- You've got the touch.
You've got the power to watch today's Nerdist News.
(upbeat electronic music)
Could the Transformers movies
finally be transforming into the Hasbro cinematic universe?
With director Michael Bay's fifth and supposedly final
Transformers film only a few months away,
the future of everyone's favorite disguise-donning
robots has been more up in the air
than Optimus' ice-coated corpse.
What oh what will those poor little Autobots do
without their dear Papa Bay,
the man who has been homing their big screen adventures
for an entire decade now.
Well luckily, it seems that we may never actually
have to find out.
Like, literally never.
Because in a recent interview with MTV.com
Bay revealed that he and his Transformers writers room
have hashed out not one, not two,
but 14 friggin story ideas for potential sequels.
Fourteen, people!
Just to be clear, that means there are more Transformers
movies currently in development than there are
Star Wars movies that ever have existed.
And yes, I am talking about those dumb made-for-TV
Ewok movies and adding them in my count.
Anyway, the point is 14 is a lot of movies,
which means even if Bay won't be directing any of them
going forward, his influence will still be felt
on the franchise for years to come.
And heck, who's to say for sure he won't direct any of them?
Bay has been making threats to step away from the franchise
since the third one came out way back in 2011,
threats he's always backed down on as soon as a new movie
was in the works.
And lo and behold, in the same MTV interview
when Bay is asked point-blank if he would really
be giving up director duties,
he skirts that question pretty hard.
- Is this the last one?
- I mean, uh ...
- It sounds like you're now having second thoughts.
What's going on?
- I'm having fun... I'm stuck in the editing hole.
You're talking to me in the editing hole.
- At the end of the day, I guess the Autobots
really are the Ennis Del Mar to Michael Bay's Jack Twist.
He just doesn't know how to quit them.
But what will Bay's extended stay on Brokeback Cybertron
mean for the future of the franchise?
Well, we may have gotten a small glimpse
of the Transformers future from a new video
that just went up on MichaelBay.com, or more specifically,
we got a small glimpse of their past.
That's because the video,
titled "The Secret History of the Transformers,"
shows a series of split second shots featuring
the Transformers behind the battle lines
of almost every major military battle in history.
We see bots and humans fighting side by side
in World War I, World War II, even a Samurai Transformer
posing for a pic with his buds in a medieval Japanese army.
So it seems pretty likely that most of the Transformers
movies moving forward will be prequels delving
deeper and deeper into this secret history.
Now, while talking to MTV, Bay even confirmed
that the Bubblebee movie, the only Transformers spinoff
that is for sure happening at the moment,
will be a backstory as well, chronicling the little yellow
bot's life before meeting up with the rest of
the Transformers on Earth at the start of the first movie.
But the big question we now have is where does all this
leave the Transformers 80's boys toys brethren G.I. Joe?
We've been hearing for some time now
that Hasbro has been wanting to blow out all their
major toy lines into a big ol' cinematic universe
because it's 2017 and that's just what you do in 2017.
But the fact that Transformers will be headed to the past
kind of conflicts with the latest news that we've gotten
on any upcoming G.I. Joe films.
In a recent interview with The Los Angeles Times,
Hasbro Studio Head, Stephen Davis,
said the company was looking to take a more contemporary
approach with the Joe franchise.
Now of course, contemporary approach
doesn't necessarily mean modern times setting.
But in this case, it probably does.
Couple that with the fact that director D.J. Caruso,
the man who was supposed to direct G.I. Joe III
until it got canceled in favor of a reboot,
said his original script for the project did end
with the two toy worlds colliding.
But now he thinks that won't happen until, quote,
"Mr. Bay is done with the Transformers."
So basically it seems like any potential Hasbro cinematic
universe rests entirely in the hands of Michael Bay.
I mean, that's (beep) saying something.
Obviously a successful cinematic universe
could be a big win for the company,
but not big enough to justify losing Bay,
one of the few consistently bankable directors
left in the industry.
(laughing)
And until he decides he wants to share his Transformers toys
with the other kids, or he just gets bored with them,
the Hasbro cinematic universe will have to wait.
But what do you guys think?
Could you imagine a Bay-less Transformers universe?
Or would you rather see the Joes and the Autobots
finally team up on the big screen?
Let's discuss.
(ambient electronic music)