The Energon Pub

[guarayakha]

Sequels, I can understand, but spinoffs? What, are we getting a movie entirely about Mr's Witwicky's weed trip?

[SlyTF1]

Sequels, I can understand, but spinoffs? What, are we getting a movie entirely about Mr's Witwicky's weed trip?

A standalone movie for the Dinobots, a Beast Wars movie, a movie about survivors still stuck on post-apocalyptic Cybertron, a more in depth look at the first Primes. There's so much. A Lockdown prequel would be badass.

The Allspark was likely made by the Creators as a new way to either make life or as an energy source but was lost from them and drifted off into space until it stopped to create Cybertron and the Transformers and as for the Knight's relation to the Primes well who's to say that the Knights themselves were a part of a legend that probably say that the Primes were either made or inspired by the Knights of Cybertron to help Cybertron further which helps explain how Sentinel and Optimus share the same helmet design, and as for Optimus perhaps he's likely one of the newly made Knights the creators made that had him carry the same descendent genes have elements that the Primes past him got thus making him still be the last descendent of the Primes but in a different manner. I could be all wrong in the end but if I'm right in that we'll see how Optimus fits into this in the 5th and 6th installments then we'll see if it'll make sense or not.

See, that's all fine and well, but it's us fans who have to come up with all these answers to fill in these holes since there's no official media to do that job for us. We shouldn't have to do the job that the fiction is supposed to do, as that's a sign of inadequate writing.

Why are you so sure the sequels won't answer those questions. It was obvious that the movie was vague on those details for a reason.

[Flashwave]

Actually, I think SPin-offs woyld be great for this. Every movie has a different cast anyway and a different, vaguely overlapping story to tell. Mostly, Prime, Bee, and a human or two are the only bridging elements. So a SPin-off, would sctually fit very well into the current TF:Movie formula, and in cases of NEST or Cemetary Wind-centric stories, be a platofrm where the majority of the movie is again, Human Driven, with minimal (expensive) TF special effects.

Sequels, I can understand, but spinoffs? What, are we getting a movie entirely about Mr's Witwicky's weed trip?

A standalone movie for the Dinobots, a Beast Wars movie, a movie about survivors still stuck on post-apocalyptic Cybertron, a more in depth look at the first Primes. There's so much. A Lockdown prequel would be badass.

i like the lennox idea, but Ia gree, Spinoffs could be fun.

Sequels, I can understand, but spinoffs? What, are we getting a movie entirely about Mr's Witwicky's weed trip?

A standalone movie for the Dinobots, a Beast Wars movie, a movie about survivors still stuck on post-apocalyptic Cybertron, a more in depth look at the first Primes. There's so much. A Lockdown prequel would be badass.

The Allspark was likely made by the Creators as a new way to either make life or as an energy source but was lost from them and drifted off into space until it stopped to create Cybertron and the Transformers and as for the Knight's relation to the Primes well who's to say that the Knights themselves were a part of a legend that probably say that the Primes were either made or inspired by the Knights of Cybertron to help Cybertron further which helps explain how Sentinel and Optimus share the same helmet design, and as for Optimus perhaps he's likely one of the newly made Knights the creators made that had him carry the same descendent genes have elements that the Primes past him got thus making him still be the last descendent of the Primes but in a different manner. I could be all wrong in the end but if I'm right in that we'll see how Optimus fits into this in the 5th and 6th installments then we'll see if it'll make sense or not.

See, that's all fine and well, but it's us fans who have to come up with all these answers to fill in these holes since there's no official media to do that job for us. We shouldn't have to do the job that the fiction is supposed to do, as that's a sign of inadequate writing.

Why are you so sure the sequels won't answer those questions. It was obvious that the movie was vague on those details for a reason.

I thinkk the movie was vague about SOME things for a reason. Like who the Creators are, but these movies still have a habit of leaving a lot of info out.

[Megatron Wolf]

spin offs might be the way to go, bay cant write & direct them all (even though he'll sure as hell try) so that means at least one will be good. Or this could make things even worse its a 50/50 shot either way.

[Stuartmaximus]

So does this mean that we may be getting those end credits scenes that other Marvel films are always doing? Although I'm still skeptical whether we'll get to see Unicron in the movies coz it looks like Bay still has some involvement in the making of those films.....+ he's stayed away from having Unicron in the previous 4!

One thing......If this really does happen(the expanded universe thing) & it doesn't turn out to be an unmitigated disaster...then a crossover with GI Joe could become more credible(yes.....I know they were considering this already, just makes it more of a possibility....that's all) & maybe even other crossovers with the likes of Spiderman ect! + didn't Marvel have something to do with the Transformers comics or something? so the possibilities are endless! maybe even a live action tv series(maybe in the vein of something like Agents Of Shield as we follow NEST's perspective...or something like that) or failing that.......a CG one(something like Star Wars Rebels), who knows?

[jrgreer74]

I can give a possible explanation to those questions. If I was writing for them, which I'm not obviously, I'd spin it with a simple answer. The creators used the "seed" bombs to harness the metals needed to create the Transformers as AOE states, that metal was then "energized" with the AllSpark energy like in the first film, the part with Simmons and the phone. Except more in the line with the G1 continuity of it being a factory assembly line, when the creators produced them more as slave labor than individuals (G1 cartoon: War Dawn). The Transformers rebel and in time a select few Leaders come out of the wood work, A3 (Alpha Trion)style. These leaders become the original Knights (AOE), who finally over throw the "Creators" which really are like the Quintessons. After the war they eventually set out to rid the universe of the influence of the "Creators", and to spread out to other worlds(Speed, Beast, etc. - Cybertron cartoon and comics). Alpha Trion, an original Knight stays behind to document the events on Cybertron as in the WFC, FOC, and comics continuity.
Alpha Trion helps to build their civilization after the war, and once it flourishes a government is needed. The line of the "Primes" is formed. "Primes" being more like a Counsel of Elders. They help guide civilization in a government form, allowing AT to document history.
Optimus becomes a "Knight" in a symbolic sense because he is a leader in the Counsel of Elders. He would be honored as a knight, in remembrance of the leaders before him, the real "Knights". This would sum him up both as a "Prime" and as a "Knight". All "Primes" would be a continuation of the "Knights". The "Knights" born from war, the "Primes" from leadership in Government. In times of conflict, the "Primes" would assume the roll of their ancestors, and fight as "Knights". Optimus becomes a member of the Council, during the early start of the conflict, due to his involvement with the gladiator Megatron, he is seen as an asset to members of the Council. The "Prime" of the time, be it Zeta or Sentinal - you pick your poison, in his arrogance ignores the warnings, and the pleas to end the caste style of government (WFC,FOC,comics). The Great War breaks out again following the aligned continuity, until a focal point is reached with the original film.
This is a perfect point in the film franchise to kick out the BS, and include all continuities (kind of like I have here) and open up all areas of spin-offs and the like.
My spin here could literally open up everything from all continuities, and I'm nobody. Imagine what it could be if someone who knows more and truly has a deep understanding of the stuff that has already been presented was to use all that history and include it in some sensible way. They could even come up with why Zeta and Sentinal both were "Primes" at the same time continuity wise, like Zeta became Prime because Sentinal disappeared when the Ark was shot down causing it to crash on the moon! Zeta was Vice-Prime and became Prime if something happened to Sentinal, the real Prime. Something! Anything, if steered in the appropriate manner could set the stage for what they want here. All it takes is a mind open to ideas and able to think inside and outside of the box we call the aligned continuity. The problem here I feel is that each writer wants something new and that's okay in it's proper place, but to accomplish the mission as I see it here, they need to stay within the lines that have already been drawn out for them. We don't need another person looking for a "name" for themselves in Hollywood here. Fix it first, then hire the guy next time with the mind to expand the franchise further. It can't be that hard! Sure at the end give the guy credit, but if he is looking only to get the credit and a name - send him packing. We have had enough of that. It just makes things harder to fix later!
And here I end my very long rant. God, I feel so much better now!
So, because I know some of you will anyway - Let the begin!

[MarkNL]

Great. This means a lot more Bay formers clogging up the toy isle, and continuing to confuse people when I mention I'm a Transformers fan.

Exactly. I was thinking the same.

How about if we put the IDW blokes in charge of the writing?

Good idea!

[noctorro]

Earlier today,

OMG, this look SOO AWESOME!!!

Yes, make moar, maybe not so high budget to create more creative freedom.
Great idea!

[noctorro]

don't look like a soup can in a blender.

First I was like meh, another bay hater.
Then this and I was
I still have ROTF Leader Megz and still need to attach that third party arm.
He's awesome but so true

[Genericon]

They should just lay it to rest for 5-10 years, then reboot it.

[OptimalOptimus2]

Transformers being expanded with spin-offs and sequels? That doesn't sound like a bad idea. Like what Seibertron said, there could be potential for a Beast Wars film. Maybe the GoBots will return. A Junkion movie? The possibilities are endless.

Though there is one problem. Paramount is talking to Bay, again. Which will bring me to my next question. Why is there a lack of commitment to direct the Transformers movies by other directors? It won't hurt their character.

[Noideaforaname]

So a franchise that totally ignores it's own continuity and needed to rely on China last time is trying to ape another studio that has the next decade planned out?

What could possibly go wrong?

[Va'al]

Paramount is talking to Bay, again. Which will bring me to my next question. Why is there a lack of commitment to direct the Transformers movies by other directors? It won't hurt their character.

I do not believe it's lack of commitment from other directors, it's more that not a lot of current directors are into the style that Bay has so far set for the Paramount franchise, along with Orci, Kurtzman and Kruger. The writing might change for future projects, as we've just seen with the news, but the films (in Paramount's eyes) are doing great so far - especially with non-US audiences (China was a big revenue with Age of Extinction).

If you compare, for example, Pacific Rim and Transformers - both have mechs, senseless fights, shaky scripts and just general nerdery, but one carries the burden of a Bay aesthetics, the other of Del Toro. One is known for explosions, the other for intriguing, eery character design. And though they both had fairly simple humour a lot of the time, and cheesy references, and the such, the Del Toro/Beacham script somehow worked and tapped into elements of the audience (including, and this is crucial, disillusioned robot fans who turned down Transformers) that spoke to nostalgia, a desire to see characterisation the first time round in a robot film, without the grittiness or over-seriousness of a Blomkamp or Aronofsky.

Paramount had four attempts at getting its audience interested. By AoE, there was little more it could do with those viewers who gave up.

[Desslok2201]

Paramount had four attempts at getting its audience interested. By AoE, there was little more it could do with those viewers who gave up.

[dragons]

http://variety.com/2014/film/news/transformers-4-1-billion-box-office-1201274581/

Found this out yesturday wasnt to excited aabout it but it should be intersting Ido like series we had better than having boring blocky alein robots look to blocky in bot modes they acturally look like alien robots compared to some comics out there g1 scorponok head master same size as grimlock,

[Madeus Prime]

I don't know whether to cackle in mad laughter or break down into tears of sorrow and hatred.

[Convoy]

I think we're forgetting the obvious spinoffs.

Explosions: The Movie

Pee and Fart Jokes: The Movie

Horny Animals: The Movie

And of course, my favorite,

Shrill People Screaming: The Movie

I know there's more but it's not fun to think about and not all that funny when I think of another to add to the list.

[kaijuguy19]

Sequels, I can understand, but spinoffs? What, are we getting a movie entirely about Mr's Witwicky's weed trip?

A standalone movie for the Dinobots, a Beast Wars movie, a movie about survivors still stuck on post-apocalyptic Cybertron, a more in depth look at the first Primes. There's so much. A Lockdown prequel would be badass.

The Allspark was likely made by the Creators as a new way to either make life or as an energy source but was lost from them and drifted off into space until it stopped to create Cybertron and the Transformers and as for the Knight's relation to the Primes well who's to say that the Knights themselves were a part of a legend that probably say that the Primes were either made or inspired by the Knights of Cybertron to help Cybertron further which helps explain how Sentinel and Optimus share the same helmet design, and as for Optimus perhaps he's likely one of the newly made Knights the creators made that had him carry the same descendent genes have elements that the Primes past him got thus making him still be the last descendent of the Primes but in a different manner. I could be all wrong in the end but if I'm right in that we'll see how Optimus fits into this in the 5th and 6th installments then we'll see if it'll make sense or not.

See, that's all fine and well, but it's us fans who have to come up with all these answers to fill in these holes since there's no official media to do that job for us. We shouldn't have to do the job that the fiction is supposed to do, as that's a sign of inadequate writing.

Why are you so sure the sequels won't answer those questions. It was obvious that the movie was vague on those details for a reason.

Agreed. Perhaps AOE could have done a better job at that regard but all the same I'm liking that they're starting to lay out some interesting plot lines that can take place which I hope will be explained and answer eventually which is another thing I like about AOE. It manages to find a way to keep me interested at how they story progresses. I would have been fine with DOTM endeding the series but again AOE has managed to find a way to keep on with the story for at least two more films if I'm right.

[Fires_Of_Inferno]

Yeah. Hasbro isn't good at making a streamlined continuity, and the Transformers movies are all horribly written. Good luck getting a decent Marvel Universe-esque game plan out of that fecal maelstrom. The best they could do is their current string of dumb action movies. Which, while they're horribly written, are at least fun to watch when the transformers are actually fighting and don't have the US Air Force save them. At least the Autobots were better written in AOE.

They need new writers, director, and new producer.

[padfoo]

Crap! I was excited until I saw Micheal Bay mentioned in there.

[griftimus prime]

paramount is the one who waited on bay to make tf4. tf5 could be coming out next year if they did not stop making the movies.

but we hear this stuff from them after every movie.

[ricemazter]

I'm going to go ahead and vote for a reboot. With the film's continuity the way it is, read nonexistent since AOE, they don't really have anything to lose. Its not like the vast majority of the people who go to see these care about the plot, so I'm sure the masses won't mind if paramount pulls a Sony and starts over.

The thing I don't get is the spin-offs. Why spin offs? Any story they tell involving the transformers could probably still be called transformers: (rise of the age of the MacGuffin name-dropped from the fiction). If they're doing a spin-off for the human characters/groups where the transformers are in the background, well, they already did that four times. If they make a movie about, say, NEST, a clandestine military group working under the radar, without involving the transformers at all then there are a million other movies with that generic premise. Using the NEST name won't matter since I bet we're the only ones that cared enough to remember. Just make a generic hu-man action movie if that's what you want.

The reason spin-offs, arguably, work for other franchises, mainstream comics, is that enough people, hopefully, care about a particular element or character of the story, and making a movie about that element won't fit under the banner of the first story. The other thing is that a lot of the background characters in Marvel, for example, have their own established comic series and lore separate from whatever the main story was about. In transformers we just kind of have an overarching continuity in which everything is handled in more or less the same framework. Bumblebee, though his own developed character outside the movies, doesn't have his own lore, doesn't have his own rogues gallery or anything like that. Nothing, that I know of, fits the bill of Marvel style spin-offs since nothing in Transformers is separate from anything else in transformers.

The biggest problem I have with the movies is that everyone involved seems to be trying their hardest to not make a transformers film. We can't have a story about Optimus Prime or the autobots, it has to be about Shia Laboof, Marky Mark, or military man for that "human" element which Paramount seems to think people go to a TRANSFORMERS to see. We can't have Optimus Prime fighting Lockdown or hound mowing down decepticons without Mark being in the foreground because whatever he has to contribute, they think, is so much more interesting than the robots. If you want to make a transformers movie, then make one. If you want to make a generic action movie, make one. Don't go halfway for fear of losing general audiences.

(sorry for the rant, but this has bothering me for a while about this movies and I just figured out how to articulate it)

[SlyTF1]

So a franchise that totally ignores it's own continuity and needed to rely on China last time is trying to ape another studio that has the next decade planned out?

What could possibly go wrong?

When did it ignore its continuity?

[kaijuguy19]

Even if they did come out with a reboot there's still going to be people who are going to complain and have problems with it one way or another even if they're better made. We'll still have people who'll gripe on about how they're not as blocky or G1,how they don't have alt modes that are accurate to G1 and in some instances we'd still have critics who'll still scoff at the idea of giant robots leading the movie I mean from what I've read it happened before in the 86 movie. Also keep in mind that the people behind the reboot may make it not any better then the current ones or else even worse. As much as Bay gets a lot of flak from the movie industry in America and the geek fandom in general there are FAR worse directors out there.

Besides the spin offs may not even happen for the current movies since the current series seems to be losing steam. Yeah China's move goers were able to help AOE but that doesn't mean it'll be the same for the fifth and sixth installments. If they do have plans to do a spin off series it would be best to save it for the reboot series.

[ricemazter]

So a franchise that totally ignores it's own continuity and needed to rely on China last time is trying to ape another studio that has the next decade planned out?

What could possibly go wrong?

When did it ignore its continuity?

The movies themselves have been ignoring continuity for a while now. For example, between the third and second movies, the specifics of whatever megatron's plans were which have been in the works for millions of years are all over the place. First he wants to use the allspark to make a transformer army, which he does by chasing the allspark into space. Then somehow we find out he's been in contact with an extra dimensional being all that time working on a different plan to consume the earth's sun to fuel the young transformer army he apparently already had. Then, on top of that he's been in league with the former autobot leader all this time to bring cybertron to earth and use humanity as slave labor. How he had all of these going on simultaneously makes no sense to me.

The most egregious example is AOE. All this time, IDW comics have generally been filling in the plot holes, but AOE tells us that instead of the transformer race being created by the dynasty of primes using the allspark to create the transformers in order to set up solar harvesters to continually fuel the cube and cybertron, they were instead made by a completely different race of aliens who used bombs to turn planet surfaces into the transformium metal, harvested said metal, and physically built them. Never mind all the stuff about the knights conflicting somewhat with the idea of the original primes. How the new information fits with the old, if at all, is completely up in the air at this point.