Mark Whalberg? Free Yeager!

But the question isn't which ones are bigger name actors and actresses in all circumstances, but in the context of the Transformers movies. And to most of the teens and twenty-somethings who enjoy the movies, Shia and Fox are bigger draws than older and better known actors.

Now it's certainly possible the new cast appealed to some new audience members as well. Most, but not all, appealed to me, but I do know that there are many millennial viewers of the series who missed Shia.

That's apples and oranges.

Jurassic World was the first JP movie in about 14 years after the third movie in 2001 was less popular than its predecessors. AoE was only three years after DotM. The former had a lot more time to be built on nostalgic demand. The latter was part of an ongoing series, and I think creating more interest in the latter is actually more challenging than creating interest in a series that was dead for a while for which tens of millions of people might miss.

Had Jurassic World come out just a few years after Jurassic Park III, it likely would have made a lot less than it did. The large break in between movies saved it.

And I'm not saying giant robot dinosaurs wasn't a draw, but it almost certainly had little to do with hardcore Transformer fan desires or their appearances in Animated and FoC, which most general audiences probably weren't familiar with, and many had probably never heard of.

Those CGI characters inhabit the same worlds as prominent human characters. I'm not saying there aren't people who enjoy Rocket or Groot, but in the end, you're talking about characters who are depicted alongside flesh-and-blood people. Most humans want human characters to connect to and be avatars for us as they adventure through worlds with talking apes, talking raccoons, aliens, and robots. I don't think most humans want those CGI characters all by themselves, without any major human characters at all and without an anchor point from a human point of view.

That isn't what I was saying. At all.

However, most general audience members watching live action films absolutely do want there to be major human characters.

 

You have to see how studios view things though. Studios would rather have a fourth entry in a series that makes 1.1 billion in box office, even if the previous movie made slightly more, than a movie that's a massive increase in box office from its predecessor but makes 400 million less and makes less profit overall. Regardless of what you personally think is an accomplishment, to a studio, making more money is more important. Any studio would much rather have RotF or DotM or AoE as their movies than any of the Apes movies, because the former all made more money.

So no different than some of the Transformers movies then.

Anyway, this is all getting off topic, if it ever was on topic. My answer to the original question of this thread is I think a Transformers 6, with the Unicron and Creator threads and Megatron/Galvatron dichotomy not resolved, has the potential to be more interesting than anything in a reboot or Bumblebee-connected movie is likely to be. Enough time has passed between now and when Megan Fox and Shia were in the films that if they were to return, it might make quite a splash with general audiences. So I say a Transformers 6 with concepts from the later movies and the two main humans from the earlier movies, that's more focused than The Last Knight, has the potential to be interesting to me as a hardcore Transformers fan, while also potentially appealing to general audiences nostalgic for Shia and Fox.

 

Now, I will admit the absence of the returning cast members from the previous films probably did affect the box office for AOE. However, from my own experiences, not many people complained about AOE because Shia LaBoeuf and Megan Fox weren't in it - indeed, the actor whose absence most people seemed to mourn was John Turturro.

Of course, that could be because I'm talking from the perspective of the UK, where Shia and Megan Fox aren't really all that popular. Whilst the lack of returning cast members probably did affect the box office negatively, it's clear that it doesn't explain the drop entirely, especially not internationally, where most of the returning cast members aren't really big names.

I don't think this statement is true anymore - what the Planet of the Apes reboot movies, as well as Peter Jackson's King Kong (two years before TF2007) have proved is that audiences will respond positively to CGI characters carrying their own dramatic arcs. Paramount didn't understand this - and miscalculated grossly because of it.

For example, in DOTM, Sentinel Prime is a surprisingly complex antagonist - he has a sincere desire to restore his home planet and is willing to go to any lengths to save it, even if it means betraying his own principles. His being Optimus Prime's mentor adds a personal connection to one of the heroes. Rather sadly, both he and Megatron are playing second fiddle to the infinitely less interesting and more one-dimensional human antagonist, Dylan Gould, seemingly because Paramount believed that the human antagonist, no matter how dull he is, should be front and centre. And that's the problem - Dylan Gould wastes time that could be allocated to Sentinel and Megatron.

Yes, AOE was the highest grossing film that year and the only billion-dollar grosser that year. I have never denied that AOE was a massive financial success - however, if you look at the details, there are serious red flags.

Rather sadly, Paramount didn't notice - rather than realising that, largely, we were all getting tired of the Bay style and aiming to a) make TLK different and b) end Bay's universe with TLK, they decided to put together a writer's room and make a cinematic universe, merging three disparate plotlines into a single film... which culminated in TLK bombing.

Here's the problem - it's widely believed that Bumblebee's disappointing box office take was due to the fact that a big-budget flop with the Transformers name on it was still fresh in people's memories. With TLK's bombing and Bumblebee's success, a straight TLK sequel is not something most people seem to want. And that's fine. Ultimately, TLK works perfectly well as a finale - the ending has a clear note of finality and, given Bay and Whalberg said this was their last run, I think they wanted it to be the final run as well. Let the Bayverse end.​

 

But your anecdotal experience or mine aren't things that can be projected onto millions of other individuals.

But it may have been that Shia was still important to the specific audience of the films among younger demographics.

I'm not certain why the Planets of the Apes movies, however much you may enjoy them, are some exemplar of audiences responding positively to CGI characters, because the third part of the trilogy literally made hundreds of millions of dollars less than its predecessor. If the CGI characters were such a draw and audiences responded to them so well, why did they also decline in box office so much?

And King King had major human characters played by flesh-and-blood actors and actresses. Without them, there wouldn't be a movie.

I'm not saying people going to see these movies don't want there to be CGI characters. What I'm saying is most people want there to be major human roles. The humans are the avatars for us. They are our connection to the CGI characters and world. If Paramount made a fan-desired live action movie only featuring the robots, it would almost certainly bomb hard.

Because we are talking about live action films that require human actors. The Transformers are also larger and more complex and have more moving parts than apes with actors using motion capture. I guarantee you the former is a lot more work than the latter.

Who's most people? People on this website? Critics?

 

Then why do so many people like things like Finding Nemo, Zootopia, and any other movie series with non-human main characters? Just because the characters don’t look like us doesn’t mean they aren’t characters.

 

Did I ever make the claim they weren't characters? Not at all. I didn't even imply that.

I said most normal people watching live action films want there to be human characters played by human actors to play important roles.

The examples you're using are animated films. However, live action films are supposed to have some grounding in reality however fanciful the premises may be, and that means humans playing the roles of important characters.

 

Obviously, I am just saying what I have encountered. We can't statistically track down everyone who saw AOE in 2014 and asked what they missed about the previous films - that would require both a) a time machine and b) everyone giving their details when they booked a ticket.

As someone who belonged to that demographic (I was 10 when the first film came out), I can tell you that, amongst my age group, most people were lamenting the loss of Simmons, not Sam or Mikaela, when AOE came out. I do think the lack of returning cast members hurt AOE's box office, but I think you're placing emphasis on the wrong people.

As I mentioned, the reason for that, many analysts believe, was franchise fatigue from the glut of terrible sequels and reboots (e.g. TLK, The Mummy, King Arthur: Legend of the Sword, Valerian and the City of A Thousand Planets, Baywatch and Pirates of the Caribbean 5). In fact, the summer of 2017 was one of the worst summer seasons for overall ticket sales since records began.

Basically, War's drop in box office had nothing to do with the fact that there were no major human characters. And perhaps more to the point, War was actually more successful than the above-mentioned films, as it did not actively lose the studio money, as TLK, The Mummy and Valerian, amongst others, did.

The problem is, again, Dylan Gould is the most prominent antagonist in the film... even though he shouldn't be. Unlike Sentinel and Megatron, he doesn't have a personal connection to Sam or the Autobots, any complex motivation other than "I'll sell out my own species to save my own skin" or drive the plot to any meaningful degree.

And yet, out of the three main villains, he has the most scenes and the most dialogue - wasting time that could be allocated to Megatron and Sentinel, who are the actual main villains, have personal connections to the heroes and whose actions drive the plot.

 

No, I think I AM placing emphasis on the right people, because Sam and Makaela were bigger characters than Simmons. It also sounds like you're using anecdotes, and if we're going to use anecdotes, I have never once seen a teen or twenty-something lament the loss of Simmons, but I HAVE seen plenty of younger people miss Sam.

I actually greatly prefer Simmons to Sam or Mikaela, and I am not saying Simmons wasn't an important supporting character through the course of the first three films, but if Simmons as well as Lennox were such huge draws, then why didn't their returns help The Last Knight's box office? Answer: they weren't. You can't ascribe declining box office to supporting characters who were never the cores of the films, however much some people here may have enjoyed them.

It was only more successful in terms of profit by virtue of its smaller budget. If it had The Last Knight's budget, then it would have been a bigger bomb than The Last Knight.

I don't get why Transformers fans have such a hard time understanding that human characters can have more screen time than giant, complex, CGI robots with many moving parts.

And yet, despite having more screen time, Dylan doesn't get any more focus as a character than Sentinel. In fact, the bold shows that they're actually more important to the film than Dylan. So who cares?

 

Of course, that could be because I'm talking from the perspective of the UK, where Shia and Megan Fox aren't really all that popular. In the UK, not many people I've encountered complained about AOE because Shia and Megan weren't in it. In fact, a lot of people were excited because Whalberg was in it.

Now, in DOTM, a few people I knew missed Fox - although that's due to Rosie Huntington-Whiteley being a poor replacement. However, not many people I knew missed Shia in AOE - again, the actor whose absence most people seemed to mourn was John Turturro.

Whilst the lack of returning cast members probably does explain the domestic drop, at least in part, it's clear that it doesn't explain the massive drop entirely, especially not internationally, where most of the returning cast members aren't really big names.

War had a similar budget to the Mummy, POTC 5 and Valerian - all three of which were massive box office bombs (in POTC 5's case, a massive disappointment). And perhaps, more to the point, War, which was meant as a smaller-scale film compared to Dawn, likely would never have had The Last Knight's budget.

Did I say Megatron and Sentinel weren't important to the film? No. They're the actual main villains, have personal connections to the heroes and whose actions drive the plot. They are important.

Did I say Dylan gets more screentime and dialogue than Megatron and Sentinel do? Yes - more screentime than someone who's the tertiary antagonist at best should.

Dylan has 139 lines of dialogue, whilst Sentinel has 75 lines of dialogue and Megatron has 33. Dylan has roughly 30-40 minutes of screentime, whilst Sentinel has roughly 10 minutes and Megatron has roughly 6 minutes.

It's different with Attinger, who can have more scenes and dialogue than Lockdown or Galvatron, since he's the villain with the most personal connection to the Autobots and whose actions drive the plot.

 

Man some of y'all need to get a room. So much multi quoting and walls of text that ain't gonna move the other person's opinion 1/10,000 of a millimeter.    

 

And that's the BIG problem with this fandom: the projection of personal preferences of fans and fans' friends onto millions of people worldwide. "People I know didn't like this character leaving, so that's why things went down!" "This movie didn't meet my expectations, so that's why millions of other people didn't like it!"

I'm sorry, but you DON'T speak for everyone internationally. How do you know what people like and don't like in other countries? How do you know what humans audiences liked in other countries? I couldn't tell you who they like.

And Age of Extinction wasn't a massive drop internationally either. It made more outside the U.S. than any of the other movies! It doesn't matter which individual markets went up and which went down, because in the end, it made a lot of money for Paramount and movie theaters regardless!

How can you not see that screen time is going to be limited for individual robots in films featuring ensemble casts of giant CGI characters with literally many thousands of moving parts?

If Megatron, Optimus, and Sentinel were the ONLY robots in Dark of the Moon, then I could see the two antagonists having a lot more screen time given its high budget. But the film also had dozens of other robots in it.

But you see, in AoE, Lockdown and Galvatron's actions drive the plot a lot, too. No less than Sentinel and Megatron in DotM. Perhaps even more so in some ways. The reason for Galvatron and Lockdown likewise appearing on screen less than some human characters is the fact Galvatron and Lockdown are giant robots in live action in an ensemble film featuring many robot characters and creatures. The same reason Sentinel and Megatron appear less on screen than many humans.

And what's this "he's the villain with the most personal connections to the Autobots" nonsense? Heck, Ratchet and the other Autobots knew who Lockdown was, but they had no idea who was behind Cemetery Wind. Attinger is more personal with the Yeagers, but not the Autobots. Attinger didn't personally kill or capture any Autobots; Lockdown did!

It is true Lockdown doesn't have any personal vendetta against the Autobots as individuals, even if he dislikes the factions and the effects of their war upon the cosmos, and he's a "big picture" guy compared to Attinger, who's vision is limited to Earth. Lockdown's just doing his job, but that doesn't mean he doesn't mean he has less personal connections to the Autobots than Attinger!

Anyway, my answer remains the same: I would much rather have a continuation of the Bayverse with a different director, which at least has the potential to be highly interesting, than whatever it is we're likely to see with a reboot, which would probably be newer versions of characters and concepts and stories we already saw in the earlier Bay movies. I'd rather things go forward into the bizarre and out there than have a repeat of scenarios we have already seen.

 

Obviously, we can't all read minds, so we must look at our experiences and make educated guesses based on that. For example, AOE's box office drop

In the Cemetery Wind storyline, Lockdown and Attinger are equal partners - they both contribute to the Autobots' being persecuted on Earth and, whilst Lockdown did most of the work, Attinger was still the one handling the logistics. The story treats them both as equally dangerous and their contributions to the plot are roughly equal. And given Attinger's the head of Cemetery Wind and aided Lockdown in hunting down the Autobots, obviously he's just as much party to them as Lockdown. Just because you don't fire the bullet doesn't mean you had nothing to do with it.

This is the opposite of Dylan Gould who, unlike Sentinel and Megatron, doesn't have a personal connection to Sam or the Autobots, any complex motivation other than "I'll sell out my own species to save my own skin" and isn't even an equal partner in Megatron and Sentinel's plan - he's a high-ranked minion at best. And yet, out of the three main villains, he has the most scenes and the most dialogue - wasting time that could be allocated to Megatron and Sentinel. For example, wouldn't it have been so much better for Sentinel to be the one to explain the plan, showing his fanatical desire to save his home planet, as well as his utter condescension towards humanity?

 

I'm kind of curious where you get this idea that Attinger was the only one involved in logistics.

Because Attinger was merely the human/Earthly side of things. The other side was Lockdown and the Creators. Earth is just a microcosm of the universe at large in AoE, in which Attinger and his ilk are small-minded and have an egocentric worldview, while Lockdown sees the big cosmic picture.

I never implied Attinger had no role. I'm saying Attinger was not known to the Autobots like Lockdown was known. Attinger has no more of a personal relationship with the Autobots than Dylan Gould does, even if their motivations and goals are completely different.

Dylan Gould is not a giant CGI robot with thousands of moving parts. He's a flesh-and-blood human who doesn't needed to be added later by a special effects team. It's as simple as that.

Why does Charlie get more screen time than Bumblebee? Why do Sam and Cade get more screen time than Optimus and Bumblebee? Because they're human beings that can be filmed as humans!

Do you know why the filmmakers have not made a live action movie featuring only the robots? Money. Someone would have to fit the bill for a film featuring all of the robot CGI, and there's no guarantee such a movie would be a success with general audiences. The opposite would likely be the case. It's that simple. There was even a news story on here years ago in which Bay was quoted which showed a robots-only film had been considered by some, but it wasn't feasible.

 

The highest grossing film of all time until Endgame was Cameron's Avatar...which not only is a 3 hour film that is almost entirely CGI in every single scene even including parts you wouldn't think would need to be CGI (I.E. mouths moving in the clear masks are actually CGI), and its budget was only $237.

Your precious AoE cost almost just as much at $210 million, is almost exactly as long in runtime (its three minutes longer, 165 min vs 162 min), and yet somehow even with the blatant cost-saving measure of the KSI transformations couldn't even achieve something that Avatar did five years prior and without the same level of CGI technology?

The numbers just don't add up.

Furthermore, the bay films didn't do something that the franchise has otherwise done numerous times and had the robot aliens talk while in vehicle mode. Presence of character is all that needs to be achieved, but not necessarily them in robot mode. Just have the vehicle with the voice actor overlayed and BAM, problem solved with no CGI. Sure, there are occasions once or twice across the series, but not enough that the vehicles really feel like they're actually aliens in disguise, and KITT basically proved the viability of talking cars as a character type as well.

 

The aliens in Avatar were not giant alien robots with multiple moving parts. The Transformers are. The latter takes a lot more effort than the former.

Who cares about how Avatar was done cost-wise relative to any of the Bay movies? Motion capture organic aliens are not the same as giant robots with many moving parts.

And where's this evidence the KSI transformations were cost-cutting measures? From what I have heard, the KSI transformations gave the CGI effects team a looootttt of work to do. If ILM was challenged by them, I guarantee you that means lots of man hours

Where's the evidence normal non-fans want to watch a Tranformers movie with this huge amount of cars talking, just so we can get more robot dialogue?

Heck, I'm a hardcore Transformers fan, and I DON'T want to see a movie with a great portion of the movie showing the characters talking in car mode. You want more of that? That's fine. I'm fine with what we have.

And it was more than "once or twice across the series" when the Transformers talked in vehicle mode. Bumblebee's introduction in TF 1. The Decepticons' roll call. The Twins as an ice cream truck. Rusty Prime, "Calling all Autobots." Bumblebee at KSI. Hot Rod kidnapping Vivian.

And since I have never heard or seen this "KITT" in action, I have no idea if it's relevant or not.

 

You never heard Knight Rider?

 

So motion capture explains the robot suits, all the scenes in space, the alien creatures that had no resemblance to anything on Earth, the planet's flora, the giant ass trucks, and the entire climactic battle of the film?

Source? I mean, it's flying cubes instead of parts actually rearranging - Super 8 did the exact same thing more or less for the alien's spaceship rebuilding itself out of the thousands of cubes at the climax of the film, and Super 8 didn't have nearly as much of a budget as AoE.

Wow, its almost like wanting more presence of the robot characters or something.

Tell me, do the aliens simply stop being aliens when they assume their alt mode disguises? Because that's why this wasn't done in the bay films and you are demonstrating that exact mentality.

And thus you prove you are closed minded to trying to solve the problem of getting more robot screen time without having to actually use the expensive robot CGI.

And more of that somehow would be a bad thing? How many times do we just have the Autobots sitting around as vehicles doing nothing while the humans are all moving about fully cognisant that the cars are actually aliens from deep space that merely have taken the forms of cars? What about the scene immediately following the escape from Hoover Dam where Bumblebee/S7 link up with the Autobots - wouldn't some voice over like "It's Bumblebee and he's being chased by the humans! / No, Ironhide, I think those humans are working with us now!" add some more presence than simply being 3/5ths a fancy GM sponsored drive-by?

You've never heard of the most famous sentient car in fictional history...

The kicker is that it's not only one of Hastlehoff's most famous roles, but K.A.R.R.'s voice actor?

Some guy named Peter Cullen. He even reprised it for the short lived (and admittedly not that great) modern reboot!

 

Did I say that everything was motion captured in Avatar? No, but the aliens and the alien environment do not have thousands of parts. Depicting organic CGI creatures that do not have thousands of parts is more complex than depicting CGI robots that do have thousands of parts. Add to that the fact you're dealing with Transformers that transform, and Transformers movies have visual challenges that most other blockbusters do not.

It's a little more complex than that. Those cubes DO rearrange themselves back into robots. I'm not saying people have to like them, but I have never, ever seen any evidence that they saved money or work on the part of the animators. AoE as a whole was actually more work for ILM than its predecessors:

Age of Extinction: ILM turns up its Transformers toolset

'Age Of Extinction' Was The Most Difficult 'Transformers' Movie To Make

Furthermore, Super 8 did not have an ensemble cast of giant robots like the Bay movies.

My point wasn't that I don't want more robot character moments. My point was that the average person is not likely going to see a movie just because some cars are talking more in their alternate mode!

I'm sorry, but I don't want to see an hour of cars talking. Transformers talking in their alternate modes are like make up or having some drinks: it's better in moderation, and less can be more.

I'm fine with little indicators here and there to show that we are dealing with a Transformer as an alternate mode. Because they are robots in disguise, I don't need it overdone.

I love the hypocrisy here on your part, because you're the one who railed against the very existence of AoE and TLK before they were even released in theaters, and you rail against their designs, and you're the one who wouldn't see Bumblebee in theaters, because you only wanted a definite reboot. And yet somehow, just because I have some different preferences regarding how Transformers and their alt modes are depicted in the movies, I'm "close-minded?"

Do you not see how ridiculous that is? You don't need to like certain movies or certain designs, but please don't then turn around and accuse others of having a closed mind, just because others might not want something you want or have the same preferences.

I didn't say I wouldn't be open to more, but I'm fine with what we do have, and I don't want it overdone. Sometimes, less can be more.

I've heard the name, but I don't know anything else about it.

Furthermore, what does ANY of this at this point have to do with whether some people want a Transformers 6 or not?

 

You have absolutely no idea how CGI works if you think that just because you can't see the parts moving.

Reminds me of a story I heard about the development of Pixar's The Incredibles. They were rewatching a scene during development when Helen is talking to her husband when for a split second there is a blink-and-you miss white streak. Slowing the animation down, the animators found that due to a hacker, the scene had been corrupted such that one of Helen's teeth shot out of her mouth at mach five.

Plus, as I mentioned, there is stuff in that film that is so subtle that it looks real, but is in fact CGI. The mouths in the masks? CGI.

You have no ground for saying that the stuff in Avatar is not as complex as the Transformer robots.

The animations for the first film actually required minute animations that are lost in the final product, I.E. when Ironhide transforms during the Mission City battle to do the flip over the woman, you can see his front wheels disengage from the axle only to be picked up by sub-arms that grab on and fold themselves and the wheel away.

AoE you just have the entire robot dissolve into cubes and then magically reform. No need to figure out what goes where when it all just breaks apart, changes appearance, and then simply glues back together differently like some overglorified giant LEGO set.

Or, y'know, a classic Megaman boss.

And this is not you demonstrating the inability to understand that the cars are characters of alien origin that merely look like cars instead of actually being cars how? If the cars are talking more, then maybe they aren't cars in the first place.

Apparently to you, "overdone" is if they do it more than once or twice. Go back and read the comics, look at the shows, the robots talking in alt. mode happens ALL THE TIME.

I do find it funny that you're all about abandoning shit like having Decepticons for your precious aborted idea of 'CREATORS' and yet the idea of alien robots that turn into cars being able to talk and interact is beyond you.

I'm sorry, who's the one who keeps going on and on about wanting more bizarre shit in the films? How can you even take this stance about what the audience would want when you also are all for abandoning the core concepts of the franchise?

This is exactly why I think you would be happy to see what amounts to the franchise burn. Would you accept a film that is just as bizarre and out there as you would like, but it proves so unpalatable to the general public that it kills the franchise permanently?

Well, the answer is people don't want a Transformers 6.

 

That describes a lot of CGI in movies. A lot of it is used on everyday objects that appear in action scenes or in the background. Likewise, there are lots of things in the Bay movies that are practical. That is really cool I think.

The ILM guys literally mention the moving parts of the robots as being a challenge for Transformers. Granted, they're not comparing it to Avatar (Heck, the one bringing up Avatar is YOU!), but if ILM are industry innovators and experts and not some Joshua and the Promised Land-level amateur production.

I'm not saying Avatar was easy either, but I do think Transformers undoubtedly creates a challenge possibly unique among big budget blockbuster franchises.

But the KSI transformations literally had their own challenges, as I showed in the links.

But I look at them as robots in disguise. If they are robots in disguise on Earth, then I'd think that they probably spend most of their time acting like they're cars when they are in their alternate mode.

And they talk and do other things in car mode in the movies, too, like Optimus Prime beeping for Cade and company when Lockdown uses his grenade.

And I love you always misrepresent what others say to make your point. I never even said a little bit more would be overdoing it, but I don't want a huge amount more.

Except the Decepticons were never abandoned? Instead, it's more like Season 3, where the Decepticons, having been Shrekt big time in the previous movie, are coming from more of a place of weakness, and in Megatron's case use that weakness as a strength to gain a new body and troops.

Plus, the Transformers having Creators was true in the original cartoon. Movies 1-3 are like Seasons 1 and 2, with DotM's battle arguably the movie equivalent of the Autobot City battle, with AoE and TLK being Season 3.

Again, where have I advocated them not being able to talk in alternate mode?

I'm capable of separating my own personal preferences from what general audiences want.

And "you are all for abandoning the core concepts of the franchise?" What type of nonsense is that? When I have ever advocated for the core concepts to be abandoned? On the contrary, I advocate the Shrexploration of the core concepts in interesting and novel ways. All of the Bay movies have Autobots, Decepticons, transformation, thinking and feeling robots from Cybertron, Optimus as leader of the Autobots, and Megatron as the Decepticon leader or at the very minimum playing an important role in the Decepticons, and more.

And yet, I have argued for there being fiction and toys that don't cater to my interests if it allows others to find something they enjoy and the continued existence of the brand.

Possible solution for the influx of subpar / safe storytelling.

The chances of a single film doing that are near zero. At worst, you might kill interest for a few years or so, but eventually, you would have enough nostalgia for new movies and fiction to be made.

But I do, and I am a singular entity within the multiple person entity known as "people." So some people DO want a Transformers 6! Just like some people don't.

 

Well for the Bumblebee parts that wasn’t actually him talking, just controlling the radio. And Rusty Optimus was also just a recording of a message that Cade accidentally activated with the jumper cables. And I don’t know if I’d count the Decepticon examples as real dialogue, since it was just computer noises (or computerized gibberish speaking?) and a few subtitles saying their names.