Last night I attended a press screening of the new Bumblebee movie in Boston. I am a longtime fan of Transformers. They came out when I was 10 years old and the perfect age for these toys. I’ve attended two Botcons and have seen all media surrounding Transformers since 1984. For a while I even did a video series where I reviewed Tranformers comics from the 80s. I even have a collection of about 400 Tranformers. So, yeah, I’m a fan.
I’m going to come right out and say it. I loved Bumblebee. Travis Knight used his masterful storytelling expertise honed from years at Laika to make a coherent story that Transformers fans will love. He hit on so many good marks. First off, you know who all the characters are, except for Shatter and Dropkick. I have my suspicion that those guys are left over Bayformers that were designed and adapted for this movie. They have that feel to them. Bumblebee himself on the other hand has had a complete overhaul in is design. We saw a little featurette before the movie and then the same one at the end but it tells you a lot about the care that went into making this movie. Here is a shortened one.
The show to replace Transformers: Robots in Disguise will be Transformers: Cyberverse. I’m hoping that this series will be more about the bots and less about any interactions with humans. So far I’ve seen no images of humans at all. That will be interesting to see. I’m excited about the designs of the characters, there is a huge G1 influence happening and I do like that Bumblebee is the main character, too. Pairing him with Windblade is cool, too. However, I really wish that they still had Will Friedle as Bumblebee and Constance Zimmer as Windblade. I will always have a place in my heart for Will Friedle as Bumblbe because after having years of Bumblebee being unable to talk (stupid thing on Michael Bay’s part) the first words uttered from Friedle’s Bumblebee sent chills down my spine and made me so happy!
That being said I am certainly going to give these new actors a chance. I’m also interested to see how the 11 minute format is going to work. I don’t know if I can wait weeks for 11 minute episodes. I;m now so used to whole seasons coming out at once. Check out the trailer below because it looks fantastic!
