That Paramount wants another to make another "Transformers" film has been no secret, and much of the fall was peppered with various rumors (they were going to shoot two new films back-to-back, Jason Statham would star, shooting would begin at the end of 2012), but today comes something resembling more concrete word, even if it still leaves a lot of unanswered questions.
SuperHeroHype caught up with super producer Lorenzo Di Bonaventura who laid a clear timeline of when we'll next see Autobots and Decepticons go smashy smashy all over the planet. But whether or not Michael Bay will return is still up in the air. "We’ll be there in the summer of 2014," he said. "Michael had a debate because he sort of felt at first that he'd done three. Michael and I are both the same in that we always like to top ourselves. That doesn't necessarily mean bigger. It can be bigger in places, it just means different, but we're going to push really hard to be as fresh and new as we can be."
It was reported at the end of the year that Paramount was putting some heavy pressure on Michael Bay to return to the franchise, but the director is firmly focused on getting his long developing, small scale crime flick "Pain And Gain" made first. That film, which will star Mark Wahlberg, Dwayne Johnson, and Ed Harris is getting set to go in front of cameras in April. That said, Summer 2014 is still a long way away, and it leaves plenty of room for Bay to finish his film and then get back to making shit explode and buildings collapse or whatever.
As for the direction the next installment will go — which Shia LaBeouf has already said he won't be doing — Bonaventura points to the upcoming "G.I. Joe: Retaliation" as the template they'll be using. "Again, we're going to try to do a hybrid there where there will be some characters that come forward–we think, we're still in the process of figuring it out–and some characters that don't, but it will definitely be a different story," he explained. Tyrese Gibson get on the phone! You could take over the franchise!
So for now, nerds, rest assured that another big, loud and expensive movie is on the way.
