The best live-action Transformers movie had the potential to become even better by introducing one major change to Michael Bay’s films. There seems to be an air of uncertainty surrounding what the future holds for the Transformers live-action franchise. While a Transformers/G.I. Joe Crossover film is reportedly in the works, not a lot seems to be known about how the franchise’s future installments will connect to the past. Recent films in the franchise, like Transformers: Rise of the Beasts and Transformers One, have significantly changed the overarching narrative direction.
While Rise of Beasts added some new Transformers characters to the mix, Transformers One gave the movie franchise a more comical and uplifting tone. In hindsight, it is hard not to see how the best live-action Transformers film paved the way for the franchise to take these recent narrative risks and explore new storytelling avenues. However, as beneficial as the film has been for reforming the live-action Transformers universe, it could have been even better if it had introduced one change.
Bumblebee Is The Best Live-Action Transformers Movie
Bumblebee Honored Steven Spielberg’s Vision For The Franchise
Long before Michael Bay was taken on board as the director of the first Transformers live-action movie, Steven Spielberg had envisioned the film as a depiction of a young boy’s heartwarming relationship with his car. Michael Bay, however, took the franchise in a significantly different direction with his movies, where the titular alien race was portrayed more as a narrative device rather than a central emotional character. While Bay’s movies have their own appeal, they seemingly forget what made the original cartoon successful in the first place.
Bumblebee, in contrast, was the first film in the Transformers live-action universe to truly honor Steven Spielberg’s vision by humanizing its titular robot character. Instead of focusing too much on endless action sequences and complex mythology, Bumblebee presented an emotionally resonant story of grief, identity, and finding one’s home. Although Bumblebee was not as successful at the box office as the Michael Bay movies, its new approach towards live-action storytelling in the franchise worked wonders and helped it garner an impressive Rotten Tomatoes score of 91%.
Bumblebee Could’ve Been Even Better If It Didn’t Try To Be A Bayverse Prequel
Bumblebee Should Have Been Its Own Thing
Although Bumblebee is widely considered a reboot, it was initially touted as a prequel to the Bayverse movies. Owing to this, the film ended up being somewhere between a reboot and a prequel, where it could neither have the identity of a standalone film nor sell itself as a direct extension of the Michael Bay Transformers universe. In hindsight, it is hard not to believe that Bumblebee would have benefited from completely dissociating itself from the parent live-action franchise instead of establishing loose ties that only created more confusion about its timeline.
Given how Bumblebee was paving the way for a new storytelling approach for the franchise, it should have been presented as its own thing instead of being portrayed as a loose prequel to the Bayverse.
Before Bumblebee hit the big screens, the Michael Bay formula for the franchise was already proving to be redundant and increasingly ineffective as each new installment was driving diminishing returns. Transformers: The Last Knight was not only panned by critics but also struggled to be as commercially successful as its predecessors. Given how Bumblebee was paving the way for a new storytelling approach for the franchise, it should have been presented as its own thing instead of being portrayed as a loose prequel to the Bayverse.
The Transformers Timeline Is In A Weird Place After Bumblebee & Rise Of The Beasts
The Franchise’s Timeline Is Becoming Increasingly Confusing
Both Bumblebee and Transformers: Rise of the Beasts attempted to drift away from the Bayverse. However, at the same time, they also established subtle connections to the Michael Bay movies, which have made the live-action franchise’s timeline increasingly muddled and difficult to follow. Despite being an animated film, Transformers One trod a similar path, where it was neither established as a separate film nor confirmed to be a direct prequel of the films in the live-action universe.
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With the introduction of the upcoming G.I. Joe crossover, the franchise might find itself in an even weirder place, where the established boundaries between timelines and universes will likely become even more blurred. Owing to this, viewers would be better off focusing less on continuity in the franchise and more on what new installments can offer. Hopefully, though, future additions to the Transformers live-action franchise will do a better job of establishing whether they are direct extensions of the original universe of standalone stories with their own continuity.
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Bumblebee
8/10
- Release Date
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December 15, 2018
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Transformers: Rise of the Beasts
- Release Date
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June 6, 2023
- Runtime
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127 minutes
- Director
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Steven Caple Jr.
- Writers
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Erich Hoeber, Jon Hoeber, Joby Harold, Darnell Metayer, Josh Peters
- Producers
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Brian Oliver, Don Murphy, Duncan Henderson, Lorenzo di Bonaventura, Michael Bay, Steven Spielberg, Tom DeSanto, Bradley J. Fischer, Brian Goldner, Dana Goldberg, David Ellison, Don Granger, Mark Vahradian
