Transformers is going to try out the Star Wars model for a while, releasing one new movie in the series every year. On Friday Paramount announced release dates for the next three. The Transformers 5 release date is June 23, 2017, followed by Transformers 6 on June 8, 2018 and Transformers 7 on June 28, 2019.
2017’s Transformers 5 will be a major turning point for the series.
It will be the first to test out Paramount’s writers’ room model, abandoning a single screenwriter for an Akiva Goldsman-helmed collective uniting Robert Kirkman ( The Walking Dead ) , Zak Penn ( The Incredible Hulk ), Jeff Pinkner ( The Amazing Spider-Man 2 ), Art Marcum ( Punisher: War Zone ) and Matt Holloway ( Punisher: War Zone ). While it’s being likened to the model used to write TV shows, it could also be said that Transformers 5, 6 and 7 are literally being written by committee.
But perhaps most consequentially, Transformers 5 will be the last directed by Michael Bay, whose near-fetishistic eye for explosions and destruction have defined the series thus far.
“I still have a great time. It’s fun to do a movie that 100 million people will see,” he said to Rolling Stone. “But this is the last one. I have to pass the reins to someone else.”
In the Rolling Stone profile, Bay unintentionally underlined his importance to the series and the uphill battle Paramount will have keeping Transformers 6 and Transformers 7 the international event that placed Transformers: Dark of the Moon (both the best and most successful entry in the franchise) and Transformers: Age of Extinction among the top 15 box office winners of all time.
In a telling anecdote Bay manages Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) preproduction on Transformers 5 while still wrapping up 13 Hours. The designers show Bay new renderings for a “crash-landed alien spaceship” and a proposed dump truck Transformer.
"Boy, I've got a lot of work to do," Bay said. "I better finish this fucking 13 Hours movie."
After signing off with the ILM team, Bay says to Rolling Stone’s Josh Eells, "It's not good when I'm not involved."
And while it may just be an innocent compliment, it would seem Star Wars: The Force Awakens director J.J. Abrams agrees. According to Bay, “J.J. told me, 'You're the only guy that could do this.'”
