, and even PowerWash Simulator, plus numerous mobile titles.

Lara Croft isn't stopping her tour across pop culture anytime soon, as she will star in yet another unexpected Tomb Raider crossover.

Tomb Raider Crosses Over With G.I. Joe This Fall

G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero/Tomb Raider; Written By Kyle Higgins; Art By Elena Casagrande & Alex Guimarães

This year, Skybound, Image Comics, Hasbro, and Crystal Dynamics team up to create a crossover over three decades in the making. Penned by Radiant Black and Mighty Morphin Power Ranges writer Kyle Higgins, and illustrated by Black Widow artist Elena Casagrande and Magic: The Gathering: Untold Stories artist Alex Guimaraes, G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero/Tomb Raider integrates Lara Croft into the world of G.I. Joe, starting with Lara's trip to Cobra Island, where she meets Destro and Baroness and teams up with multiple G.I. Joe heroes.

G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero/Tomb Raider is part of a new era for the Tomb Raider franchise. While Lara Croft explores the G.I. Joe universe in the comics, Tomb Raider: Legacy of Atlantis soft-reboots the video games' timeline in February 2027. Meanwhile, the new live-action Tomb Raider movie reboot has already started production, and it will likely release in late 2027 or 2028. Following these new major releases, new crossovers with other famous franchises across different media, like G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero/Tomb Raider, are to be expected.

Tomb Raider Deserves A Bigger Comic Book Presence

Tomb Raider Should Be Bigger Across All Media

Although Tomb Raider is primarily associated with video games, Lara Croft has enjoyed a surprisingly extensive comic-book history that has spanned multiple publishers and creative eras. Top Cow Productions produced the franchise's most recognizable comics between the late 1990s and the early 2000s, with the same globe-trotting archaeology and action-adventure spectacle as the games. Following the 2013 reboot, Dark Horse Comics adopted a different approach by publishing series that bridged the gap between Tomb Raider, Rise of the Tomb Raider, and Shadow of the Tomb Raider.

Despite these strong foundations, Tomb Raider still feels significantly underrepresented in the comics, especially when compared to similarly iconic gaming franchises like Sonic the Hedgehog and Mass Effect. Lara Croft possesses all the ingredients needed to sustain a flagship adventure comic for years, like an endlessly expandable mythology, a premise that naturally accommodates standalone expeditions, and a protagonist capable of carrying everything from grounded archaeological thrillers to supernatural epics. The same can be said of Tomb Raider's cinematic legacy. While the Angelina Jolie movies became cultural landmarks and the 2018 reboot captured elements of the modern games, neither era produced a universally acclaimed adaptation.

Which Tomb Raider crossover would you like to see?

G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero/Tomb Raider #1 is available October 7 from Image Comics

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  Created by Toby Gard

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  Cast Channing Tatum, Marlon Wayans, Dennis Quaid, Ray Park, Sienna Miller, Lee Byung-hun, Rachel Nichols, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Henry Golding, Andrew Koji

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