Although he swore up and down he’d never go back to it, and swears up and down this will be his last Transformers film, Michael Bay has indeed returned for Transformers 4.
Love him or hate him, Transformers has distinctly become Bay’s franchise, and it’s hard to imagine anyone else at the helm, which is why some fans were over the moon that he was back.
As we previously discussed here on TG, Bay returning for Transformers may have been a bit of a bargaining chip with Paramount so the director could make a smaller movie he’s always wanted to make, Pain and Gain, about criminal body-builders. It’s a smaller, dark comedy that Bay’s wanted to do for years, and Paramount finally gave him the greenlight to make it, along with Transformers 4.
So now Bay has talked about his Transformers plans to the L.A. Times coinciding with the opening of the Transformers ride at Universal. The ride reportedly cost $100 million, and the Times tells us it’s “being hailed as a game changer.” Not to mention there’s also a Transformers: Fall of Cybertron game due in August. As has been speculated previously, Bay told the Times some of the robots will be redesigned, as well as a whole new cast.
Bay also reiterated that this will be his last Transformers film, but the franchise will be set up “for the next guy.” Yes, Bay wants to prove he’s not just about babes in bikinis and huge explosions, but if that’s what you do best, why fix it if it ain’t broken? After all, Spielberg and Lucas realized delivering big, crowd pleasing movies is what they did best, and they accepted that that’s who they are as artists.
Bay has never been a critics darling, and it’s doubtful he cares. The audiences like his movies, they actually PAY for their tickets, and if they like his flicks in spite of what the critics write, he’s fine with that.
“Michael’s primary concern is with the audience,” says Roberto Orci, who with Alex Kurtzman wrote The Island and the first Transformers for Bay. “I know he’d like critical acclaim, but he talks to his audience, and that’s one of the great things we learned about him. He just wants to make sure they have a good time. The rest of it doesn’t really matter.”
