Fourteen?! That may seem to be a tad excessive, but the TRANSFORMERS franchise has continued to be very reliable when it comes to bringing in the big-bucks. Still…fourteen! While speaking with MTV at CinemaCon, Michael Bay revealed that there are fourteen stories written for the TRANSFORMERS franchise, which includes both main saga movies and spin-offs.
Of course there's no guarantee that we'll actually see all these movies, but it seems that the TRANSFORMERS writers room, consisting of Akiva Goldsman (A BEAUTIFUL MIND), Art Marcum & Matt Holloway (IRON MAN), Ken Nolan (BLACK HAWK DOWN) Zak Penn (READY PLAYER ONE), Lindsey Beer (BARBIE), Geneva Robertson-Dworet (TOMB RAIDER), Christina Hodson (BUMBLEBEE), Steven DeKnight (Daredevil), Jeff Pinkner (Fringe) and Andrew Barrer & Gabriel Ferrari (ANT-MAN) certainly hasn't been idle over the past two years. Following the release of TRANSFORMERS: THE LAST KNIGHT, the next TRANSFORMERS movie on the slate will be BUMBLEBEE, a spin-off centered around the much-loved robot in the years before he joined forces with Sam Witwicky (Shia LaBeouf). The spin-off will be directed by Travis Knight (KUBO AND THE TWO STRINGS) and will be released on June 8, 2018.
There's been a bit of a running joke regarding Michael Bay and his frequent declarations of "this will be my final TRANSFORMERS movie," but it seemed that THE LAST KNIGHT really would be Bay's final outing. However, when asked by MTV whether he would actually be leaving the director's chair behind, Bay seemed to be having second thoughts as he wouldn't commit either way, merely saying that he was having fun editing THE LAST KNIGHT. Sigh. Even if Bay doesn't return for another TRANSFORMERS sequel, he seems keen on taking the helm of one of the spin-off movies, so, whether you like it or not, Michael Bay's association with the franchise will likely continue.
TRANSFORMERS: THE LAST KNIGHT is set for a June 23, 2017 release.