Bumblebee was a breath of fresh air to the Transformers universe. By ditching the excesses and telling a simpler story of a girl and her robot friend, the Amblin-style film touched audiences in a way none of Michael Bay’s films ever did. While the Autobot’s origin story was seen as a chance to reboot the franchise, producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura has made it clear that a core Transformers sequel is still happening alongside Bumblebee‘s further adventures. And if you think that means Bay’s influence will no longer be felt, think again.
Speaking with Collider, di Bonaventura says Bumblebee and Transformers sequels will be “a fusion of Bumblebee and the [Michael] Bay movies”, adding “a little more Bayhem” into the mix. He goes on to say that despite the accolades heaped on Bumblebee, there was still an imbalance for fans, as some wanted more action while others appreciated the injection of heart…
“…the audience had asked us several times, in different ways, ‘I want to get to know a Transformer better.’ We did that. In some respects, definitely a tip to what the audience had said to us. The interesting part is when you set out to do something like that, you don’t exactly know the ramifications of it. In this case, the ramification of it was, for the people who didn’t love the movie, was not enough action. Because you’re telling a more intimate story, therefore you can’t.”
He continues…
“Several lessons have come out of this. One is that we have the freedom to tell almost any story. The other is that, how strongly the audience identified with the strength of character and emotion. I know the next Transformer, our attempt anyway, is to sort of do a fusion of Bumblebee and the Bay movies…a little more Bayhem. And a little bit more of the character falling in love within the emotional dynamic of the movie. One of the things I want to do — and I hope we pull it off — is, we did it with Bumblebee because he’s so cute and he’s so accessible, but he can’t talk. I think the more human we can make these characters, the more people are going to like them.”
This sounds like a bad idea, and like di Bonaventura is ignoring what made Bumblebee great, which is that it’s nothing like a Michael Bay movie. I get it; he looks at the film’s numbers and sees that it “only” made $459M worldwide, the lowest of the franchise, and thinks fans were missing the ‘Bayhem” they were accustomed to. But I think he’s missing a crucial point, which is that audiences turned against that style with Transformers: The Last Knight, and Bumblebee was undoubtedly affected by those who have given up on the entire franchise.
Another part of the producer’s attempt to balance out the increase in action is to possibly introduce a robot-on-robot romance. That’s right, we’re talking Transformers love story, kiddies!
“One of the things I want to see, and I don’t know if we’ll do this particular thing, but I think we will eventually do a love story between Transformers…What does a love story mean? Definitely not sex, maybe not even kissing, but the idea that they would have that emotional crush has never really been brought in. That’s kind of the direction we’re going to try to head into, which is to give them human desires that, up until now, we haven’t seen much of. I think that will change the relationship with the Transformers. So we may do some wild action, we’ll do action for sure in the main line, but it’s a different kind of attempt. I know we will hold on to a lot of the lessons from Bumblebee.”
So no sex? Boooooo. There go the fuel-injection jokes. Anyway, the idea of a romance between Transformers isn’t that crazy. Certain Transformers have been known to be more than just battlefield comrades. Optimus Prime’s lady love Elita One was with him during one of Megatron’s earliest attacks, and the female Autobot known as Arcee has been shown to be in a love triangle with Hot Rod and Springer.
