TRANSFORMERS 4 - A Reboot Sequel Directed by Michael Bay

Considering the huge success of the "Transformers" trilogy it was quite obvious that Paramount was not yet ready to abandon the franchise. In this last week, several details surfaced regarding the new sequel. First of all, it's not a sequel, per se, but a reboot. Secondly, producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura confirmed that Michael Bay will once again return to direct. This last bit of information is no suprise, since it's Bay who has built the franchise into the huge box-office hit we all know and love/hate. The sequel/reboot will be produced by Lorenzo di Bonaventura, Don Murphy, Tom DeSanto and Ian Bryce, alongside executive producers Steven Spielberg, Brian Goldner and Mark Vahradian.

Now about the sequel/reboot thing. According to di Bonaventura, the movie will probably have some returning characters, thus it's a sequel, but will mostly feature a new cast of characters, which is why they're branding it a reboot :

"Well I mean again it’s hybrid. It’s not the way—I’m not involved with Spider-Man but what I perceive Spider-Man to be is a redoing of the whole thing, [Transformers 4] is not. It’s an evolution. There’s still continuity that’s going on, and yet there’ll be a lot of new cast. Whether there’s anybody from the [original] cast, we don’t even know yet. But the truth is, it’s gonna be a whole new story. The characters that would certainly come along would be Optimus and Bumblebee I’m sure."

Furthermore, in a recent interview, Josh Duhamel, who played Captain William Lennox in all three of the "Transformers" movies had this to say :"I don’t think anybody’s doing it. I know Shia [LaBoeuf]‘s not doing it. I don’t think Tyrese [Gibson] or Rosie [Huntington-Whiteley] or anybody else is doing it." This is a clear indication that the lead characters of the original trilogy will not be returning, unless they're going to do some cameo appearances, but there's still a chance that some of the original's supporting characters might still be involved. What's important however is that the robots will definitely return. After all, they're the real stars in these movies. Paramount also selected a release date for the fourth "Transformers" movie : June 29, 2014.

To be honest, I enjoyed the Transformers trilogy because I'm a sucker for loud overblown action and cool visual effects, so I turned a blind eye to its flaws. I think the length of these movies is the big issue, mainly because the mixture of action and (stupid) comedy is way too uneven for the fun to last past the two-hour mark (and two and a half hours is excessive). They really need to trim-down the running time of the sequel to a more manageable length. I think anywhere between 90 - 100 minutes is more than enough. Everything besides the action (clunky human interaction and silly humor) is just useless filler. And the plot usually gets pointlessly complicated only to be reduced in the end to a huge mass-destruction type action sequence. Keep it simple and it might actually become the complete fun experience it deserves to be. And if that doesn't do it and it's still an annoying mess, then at least you can say : "Hey, at least it wasn't 2-hours long !"

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