'Transformers' Live Action Movie from DreamWorks?

mr_don't writes "Apprently, CNN is reporting that Dreamworks might be in talks with Michael Bay (who directed the bomb Pearl Harbor) to direct a live action Transformers movie. The article says: A November 17, 2006, release date has been set. Bay's credits include the two "Bad Boys" movies, "Pearl Harbor," "Armageddon" and "The Rock." Well, as a child of the 80's I must admit I am interested, but could the movie be directed by Robert Rodriguez instead?"

There is more than meets the Eye

[by Anonymous Coward]

Why would anyone watch a movie about a giant spool of wire?

Re:There is more than meets the Eye

[UnixRevolution (597440)]

An electrical transformer changes the voltage and amperage of an electric current by induction between 2 dissimilar (usually different winds) spirals of copper wire.

Much, much more info here [wikipedia.org].

Cast

[by Anonymous Coward]

I hope Bender gets to play Optimus Prime.

He could be made for that role.

Re:Cast

[Shkuey (609361)]

"I am Optimus Prime, please insert liquor!"

Re:Cast

[MightyMartian (840721)]

"Ahh, you Autobots are such chumps. I'm gonna get a hookerbot, so kiss my shiny metal ass."

Directed by..

[Cruithne (658153)]

could the movie be directed by Robert Rodriguez instead?

I dunno, Michael Bay could be more than meets the eye...

Re:Directed by..

[dmf415 (218827)]

Quentin Tarantino could do it! Oil and tranny fluid spilling EVERYWHERE!

Re:Directed by..

[mcslappy (830989)]

Optimus Prime:
I've killed a hell of a lot of robots to get to this point, but I only have one more. The last one. The one I'm flying to right now. The only one left. And when I arrive at my destination, I am gonna kill Megatron.

Re:Directed by..

[WormholeFiend (674934)]

Well, on Cybertron, you can buy energon in a movie theatre. And I don't mean in a paper cube either. They give you a glass of energon, like in a bar. On Paris, you can buy energon at MacDonald's. Also, you know what they call a Quarter Pounder with Cheese on Unicron?

Re:Directed by..

[Golias (176380)]

They should get Micheal Moore to direct it

But then the main battle scene would be done as nothing but sound against a black screen, and most of the rest of the movie would be shots of Autobots refusing to talk to him.

Re:Directed by..

[Ubergrendle (531719)]

Personally I suspect the US has not joined the international war crimes tribunal due to fears that the rest of the world would extradite Michael Bay, Joel Schumacher, and Jerry Bruckheimer for Crimes Against Humanity.

In fairness, they'd probably be acquitted since it would be impossible to find an impartial jury.

Old news

[Masami Eiri (617825)]

Kind of. Transfans have known this to be in the works for a while.. the original projected release date was 2005.. though I doubt that now.
I'm mixed on this.. if its done right, it could be truly awesome...

Quick guide to Transformers TV shows

[Gax (196168)]

> the original projected release date was 2005

Not quite. The projected release date has always been 2006. 2005 was just a date picked by the fans to coincide with the 20th anniversary of the first movie. On the web forum, Don Murphy mentions they were shooting for a summer 2006 [d13satellite.com] release. More information on the movie can be found on the TF - The Movie roundup [tfw2005.com] page. If the first movie is successful, they plan for Unicron to make an appearance in the third one.

Though many people do not realise it, over 500 episodes of Transformers have been made in their various incarnations.
Here is a brief rundown of the various Transformer shows that have aired in the last 20 years.

American shows
Transformers Generation 1 TV show [bwtf.com] (American written show, set during 1985-86 and 2005-06)

2) Transformers Generation 2 TV show (modified version of the G1 series that added an annoying 3D space cube animation.

Japanese only series
Transformers: Headmasters [digiserve.com] (Japanese). Available as an official or partial fandub.

Transformers: Masterforce [digiserve.com] (Japanese). Available in official dub or sub-titled versions.

Transformers Victory [digiserve.com] (Japanese series) Available as an official dub, fan dub, or subtitled.

Transformers Zone [digiserve.com] (Japanese). Available in subtitled or dubbed versions.

Though transforming robots remained popular in the East, the Transformers line was 'rested' for a few years.

The Beast Era
In 1996 the toy line was relaunched. After the disappointing sales of the Generation 2 series, vehicle modes were abandoned and animal forms introduced. Optimus Primal transformed into a gorilla and Megatron became a dinosaur. The Beast era was set years after the original series 300-1000 years, depending upon your source) and introduced two new factions - the Maximals and Predacons.

Beast Wars [bwtf.com] - The Autobots and Decepticons are gone and the Maximals and Predacons have made peace. This peace is broken by Megatron (a namesake, not the original), who travels back in time in an attempt to change the course of history. In most episodes he is thwarted by Optimus Primal and a small band of Maximals. The animation shows its age, but it is probably the most intelligently written TF show made (season 2, in particular).

Beast Machines [bwtf.com] - The Beast Wars are over and the Maximals return to Cybertron. They find that Megatron has captured the sparks (soul) of every Transformer on the planet and created an army of mindless drones called Vehicons. Best remembered for the strong religious overtones, huge explosions and scenes of the Maximals running away.

Japanese Beast series
While the US got the second and third season of Beast Wars, Japan received two spin-off series that focused upon other planets.

Beast Wars 2 [digiserve.com] (Japanese). Leo Convoy (lion) Vs Galvatron (dragon).

Beast Wars Neo [bwtf.com] (Japanese) - The Maximal leader, Big Convoy (a wooly mammoth) faces against the evil Magmatron. Unlike earlier Convoy/Prime toys, Big Convoy has a removable matrix in his chest.

Autobots and Decepticons return
Hasbro's initial plan was to create a followup to the Beast Machines series called Transtech. This would feature vehicle TFs with animal moulding. However, it was later abandoned and Hasbro made a deal

Sombody's Got A Bone To Pick

[American AC in Paris (230456)]

The headline is confusing--it has very little to do with the thrust of the summary. It should read "mr_don't Says 'Michael Bay Sucks!'"

P.S. Pearl Harbor wasn't a "bomb"--it was a bad movie that did very well at the box office. To suggest that it was a bomb is just plain silly [rottentomatoes.com]. Pearl Harbor was a plodding movie with a trite script and stilted acting that performed extremely well at the box office thanks to aggressive marketing and some pretty good technical work. Just because you don't like it doesn't mean you can go around claiming it failed miserably.)

Re:Sombody's Got A Bone To Pick

[American AC in Paris (230456)]

And even though it 'performed extremely well' by your definition, it still didn't make back its budget or make any profit, hence it IS A BOMB.

Y'know, if you're gonna troll, at least take the time to make sure your claims aren't completely wrong. [the-numbers.com]

Released in US: May 25, 2001
Total US Gross: $198,539,855
Production Budget: $135,000,000
Prints and Advertising Budget :$45,000,000
Worldwide Gross: $450,500,000

Assume that roughly 50% of gross goes back to the studio, factor in things like DVD/Video sales and merchandise, and you've got a seriously profitable movie.

Wow.

[schild (713993)]

This movie is going to be fucking expensive. As in reallly really goddamn expensive.

I expect a lot of explosions. Terrible dialogue. An incredibly bad mixture of CGI and reality, the likes of which hasn't been seen since the end of Air Force One.

All in all, this is a silly prospect. Shouldn't they be working on more interesting things? I'd suggest something but the news of a Transformers live action movie (which isn't really "new news") has left me incapable of thinking on an intelligible level.

Re:Wow.

[gphinch (722686)]

A friend of mine from college works in developement now, and he was telling me that basically the studio's market research shows them that something like 95% of American males 18-35 like Transformers, so they are going to throw as much money as is needed at this, $200 mil or more, knowing that the money made will probably be in the billions when all is said and done.

Transformers BREAK DANCE

[Pike (52876)]

You know, it could still be really cool and quite inexpensive...

...if they made it something like this [washington.edu]!

plus explosions of course.

oh yes.

Preview

[mm0mm (687212)]

I expect a lot of explosions. Terrible dialogue. An incredibly bad mixture of CGI and reality, the likes of which hasn't been seen since the end of Air Force One.

here's the pitch clip [steakandcheese.com] that was shown by Dreamworks during the recent discussion with Michael Bay. apparently the studio want the film to be very different from Bay's style, which is good.

I knew this was coming

[hairykrishna (740240)]

Recently here in the UK there's been some car commercial (don't know which brand) with a car which transforms into a dancing transformers style robot. It looked so cool that I knew that someone had to exploit it for a movie, yay!

Re:I knew this was coming

[by Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, that advert is exactly what the movie should be.

Only less Citroen C4 and less dancing.

The ad is here: http://uk.download.yahoo.com/ne/fu/oa/eurcncs18503 0.mpg [yahoo.com]

Los Hooligans

[Lovesquid (840251)]

After Sin City, I hope to hell that all movies from now on are directed by Robert Rodriguez. And they should all star Carla Gugino as the closed-mouthed, naked lesbian.

The Movie Will Have Everything!!!!!!!

[BRock97 (17460)]

'Bay's credits include the two "Bad Boys" movies, "Pearl Harbor," "Armageddon" and "The Rock." '

So, based on that resume, we can expect the following:

• Bumble Bee and Spike will be two loose cannons that try and bring down an Insecticon drug ring
• Hot Rod and Kup will defend Cybertron from a surprise attack from the Quintesons
• Optimus Prime and a rag tag group of Autobots will lead a US mission to Unicron and try to blow it up before he eats Earth
• And my personal favorite, Kup and Perceptor will try and take back an energon plant from the Dinobots who have gone AWOL. AGAIN!

This will be the most incredible movie, EVER!

Re:The Movie Will Have Everything!!!!!!!

[dr_dank (472072)]

Don't forget the breathtaking scene where BenAflecktron puts an animal cracker down LivTylerbots pants.

Re:The Movie Will Have Everything!!!!!!!

[falser (11170)]

The degree to which you remember the names of the Autobot characters is, well, frightening.

Re:The Movie Will Have Everything!!!!!!!

[Requiem (12551)]

Also, Ultra-Magnus will go down in the first action sequence.

News? Right.

[Alaren (682568)]

Yay, CNN. More than half a year old [audioholics.com] still counts as news. I think I heard about it even before then but that was the first link I found...

(P.S. Yay /. for picking up the story even later. d^_^b)

Pearl Harbor

[dR.fuZZo (187666)]

I miss you more then Michael Bay missed the mark
When he made Pearl Harbor
I miss you more than that movie missed the point
And that's an awful lot girl
And now, now you've gone away
And all I'm trying to say is
Pearl Harbor sucked, and I miss you

I need u like Ben Affleck needs acting school
He was terrible in that film
I need u like Cuba Gooding needed a bigger part
He's way better than Ben Affleck
And now all I can think about is your smile
and that shitty movie too
Pearl Harbor sucked and I miss you

Why does Michael Bay get to keep on making movies?
I guess Pearl Harbor sucked
Just a little bit more than I miss you

Dude, Give Credit Where Credit's Due

[BRock97 (17460)]

Dude, if you are going to rip someone's lyrics, at least give the source. This fine song is called The End of an Act from the Team America World Police soundtrack. Highly recommend it if you want to laugh your ass off.

Sign of the Times

[jspey (183976)]

..."The Transformers," Hasbro's popular 1980s toy line of giant robots that morph into cars, trucks, planes, ships and other technological creations.

20 years ago, transformers would have been described as giant robots that transform into other things. Now CNN says they 'morph', depite the face that their name contains in it the word used to describe their shape-changing. What's worse is that the word 'morph' became popular because of the terminator in T-2, where it's used to describe something noticably different from what the transformers do.

I'll never understand the media.

Re:Sign of the Times

[nEoN nOoDlE (27594)]

From dictionary.com

morph: To be transformed

I don't know why you think it's a sign of the times that the media is using synonyms.

Re:Sign of the Times

[KillerDeathRobot (818062)]

Maybe they just wanted to mix up the vocabulary used in the sentence. "Transformers are robots that transform" sounds kind of redundant.

Re:Sign of the Times

[Sc00ter (99550)]

What about Megatron.. He stands next to one of his evil buddies, then transforms into a hand gun that his buddy is now holding..

Re:Sign of the Times

[On Lawn (1073)]

Now there is an idea. Amidts these giants, Megatron is simply some tiny robot with a napoleon complex.

This is old news

[bigdady92 (635263)]

This has been circulating the net for MONTHS. If you visit any of the transformer sites you can see that they've known about this for a while.

http://www.transformerland.com/transformers-the-mo vie.html [transformerland.com]

Why do I say it's been around for months? Because they have already secured the voice of the ORIGINAL Optimus Prime! Not that crappy one on the new cartoons, the ORIGNAL voice. The TRUE voice of Prime !

Rodriguez is not an option.

[randomaxe (673239)]

In case you hadn't heard, Robert Rodriguez probably won't be doing many major-studio pictures any time soon. His decision to share directing credit with Frank Miller (and, to a certain extent, Tarantino) forced him to drop out of the Director's Guild of America.

And AFAIK, it works kind of like a union thing, the major studios only hiring directors from the DGA.

Rodriguez will no doubt have little trouble finding work... but expect it to be via indie studios.

Re:Rodriguez is not an option.

[rnelsonee (98732)]

From From an article [yahoo.com] I read today:

So Rodriguez dropped out of the DGA. That move cost him the opportunity to direct Paramount's sci-fi adventure A Princess of Mars. (The union forbids non-members from signing onto projects already in the works at a member studio.) He can, however, make movies independently and distribute them through a studio. His friendship with Bob and Harvey Weinstein, who headed Miramax but split from Disney this week to start a new company, practically guarantees he will continue to direct movies.

So it looks like the old having-powerful-buddies thing will still happen for Rodriguez. Sure, it won't be as good as it would if he was in the DGA, but who knows.

follow the sweet scent of money

[asoap (740625)]

Movie studios today are more like marketing companies then movies that actually want to create a decent story. There are exceptions, but they are mostly intereseted in making money. They are in the business of making money. That is why you are seeing so many geek movies, lord of the rings, xmen, spiderman, x2, spiderman 2, daredevil, hulk, elektra, etc, etc... The reasoning is that these movies are already "pre sold". They are garunteed that no matter how bad it is there will be enough geeks who will

Too late

[sulli (195030)]

Optium s Prime has died of prostate cancer. [pcacoalition.org] Perhaps our Autobot heroes will wear blue ribbons for him.

The "Bomb" Pearl Harbor?

[BTWR (540147)]

Maybe it was a bad movie, and maybe it was mocked by critics, the press and the public... but a "bomb?" I think not.

From boxofficemojo.com [boxofficemojo.com] this is the breakdown:

Pearl Harbor:
Production Budget: $140 million
Est. Marketing Costs: $70 million

Domestic gross: $198,542,554 (44.2%)
+ Overseas gross: $250,678,391 (55.8%)
-----------------
= Worldwide gross: $449,220,945

So... it cost $210 million to make and market the film, it took in $450 million from the box office ALONE (not including the millions that selling tv rights brings, DVD/VHS sales, pay-per-view spots), and I'm sure the producers are really crying about this "bomb" - crying all the way to the bank...

I don't blame...

[stubear (130454)]

...Michael Bay for the pitiful excuse of a movie Pearl Harbor turned out to be. I blame Ben Affleck and Josh Hartnett for sucking so bad at acting. For this one need only look to the casting director. Michael Bay is good at directing pure adrenaline fueled action sequences and he'd done three that in my opinion are tough to top; 1) the attack sequence of Pearl Harbor in Pearl Harbor, 2) the car chase between the H1 and teh Ferrari in The Rock, and 3) the F-18 approach/ bombing of Alcatraz in The Rock. Keeping in mind that The Rock never aspired to be the next Citizen Kane, I'd even go as far as to say that it was a pretty decent action movie.

Robert Rodriguez, king of overrated

[ArmenTanzarian (210418)]

I'm sorry, his treatment of Sin City may be nice, but it's because Miller already did the storyboards for him. Anyone who sat through all three Spy Kids movies in the theatres (with my nephew) can give you about 5000 reasons to distrust his direction.

Re:Robert Rodriguez, king of overrated

[Wubby (56755)]

Agreed!

NPR did an interview with him a couple years ago. He talked about how people were surprised that he did the Spy Kids movies after such fare as "From Dusk 'Til Dawn" and "El Mariachi" (sp?). He said he always wanted to do the Spy Kids type movies, the others were just to make the money.

My point is I see him as a kind of George Lucas, he made "Star Wars" and everyone thought he was going to be this great scifi director, when in fact all he wanted to do was make cheezy kids movies with puppets and "

Just bring back the original animated series

[c0d3h4x0r (604141)]

A live action Transformes movie would be pointlessly expensive and lame.

They would be better off bringing back the original Transformers series using modern animation, and targeting it as scifi for adults rather than a silly cartoon for kids.

The original US Transformers generation 1 series had a more personal, emotional, sci-fi aspect to it than do the modern shows like Transformers Armageddon. Granted, it had its 80's cheese factor (like, how many oil rig workers do you know who wear hard hats all the time on land and write touchy-feely entries in their diary every day?) But it also had better-written dialog and stories that were delivered with a more serious and measured touch.

The newer shows have better animation and dropped the corny 80's feel, but in the process picked up the corny 90's feel and all the horrible attributes of those ridiculous american-anime shows like YuGiOh and DragonballZ: terrible dialog spoken too fast and characters who do nothing but boast stupidly at each other constantly about their superior fighting powers like it's a pissing contest.

If they would just return to the original writing, characters, and story, but do it all using modern animation (maybe CGI), and target it more as scifi for the 20+ crowd instead of as cartoons for kids, then I think they'd really have something.

Re:Just bring back the original animated series

[David M. Sweeney (105063)]

They would be better off bringing back the original Transformers series using modern animation, and targeting it as scifi for adults rather than a silly cartoon for kids.

A movie about robots that transform into big rigs and boom boxes... aimed at adults. You lost me there, amigo.

Perhaps update Transformers to 21st century

[IronChefMorimoto (691038)]

I'm wondering if they'd make the following adjustments to the Transformers characters to really make the whole movie more "realistic" and proper to the 21st century:

• Dinobots will moonlight on Discovery Channel during those "back in time" dinosaur documentaries
• Optimus Prime will be based at the "Highway 7 Boobs'n'Burgers" when not saving the world
• Autobots disguised as GM products will frequently be out of commission due to recalls
• Starscream will make the news when he accidentally strafes an unoccupied middle school
• Megatron will find many of his plans foiled by gun control advocates
• Two of the Insecticons die horribly when they move through a suburban neighborhood rife with treatments of Andro Fire Ant Bait
• The Constructicons will often be missing in action, idling near a highway construction project looking at a hole in the 2 left lanes while taking a lunch break that snarls rush hour traffic
• That Autobot city (can't remember the name) will never be truly effective as a weapon, mainly because City Hall is chock full of corruption and budget cuts
• Omnicron will make it to Earth at the end of the movie, only because George Bush kills the funding for the Voyager probe that MIGHT have seen him coming

IronChefMorimoto

News!

[Angron (127881)]

New! From the director who brought you Pearl Harbor and the screenwriter who brought you Catwoman! It's....your childhood being beaten with a baseball bat. Sigh.

-A

Re:RTFA

[Professor_UNIX (867045)]

The title's more than a little misleading as well. I thought everyone had known about the movie since the dawn of time - the only news here is the speculation about the director.

The only people that would have known about it are the kind of guys that would stand in line for a Star Wars movie a month before it opens... at the wrong theater.

I mean hell, I watched Transformers as a kid and loved it, but why on earth do you assume a 30 year old man would keep up on a cartoon, much less that it's apparentl

Re:RTFA

[NanoGator (522640)]

" How the heck are they going to do live-action robots transforming... lots of CGI?"

Precisely. From an fx point of view, it's more than plausible. Not only have commercials featured this, but some ameteurs have pulled it off as well.

I think you'd be surprised, though, at how many people are Transformers fans today. I recently visited an FX studio and was shocked at how many Transformers models they had posed around their cubes. (next to LotR figurines...) There are also quite a few people wearing autobot/decepticon insignias in various forms. (Hats, t-shirts, bumper stickers...)

I think a LOT of people would like to see a live-action transformers movie. Unfortunately, it would be VERY easy for the director to really fudge it up. The animated Transformers movie from the mid-eighties showed a glimpse of being 'more grown up'. (main characters dying, swearing, etc...) For the people I'm thinking of, it'd be great if they did something more matrue and sci-fi. They've got a great mythos to draw from, but those tards are quite likely going to try to appeal to kids. (Inspector Gadget, anyone? )

So, yeah, expect a lot of news about it followed by moaning and groaning.

I have only six words....

[Prod_Deity (686460)]

Bah weep granah weep ninni bong