Transformers 4 Movie Blasting Off, But Not All The Way

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I don’t have a beef with the Transformers movies, and I am of the age where they were a major part of my childhood, but certainly there are some things I’d have preferred to see. The bottom line, however, says that the last film, Dark of the Moon, is the 5th highest grossing film in history. Slice that how you want it, that’s a lot of cheddar and ultimately a lot right to the people who matter. Like any film franchise of this magnitude, the next film had its fair shares of rumors circulating about it, including Michael Bay not being back to helm it and even the dismissed rumor of Jason Statham being involved in taking it in a new direction (between you and me that sounded badass to me).

related | TRANSFORMERS 4 – SWEET ROBOTS REPLACING HUMANS?

Well, Bay is back and the cast is being shuffled. According to the LA Times the next Transformers film may look a lot different than the previous 3, with Bay talking redesigns and a new cast of human stars. He stresses that it won’t be a reboot, that the previous films will have happened in the fictional continuity, only that they will be going in a new direction – possibly to space. The problem, for me, is that apparently he won’t be able to nor has the inclination to go all the way. Bay seems aware of that fact (and it is a fact) that to keep it grounded for the masses on the level he has achieved with the first 3 films he has to have some grounded (earthbound) presence, which eliminates the possibility of the Transformers movie  I want see. In short, a movie about the Transformers.

A couple of years ago I read a book called Transformers: Exodus a below average novel by the usually competent Alex Irvine that still presented what I thought was the perfect backdrop for a movie. It was the beginnings of the Autobots/Decepticons conflict on Cybertron, part Gladiator and part intergalactic Braveheart. It was a pretty successful mash-up origin of the numerous Transformers continuities. Beyond the desire to keep the film grounded, Bay admits that despite the overwhelming success of the previous film and the franchise as a whole, he’s not going to have quite the bankroll to work with on Transformers 4.

Not enough for a full blown Cybertronian civil war.