Sentinel left Cybertron in the final days of the war, Megatron left Cybetron before him.

 

Hopkins doesn't need to read through scripts from the first four movies, he probably wound up watching them. Did each movie make sense? No.

My head scratching is how they explain Transformers have been here forever, while in the first movie they "were sent to Earth" for the first time. There were comic and novel prequels supporting this. In a flashback, will Bumblebee have his voice? I'm curious how this plays out.

 

The Fallen came to earth originally because the sun was one he wanted to use to power up an army to overthrow the primes. He was trying to use it to take over the universe because all organic life/non-cybertronian life to him was worthless, beneath him. The prime's stopped him on earth. Sacrificing themselves to try wound him and seal the matrix away. Since then, he's been recuperating on (supposedly) Mars.

The ark was coming to earth with Sentinel Prime because of the spires to bring cybertron to here since the matrix and allspark recharging thing were here. We're(earth) tied to cybertronian history because of the fallen's actions in the ancient past. Which apparently includes spot checks throughout history to see if the power recharge they could do off of our sun was still good and what other resources they could take from earth. Possibly even prior to that, cybertronians have visited here to check out our planet and what it was. Though most it seems didn't arrive until later. The knights I would assume are after the events of the Fallen's betrayal when on earth. So we may have a lot of various artifacts in our own mythology that are tied to cybertronian lore. Which isn't a new thing.

Many legends have some basis in fact but then contain extreme hyperbole and alter over time per each retelling. So for example, Thor's hammer or the Hephaestus' forge could have been drawn from the same basis as the forge/hammer of solus prime.

The allspark was shot off into space and homed in on the Matrix. So it came to earth. Megatron followed the allspark in a tunnel vision rage. Not even knowing where he was going. All he knew was the co-ordinates of where the allspark hit on earth, but his tunnel vision rage made him land in the antarctic and fall into a forced hibernation from the cold. Sentinel prime had already crashed before that and megatron didn't know at that time this was that same planet until he was woken up in ROTF and DOTM. AOE implies that ancient cybertronians of the Primes age were here during dinosaur times. As they have the forms of dinosaurs without anything modern to scan, and were captured by Lockdown and sealed away in his ship as his personal trophies, I'd assume as some form of gratitude from the creators. But even they have some Knightly influences in their bot mode designs. So it wouldn't be a far stretch to think more had stayed on earth and adapted to earth cultures/helped inspire earth cultures as they grew along with the ages. Heck for all we know, humanity itself from primordial days could be because of bacteria cybertronians accidentally brought with them from any worlds they visited.

From there I have no clue what movie 5 is going to do to the story, and expand on the lore and concepts. But it's been an aspect that Cybertronians have been coming to earth for a long long time for various reasons. Considering we're one of many planets with sentient life, that's not surprising. So who knows how many artifacts have been scattered here through the ages with no direct way to find without some kind of catalyst(first movie was the glasses, second movie was jetfire, third movie was sentinel on the moon, 4th movie wasn't really an artifact).

It wasn't until the internet age, where Sam uploaded his ancestor's glasses onto the internet, that Bee and Barricade had their first big lead in finding megatron and the allspark. How long they've been scouting the planet to find any clue before then is unknown. But it wasn't until after Bumblebee got that lead for the whereabouts, that he called in the cavalry and Prime directly. Essentially saying. "I found it! Come here!"

That's my assumption at least. And it fits with some of the little details we know like how long Jetfire has been here and adapted to the ages. As he suggests in ROTF, he's been here since caveman days. We also do not know how many scouts Bumblebee first came to Earth with. How they got separated or if he was the only one left before he called in the cavalry. His scouting party could have given up, gotten killed by barricade or other decepticon scouts, or whatever else, that's another entire story area that could get explored.

 

The AllSpark arrived on Earth in 10.000 BC, so Megatron were on Earth for thousands of years, before to be discovered by Archibald Witwicky in 1899.
The Ark arrived on Earth in 1961.

 

One of the quotes from the Sentinel Prime Leader Class toy is literally "What has happened to the AllSpark?"

It locked onto the Sun Harvester (which makes sense given the Harvester existed purely to recharge the damn thing) or, as Deadend suggests, the Matrix (which frankly makes more sense as far as mystic techno-magic space cubes go since the Matrix doesn't always have a true physical form).

And if TF5 implies the Decepticons have been here since at least the 1500s, then they're really fucking bad at finding shit because that would mean you're saying Megatron spent 10,000 years frozen at the top of the world and his own forces couldn't find him literally under the ice.

 

We already know that the Seekers have been on Earth for thousands of years searching for the Matrix. They were Decepticons, even if it is possible that some of them changed side, like Jetfire.

The rest isn't canonical.
The movie should explain things, but they didn't do it, so we will see what the movie will tell us.

 

Seekers are not the same as a large portion of the Decepticon army which TF5 damn well seems to be implying with bullshit like Infernocus being all medieval themed.

Unless you got something better, that's the best we got because it's from the official comics. And those are official works of fiction in the franchise so like it or not, because the films up to this point have not suggested anything to the contrary (amazingly), that is currently the most official timeline of events.

 

You think Sir Anthony downs a Jameson double before he discusses anything Bayverse?  

 

The comics aren't canonical, Michael Bay said it.
Only what is on screen is part of the canon.

Maybe the writers took some concepts from the original scripts, like they are using the concept arts. The interdimentional nature of the Original Primes, for example, would be a perfect explanation of their presence on Earth in 17.000 BC.

And what does Infernocus have to do with this argument?

And sincerly, we don't know if all the robots that have been on Earth are part of the two factions. The Knights of Cybertron aren't Autobots, for example. Not everyone is an Autobot or a Decepticon.

 

Hasbro dictates what is and what is not canon. Not Michael Bay.

Name off the top of my head for a Decepticon who was apparently around in the 1500s.

It was an either-or kinda thing. If you weren't a Decepticon, you were an Autobot and the Decepticons killed you. I mean, you do remember why the war started in the first place, right? Why it's a civil war?

Oh sure, like the Dinobots...oh wait they were all Autobots.

And Lockdown...who ACCORDING TO HASBRO was a Decepticon.

It's worrysome that you're questioning HASBRO over what they say or do at this point.

 

You are very confused.

 

Sir Alec thought that even after Jedi, and to the end of his days. And Sir Anthony just gave me the PERFECT "quote of the week" for my column on Wednesday in that article...  

 

There were, but I think fans are going to accept that we're in a Star Wars situation here where the tie-in material is only going to be canon until the actual movies up and decide things are going to be different, and then they're just not anymore.

 

Hasbro owns the brand. They dictate what is and is not canon.

You're crazy to suggest anything different. Especially when Michael Bay says the tank guy in the first film is Devestator, who is also the Combiner in ROTF.

 

He clearified that it was a mistake, and Hasbro has never expressed any opinion about the movies.

 

Legally, anything branded by Hasbro to be official material is their expression of the state of whatever is the case in the films, or anything in so far as the Transformers franchise is concerned, in so far as nothing of higher importance contradicts it. As there is nothing in the films to suggest the comics in that particular subject is wrong, then simply whining about how Hasbro didn't explicitly issue a press release about it isn't going to change what is standard practice in most fandoms these days.

There is an article about canon. I suggest you read it.

Plus, even if it was a mistake...why was it never changed?

 

Because the Wiki page is owned by fans.

 

You don't get it, do you? What determines canon, then, if you ignore a concept of trying to determine that very question that every fandom faces? You've outright put Michael Bay's word over that of the actual owners of the Transformers franchise, rejected the wiki page written by people who while fans, also are extremely dedicated to figuring out what is canon or what and where, and insist that having unexplained plot holes are better than simply using headcanon to fit something in associated media in the same franchise because it makes sense and there isn't contradiction?

Or is just 'screw everything, if it isn't explicitly in the movies it doesn't count' here?

 

Well, none ever said that you are obligated to consider only the movies, but the movies are taking their own route.
Everyone has its own opinion. If you don't like it, ok. But don't act as if your conviction is true, because it is not.

Every franchise has a lot of different material, and don't always the owner clearifies things, and this is one of those cases.
If Hasbro has never talked about the movies, is clear that they leave to M. Bay and his stuff the freedome to make the decisions.

 

Don't all Transformers have goofy cartoonish faces? And not just the movies, especially the cartoons have cartoonish faces.