Critical reception be damned, Paramount is pushing full steam ahead with its Transformers universe – and when Age of Extinction pulled in a staggering $1.1 billion worldwide in 2014, can you really blame them?
Nevertheless, word first broke late last week that a brand new trilogy was hatched at the studio, ensuring that a one-two-three punch of films would release across 2017, 2018 and 2019.
[zerg]In the style of Hollywood’s shared universes, though, it appears that two of these new installments will be numbered sequels. As a result, given that we already know Michael Bay will take point for 2017’s follow-up, all signs pointed to Paramount straying from the beaten path to nurture a spinoff, and the studio confirmed as much over the weekend by revealing 2018’s feature will indeed be a Bumblebee standalone film.
“This summer we worked closely with a talented team of A-list screenwriters to map out the future of the Transformers cinematic universe, and as [Hasbro President] Brian [Goldner] announced earlier, things kick off in a major way in 2017 with the release of Transformers 5 in June. And we’re working on a spin-off movie centered around Bumblebee for 2018 and the next chapter for 2019.”
Even factoring in the Bumblebee spinoff, Paramount’s plan for the next three years is an aggressive one. But having assembled such a star-studded writer’s room to steer the lucrative juggernaut in a new direction, we’re at the very least cautiously optimistic to see how the Transformers universe pans out.
We’ll begin to see the first signs of Paramount’s rebooted Transformers universe when Michael Bay’s latest – and likely final – installment opens on June 23, 2017.