Next Transformers film is called Transformers: Rise of The Beasts

Earlier today, Paramount held a virtual event for the upcoming Transformers 7 film. They revealed the title as Transformers: RISE OF THE BEASTS during the event and via this press release. Attending the virtual event were Lorenzo di Bonaventura (Producer), Steven Caple, Jr (Director), actors Anthony Ramos and Dominique Fishback along with moderator Anthony Brenzican (from Vanity Fair). Here are my notes from today's exciting TRANSFORMERS Production Kickoff Virtual Event Confirmation with Paramount:

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Transformers 7 Production kick-off event

Director: Steven Caple, Jr
Moderator: Anthony Brenzican
Producer: Lorenzo di Bonaventura

• Caple talked Beast Wars.
• Title of next movie is Transformers Rise of the Beasts
• Prehistoric, Predacons
• Moderator mentioned Maximals, Predacons and "Terrorcons"? Not sure if he misspoke on Terrorcons.
• Lorenzo talked about finding a new set of priorities with this direction.
• Going to see new villains and Autobots we've never seen before.
• Mentioned that Transformers has a lot of "tribes" and this movie is going to bring a lot of these "tribes" together.
• Director mentioned Terrorcons again, so apparently not a mistake earlier. Terrorcons will disrupt the movie.
• Difference between Predacons and Terrorcons. Predacons are more reptillian. Building a backstory to Predacons.
• Predacons are the natural enemy of the Maximals.
• Terrorcons are in opposition to the Autobots.
• There will be some Decepticons in the movie.
• 5 factions mentioned so far.
• Terrorcons will threaten everyone.
• Rise of the Beast time period will place around 1994.
• Sounds like it will still be in the Bayverse. Intentionally setting it in 90s so that it doesn't cut into time period of Bay films.
• 90s are rich in texture, mentioned music, and energy from the 90s. Director used the word "grit" to describe this era.
• Drawing some inspiration from popular 90s films.
• Will be a journey!
• Lorenzo discussed how they are privileged to be part of this franchise. Access point are the human characters to get access to the Transformers characters.

Locations discussed:

• New York City (Brooklyn) ... travel through New York, but Brooklyn is main area.
• Peru, jungle, Monchu Pichu (sp?), beautiful landscapes, beautiful people. Incan traditions and how it impacts storyline.

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Characters in Transformers Rise of the Beasts

Transformers characters discussed:

• Main robot character ... is Optimus Prime, has a much more G1 flair. Cleaner look. Steven: "We are going G1 with Optimus Prime". Bringing the story back to see how (why?) Optimus Prime becomes the leader that we know. He's "new" to Earth. This film is forming why he wants to protect humans. Peter Cullen is returning as Optimus Prime.
• Bumblebee as a Classic Z28 Camaro, but with an offroad kit on it. Literally called it Offroad Bumblebee.
• Another Autobot ally ... Mirage is a silver Porsche 911 with blue detailing. Why not Jazz??? Rebel of the group. Anti-authority character. Lorenzo said Mirage has always been able to transform into other vehicles. Not sure what he was talking about? Mirage takes a prominence that is significant to the movie.
• Arcee is 4th Autobot mentioned. Loyal soldier to Prime. Voice of reason. She transformers into a Motorcycle. Dakatti 916?
• Another female Transformer is Nightbird. Vehicle form reminds me of Cybertron Runamuck. Transforms into a GTR. Still a ninja. Looks really cool. She's a Terrorcon. Lorenzo stated that she has had flexible allegiances in the past?
• Different villain than Megatron. Big bad this time around is Scourge (but a different version than we've seen before). Leader of the Terrorcons. Looks like it might have a truck form or something. Large crane claw on left hand. Smokestacks behind shoulders with black smoke coming out of them. Sounds like a bounty hunter of sorts. Loves to collect Autobots and Maximals and tears off their faction symbols and wears them. Character design art by "Del Rio".
• Beast Wars characters: Airazor. She's the heart of the Maximals. Rustic in design. Aged texture. Looks a bit rusty. Realistic mechanical beasts. Kind of gives me a Beast Machines vibe.
• Rhinox is here as well. Looks like Headstrong. Likes to ram things. "Wants to use that horn!"
• Optimus Primal as a gorilla. Has a traditional Maximal symbol on his chest. Not sure if that's final or not. Has hair on back of forearms and back of shoulders.

Human characters discussed:

• Actors brought into conversation: Anothony Ramos and Dominique Fishback.
• Dominique's character: playing Elena, works at a museum, trying to get a leg up in life, boss keeps taking credit for work she does. Intelligent person. Artifact researcher. Sophisticated thinker. New Yorker. If I recall correctly, she mentioned that she got into Transformers because of Shia and the first Michael Bay Transformers film.
• Anothy's character: Noah, is from Brooklyn. Sort of like a father figure to his brother. All about taking care of home and family. Ex-military. Trying to find his way after came back home. Lower income. Hustling. Amazing with electronics. Anything electronic can fix. One thing he loves about Noah is his tenacity, heart, and will to never quit. Amazing to see his journey as humans meet Transformers in film. Anthony said Beast Wars was his Transformers.

Recap of characters discussed during today's event:

• Anthony Ramos as "Noah"
• Dominique Fishback as "Elena"
• Optimus Prime
• Bumblebee
• Arcee
• Mirage
• Nightbird
• Scourge
• Airazor
• Rhinox
• Optimus Primal

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Questions from the audience:

Are there practical elements to the film? Practical versus digital elements. Lorenzo says most of these movies are practical with digital effects enhancing the practical. The more you create "real", the more real the CG effects look. Steven: Cheat code for visual is partly the locations / scenery.

Daniel Cribb: What was some of main concerns coming into the legacy of Transformers?
Steven: balancing out what has come before and what he's going to bring to the table. Making sure people are feeling something new / fresh to the table. Something honest. Finding a relatability, a way to connect. Listens, close ear to the ground to hear what people are saying.

Rise of the Beasts will be more of a larger spectacle and not a smaller initimate film like Bumblebee.

Will there be rap music involved in the film? You will feel '94. Hip hop culture. You will feel Brooklyn. Will have a great soundtrack.


Who is your favorite Transformer and why?

Lorenzo: evolved over time. Ironhide originally because his son's favorite character. Bumblebee has been his favorite.

Steven: you haven't met his favorite character yet because it's in Rise of the Beasts. Loves Prime. Ironhide is a cool character. Of course 'Bee. Gonna be some dope characters he's going to introduce in this film.

Nice!

Seeing Beast Wars characters in live action will be cool.

Glad to see synopsis match the title.

Edit:Peter Cullen is back?HYPE

Looks Arcee will Transformers Prime inspired.Awesome.

Between this, Shattered Glass Goldbug, the new Sea of Thieves update released this morning, and me prepping for deployment to Korea, today’s been one helluva Tuesday. Please don’t be an incoherent mess, that’s all I ask…

This is very interesting news. Part of me loves the idea of all the factions. I'll give it a watch.

Though I guess this means the return of the bayverse vs reboot arguments -_-

Could be neat, Bee’s new Camaro mode sounds cool!

In regards to connections to the Bayverse, I’m guessing this will be like Bumblebee in that it does it’s own thing story-wise but pulls a few things from the Bayverse.

Im wonderong by scourge are they reffering to the original nemesis prime scourge, i mean he was a truck after all

Seibertron wrote:[*]Sounds like it will still be in the Bayverse. Intentionally setting it in 90s so that it doesn't cut into time period of Bay films.

Welp, there goes my excitement for this movie

Brutal brawl wrote:Im wonderong by scourge are they reffering to the original nemesis prime scourge, i mean he was a truck after all

This having Beast in the title,make me believe he will also have Cybertron Scourge elements

Sounds bad, good luck on the bad guy wearing maximal insignias that hes torn off when they aren't physical hahaha

While interesting, I still feel less then enthusiastic. This feels like it will have too many robots to tell a good story about the robots themselves, which means it will once again be a transformers movie not actually about the transformers and just story about goofy people caught in a robot apocalypse. The Bumblebee movie wasn't perfect, but it was a huge step in the right direction for telling a good Transformers story about the Transformers. I am not saying to cut the humans out of the story. In fact, you really can't, as they serve as an audience proxy as well as establishing scale.

Still, I want to believe in the movie franchise, and I want to have hope that it will be a fun ride. Fingers crossed!

The concept overall sounds interesting. It is odd for me to still see some people (on other sites) up in arms about the use of character names. I mean name slapping has occurred since the first film, and I didn't expect it to change here.

I'm glad they confirmed it's a sequel to BB, and in a different continuity to films 1-5. Also 1994... was quite a nostalgic year for me. It was when I graduated High School. (yes I'm old). It will be interesting to see how they interpret the time period. Also it would have been a neat little not to set in 1996, when BW officially came out, but it's ok. Yes I was 20 years old watching BW, giving it a chance (I had my doubts but never hated on it). I watched the early premiere in Spring, and when S1 fully rolled out in the fall, I woke up super early each Monday Tuesday (and sometimes Wednesday) to record it. From the time I saw the Starscream cameo in episode 3 I knew there was hope, and the show didn't disappoint.

Hrm… I don’t want to sound like a negative jerk but I have a terrible feeling about this already.

Reading through that post, it seems the same group of people ignoring source material, doing whatever they want to, and then at the same time ironically tying to “please” every type of fan all at once at the same time as they try to please themselves too by making up their own characters and then just working with/trying to clunkily tie all these characters together…..

Honestly, it sounds overly complicated/convoluted already and like it’s going to be a huge mess. Really hope I’m wrong. The good news is that I’m wrong all the time, so fingers crossed!

o.supreme wrote:The concept overall sounds interesting. It is odd for me to still see some people (on other sites) up in arms about the use of character names. I mean name slapping has occurred since the first film, and I didn't expect it to change here.

I'm glad they confirmed it's a sequel to BB, and in a different continuity to films 1-5. Also 1994... was quite a nostalgic year for me. It was when I graduated High School. (yes I'm old). It will be interesting to see how they interpret the time period. Also it would have been a neat little not to set in 1996, when BW officially came out, but it's ok. Yes I was 20 years old watching BW, giving it a chance (I had my doubts but never hated on it). I watched the early premiere in Spring, and when S1 fully rolled out in the fall, I woke up super early each Monday Tuesday (and sometimes Wednesday) to record it. From the time I saw the Starscream cameo in episode 3 I knew there was hope, and the show didn't disappoint.

Urm they didn't say it was set in a different continuity...

i will reserve judgment until i see who's writing it.

Rhinox is here as well. Looks like Headstrong. Likes to ram things. "Wants to use that horn!"
Not a fan of that Rhinox description . Rhinox is the Computer expert/medic of the Maximals come on guys its not that hard. the only brute force Rhinox liked using was his chain guns of doom.

megamanfan wrote:i will reserve judgment until i see who's writing it.

Joby Harold

This probably would've been really exciting news that would've got me super-hyped..........ten years ago. But just reading through all of the confirmed information here, it just sounds like Rise of the Beasts is throwing any old shit at the wall to see what sticks. G1 Optimus, Beast Wars, Prime-inspired Predacons, RID 2001-sounding Scourge as a Lockdown knock-off, Nightbird....it sounds like something I would've written as fan fiction when I was a teenager. I'll wait for trailers and reviews and such before I decide whether or not to see it, but so far I'm not completely sold.

Ok, I'm back.

I will say that Scourge seems awesome. Cross between Cybertron and RiD Scourge and BH Predaking with a flaming goatee? Sign me up for his Studio Series figure

So far from what I've read, I really am only interested in the Terrorcon faction. And my goodness Scourge sounds so badass, none of the others caught my attention but he sure did. I would Love a leader class figure of him with some smoke effects. It seems they were shown concept art, has that leaked/been shown to the public?

I think the big thing that will be dragging the movie down for me, is the human characters and that it is supposed to be a heist. Like why do they have to do a heist, they are giant alien robots they can walk up and take whatever it is. The human characters, based off the descriptions, are going to be boring and unoriginal cleishas.

Hopefully the movie can surprise me, but I currently only have 1 expectation of anything good, and that is Scourge.

I want to be excited. I do. And part of me is. But if you read between the lines, so much of Lorenzo’s stupid comments are leaning towards everything that made the bayverse a mistake. But what pisses me off is that they refuse to separate this from the bayverse. Not because I hate the bayverse, but because it’s just going to start making less and less sense with these bigger scale events happening closer to the events of the ‘07 movie. What happened in BB barely slipped by with continuity with the first film, but now this?? 5 different factions, dozens of new characters, and major battles all just 15 years before the first movie? And the continuity is expected to stay in line?? Holy crap, I really hate Lorenzo. And yes, I’m blaming this all on him. Based off of the last 15 years of press and experience with him on these movies, I’ve learned how much he throws these films down the hell hole. Gosh, I hope I’m wrong. I hope he’s just yapping away as usual and not indicating the actual result of the movie.

Reaction on twitter is mostly positive/cautious optimism. Most negatives have just been on the humans (though i suspect the announcement of casting for Disney Snow White will take the spotlight off this film for non-tf fans). Everyone is largely pleased this isn't connected to the bayverse films...which is weird as I can't find any straight statement on that

Sigh. After Bumblebee I dared to hope we could have nice things.

But this sounds like the sort of incoherent mess we've come to expect from the Bayverse.

I'm guessing that there was a desire from Hasbro to push Beast Wars to line up with Kingdom and just generally because 90s kids are hitting prime nostalgia buying years, and a desire from Paramount to be a follow-up to Bumblebee set in the 90s and a desire from di Bonaventura to do another "big" Transformers movie and maintain continuity with the Bay films, and nobody at all stopped and said, "Wait, do we actually have, y'know, a story here?"

Hope I'm wrong. But they've done zero to earn the benefit of the doubt.

As long as it is as good as the Bumble Bee movie I'm down.

Speaking as a diehard fan of Beast Wars, that is a really stupid title.

Like, it sounds like a placeholder name that never got changed.

Man having 4-5 factions (Depending if the Decepticons are in the movie) in one movie plus humans certainly sounds like a great idea for having Transformers be the main starts with plenty of screen time.

Because it wasn't like we never had trouble with just the 2 base factions already noooooo.

Like the details sound cool on paper until you realize this is just going to be a mess regardless of which continuity it is in because just cramming a lot of characters doesn't make for a good film, which gets to my point of potentially creatively restricting themselves by making the movies take place in the same continuity as Bayverse which means the they have to stick to the past while we have to acknowledge what eventually happens in the other films.

Since ya know, any Autobot who wasn't alive by TLK is more than likely dead unless they took off in a space ship and decided to not showed up when Optimus asked Autobots to come to Earth in 2007.


Same with Arcee here, if she's the same Arcee as ROTF I sure can't wait to get invested in a character in this film who in the future gets ceremoniously killed off in a bit part after 2 lines during ROTF, same with Mirage if he's the same guy as Dino who was going to be called Mirage in DOTM.

If this actually ends up being a good film I'm going to be surprised, I really want to be optimistic but hey I was optimistic for literally every sequel after 2007 which only DOTM really got anywhere close to decency.

Last but maybe not least: The title is dumb, who uses "Rise of" in a movie title these days? Love the creativity placed into it.

Seriously why is this film being made now?

Would it not make more sense to do an individual Autobots vs Decepticons movie sequel to Bumblebee and a individual Beast Wars films to set up these characters before bringing them together to take on the Terrocons?

All the "lack of screen time" issues people complained about before is going to repeat themselves again.

Edit: I'll list a positive, in a vacuum the announced characters do sound cool and I'm grateful their not doing a straight G1 retread, I was hoping for something with a scale similar to the 2007 movie where we had a core group of good guys and bad guys like say 6-7 Autobots vs 7-8 Decepticons.

ZeroWolf wrote:Everyone is largely pleased this isn't connected to the bayverse films...which is weird as I can't find any straight statement on that

It was originally stated on TFW, unfortunately I don't have the original article saved, and it has since been edited

TFW2005 wrote:.Note: additional notes and clarification have been added since the original article was posted.

My guess is something was posted that wasn't supposed to be, or they were just making corrections. Producers are just probably trying to keep their neutral stance, because if they actually pick a side, then no matter what, one group will not be happy. I guess it is better to keep everyone guessing and bickering with each other, even though it's pretty obvious the events in BB don't match up with TF 1-5

o.supreme wrote:

ZeroWolf wrote:Everyone is largely pleased this isn't connected to the bayverse films...which is weird as I can't find any straight statement on that

It was originally stated on TFW, unfortunately I don't have the original article saved, and it has since been edited

TFW2005 wrote:.Note: additional notes and clarification have been added since the original article was posted.

My guess is something was posted that wasn't supposed to be, or they were just making corrections. Producers are just probably trying to keep their neutral stance, because if they actually pick a side, then no matter what, one group will not be happy. I guess it is better to keep everyone guessing and bickering with each other, even though it's pretty obvious the events in BB don't match up with TF 1-5

Their latest edit confirms this film is part of the Bayverse:

"This will show how Optimus becomes the leader he was in Bay movies. "

I guess they went the prequel route afterall.

Ryan said the same in his assessment for our site.

Also to be fully honest with all of you, what intrigues me most now is the toyline.

william-james88 wrote:

o.supreme wrote:

ZeroWolf wrote:Everyone is largely pleased this isn't connected to the bayverse films...which is weird as I can't find any straight statement on that

It was originally stated on TFW, unfortunately I don't have the original article saved, and it has since been edited

TFW2005 wrote:.Note: additional notes and clarification have been added since the original article was posted.

My guess is something was posted that wasn't supposed to be, or they were just making corrections. Producers are just probably trying to keep their neutral stance, because if they actually pick a side, then no matter what, one group will not be happy. I guess it is better to keep everyone guessing and bickering with each other, even though it's pretty obvious the events in BB don't match up with TF 1-5

Their latest edit confirms this film is part of the Bayverse:

"This will show how Optimus becomes the leader he was in Bay movies. "

I guess they went the prequel route afterall.

Ryan said the same in his assessment for our site.

william-james88 wrote:This will show how Optimus becomes the leader he was in Bay movies.

Which makes no sense. Optimus first arrives in 2007. "We learned Earth's languages from the World Wide Web" - while the military had the internet in the 80s, there was no WWW in 1987, do he must have been referring to his arrival in 2007.( They even talk about using the Decepticon tech to build it in the BB movie)

o.supreme wrote:

william-james88 wrote:This will show how Optimus becomes the leader he was in Bay movies.

Which makes no sense. Optimus first arrives in 2007. "We learned Earth's languages from the World Wide Web" - while the military had the internet in the 80s, there was no WWW in 1987, do he must have been referring to his arrival in 2007.( They even talk about using the Decepticon tech to build it in the BB movie)

Continuity, good writing and character focus isn't important compared to big spectacle/action, getting butts into seats and money into wallets.

They don't see the Transformers as "characters" truly, just talking cgi plot-convenience making machines.


Not that the former 3 things are "needed" for an entertaining film but for me personally we already got 5 films where the majority of those things were not featured.

This film sounds like a feature/character crammed disaster waiting to happen if they pull it off wrong.

o.supreme wrote:

william-james88 wrote:This will show how Optimus becomes the leader he was in Bay movies.

Which makes no sense. Optimus first arrives in 2007. "We learned Earth's languages from the World Wide Web" - while the military had the internet in the 80s, there was no WWW in 1987, do he must have been referring to his arrival in 2007.( They even talk about using the Decepticon tech to build it in the BB movie)

Just say that he was never speaking English in the Bumblebee movie, and that what we heard him speak was merely for our benefit.

After all, it's not like the Transformers were all speaking Earth English on Cybertron 4 million years before ever coming to Earth back in the first episode of the G1 cartoon.

Sabrblade wrote:

o.supreme wrote:

william-james88 wrote:This will show how Optimus becomes the leader he was in Bay movies.

Which makes no sense. Optimus first arrives in 2007. "We learned Earth's languages from the World Wide Web" - while the military had the internet in the 80s, there was no WWW in 1987, do he must have been referring to his arrival in 2007.( They even talk about using the Decepticon tech to build it in the BB movie)

Just say that he was never speaking English in the Bumblebee movie, and that what we heard him speak was merely for our benefit.

After all, it's not like the Transformers were all speaking Earth English on Cybertron 4 million years before ever coming to Earth back in the first episode of the G1 cartoon.

What about them speaking English in this movie? There are human characters here after all.

o.supreme wrote:

william-james88 wrote:This will show how Optimus becomes the leader he was in Bay movies.

Which makes no sense. Optimus first arrives in 2007. "We learned Earth's languages from the World Wide Web" - while the military had the internet in the 80s, there was no WWW in 1987, do he must have been referring to his arrival in 2007.( They even talk about using the Decepticon tech to build it in the BB movie)

The films have never been consistent. Remember how Bee's voice was fixed at the end of the first one? Plus, Bay directed The Last Knight which already rewrote the history of TFs (first contact, ect). We know Hot Rod was speaking English back in the 40s, and he was teamed with Bumblebee. So everything is on the table.
Any inconsistency you raise simply further confirms this must be a Bayverse film.

Deadput wrote:

Sabrblade wrote:

o.supreme wrote:

william-james88 wrote:This will show how Optimus becomes the leader he was in Bay movies.

Which makes no sense. Optimus first arrives in 2007. "We learned Earth's languages from the World Wide Web" - while the military had the internet in the 80s, there was no WWW in 1987, do he must have been referring to his arrival in 2007.( They even talk about using the Decepticon tech to build it in the BB movie)

Just say that he was never speaking English in the Bumblebee movie, and that what we heard him speak was merely for our benefit.

After all, it's not like the Transformers were all speaking Earth English on Cybertron 4 million years before ever coming to Earth back in the first episode of the G1 cartoon.

What about them speaking English in this movie? There are human characters here after all.

They spoke English in the 1940s, in a film directed by Bay.

william-james88 wrote:
They spoke English in the 1940s, in a film directed by Bay.

Was this TLK I don't remember anything else besides that period? This is presuming that they actually spoke to the humans instead of alt means of communication.

Then again Soundwave also got Nasa shout down back in the 60-80s so that point is moot anyways, not that I think the "learn from the world wide web" was the only possible means of learning the language.

Also TLK is a garbage film and should be the reason the Bay continuity should of been finished with DOTM.

Oh! It just hit me! Sam was asking about how Jazz spoke Earth slang, and Optimus's response of "We've learned Earth's languages from the World Wide Web" could be retroactively applied to that particular inquiry, about Jazz speaking slang rather than English in general.

Plus, it could be that they learned other languages besides English via the Internet, while learning English earlier.

That works.

I was never much up in arms about the "Earth wide web" thing, because it's not like they couldn't learn a language naturally like we could, the line at the time was so the Transformers could learn our languages instantly so we didn't waste time in the story with the presumption that they only just got here.

Sabrblade wrote:Oh! It just hit me! Sam was asking about how Jazz spoke Earth slang, and Optimus's response of "We've learned Earth's languages from the World Wide Web" could be retroactively applied to that particular inquiry, about Jazz speaking slang rather than English in general.

Plus, it could be that they learned other languages besides English via the Internet, while learning English earlier.

Yeah Sam was specifically asking about the use of slang. Not sure Optimus understood the query though. But whatever, Bee was a Bayverse film, so being part of that continuity just means Bee will have that Bsyverse face and talk through a radio, not much more than that.

You all are really trying to grasp straws aren't you . But that ok. If you want to say a series of films full of incoherence, is evidence of shared continuity go for it. I just want a decent film. Not saying being connected to TF 1-5 makes it impossible to be good, but it would certainly be easier if they made a clean break and started over.

Bumblebee was a decent film.

o.supreme wrote:You all are really trying to grasp straws aren't you . But that ok. If you want to say a series of films full of incoherence, is evidence of shared continuity go for it. I just want a decent film. Not saying being connected to TF 1-5 makes it impossible to be good, but it would certainly be easier if they made a clean break and started over.

The Bee film was connected to TF 1-5 and it was good, this could be too.

Bumblebee was a great reboot film.

Japanese title is ビースト覚醒 (Bīsuto Kakusei), meaning "Beast Awakening":

https://twitter.com/tf_autobot/status/1407533871646846981

ZeroWolf wrote:Everyone is largely pleased this isn't connected to the bayverse films...which is weird as I can't find any straight statement on that

They definitely made it sound like it was a continuation of the Bayverse universe. It's 7 years after the Bumblebee movie. Bumblebee has his Classic Camaro mode that he got at the end of the Bumblebee Movie, except this time around it's got an offroad package similar to this offroad package shown below but on a vintage 1970s Camaro.

I had a mildly passing interest before, but this just makes it an easy pass. Shame, a Beast Wars movie could have been done well, considering the great stories and characters.

Seibertron wrote:

ZeroWolf wrote:Everyone is largely pleased this isn't connected to the bayverse films...which is weird as I can't find any straight statement on that

They definitely made it sound like it was a continuation of the Bayverse universe. It's 7 years after the Bumblebee movie. Bumblebee has his Classic Camaro mode that he got at the end of the Bumblebee Movie, except this time around it's got an offroad package similar to this offroad package shown below but on a vintage 1970s Camaro.

Thanks for the clarification Ryan!

OSupreme@ who knows, maybe the end of this film will reboot the franchise to fit in with the plans for the hasbro verse

I assume they are going to ignore that BB started off in the '07 film as the yellow VW Beetle?

Anyway:

5 factions mentioned so far.

This is the part that concerns me. That means at least two factions (Decepticons and Predacons, I think are a safe bet) will be thrown under the bus or used as fodder. Bumblebee worked because the idea that 'less was more' adhered to the roster.