Having assembled a dedicated brain trust to nudge the franchise toward a new era, Paramount Pictures is evidently gunning to diversify its Transformers universe – a universe that has been widely derided hitherto for being anything but. That could all be about to change with Transformers 5, though, with various spinoffs and offshoots said to be incubating in development.
Shared cinematic universes quickly became the hot new trend once Marvel had established its trailblazing juggernaut, and though other studios have jumped on the bandwagon as a knee-jerk reaction, there is genuine potential for the Transformers universe to develop into a multi-faceted and, crucially, profitable movie machine. To date, Paramount has enlisted a burgeoning ensemble of crack writers for the task, including Zak Penn, Robert Kirkman, Art Marcum, Matt Holloway, Andrew Barrer, Gabrial Ferrari, Christina Hodson, Lindsey Beer, Ken Nolan and Geneva Robertson-Dworet.
Their mission starts with Transformers 5, and over the weekend Christian Post caught up with former voice actor Mark Ryan (Revenge of the Fallen‘s Jetfire), who revealed that the brain trust is currently ruminating on two nominal ideas for the big-budget sequel. Spoilers to follow.
[zerg]On the one hand, a potential creative avenue for Paramount would be to focus on Optimus Prime, the undisputed heavyweight and crux of the franchise who leaves Earth in search of his creators. Specifically, this existential search will have the indelible Autobot unearth the Quintessons, a group of ancient beings that created both the Autobots and the Deceptions as though they were two opposing pieces on one sprawling, intergalactic chessboard.
With this in mind, Prime could be on course to face Unicron, the absolute big bad of the Transformers universe that holds unfathomable amounts of power. Every ying needs a yang, though, and if Ryan’s comments are indeed accurate then we could also be seeing the introduction of Primus in Transformers 5. Binary opposite to Unicron, Primus is the light in the darkness, capable of bringing order to chaos and, one would hope, peace to all-out war.
As for the second nascent concept, the voice actor hints that Dinobots will make a return in the upcoming sequel, which would naturally pave the way for Wahlberg’s Cade Yaeger to enter the fray once more.
It goes without saying that Ryan’s response ought to be treated with heightened caution. Transformers 5 is, after all, still two whole years away, and though the production will be gearing up for a start date at the turn of the year, there’s still plenty of time for these unsubstantiated plot points to evolve and change.
One thing that is a safe bet, however, is that Michael Bay and Mark Wahlberg will indeed return for Transformers 5 at some point in 2017.