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Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika

Transformers News: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika

Thursday, December 13th, 2018 6:58AM CST

Category: Movie Related News
Posted by: ZeroWolf   Views: 15,616

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With Bumblebee edging its way into theaters soon, we have word from director Travis Knight regarding his future projects. Despite rumors stating that Knight would replace former Guardians of the Galaxy director James Gunn to take over for the third film, Knight himself dispelled the rumor in a statement he made to Bad Taste, a website based in Italy. He explains that, “After Bumblebee, [Knight’s] goal is to return to work at the animation studios Laika, [his] ‘child’ bringing with him [all] the baggage of experience [he’s] gained with [Bumblebee].”

For those who do not know, Knight made his name known working on stop-motion animated films such as 2009’s Coraline and 2014’s Kubo and the Two Strings, the latter being Knight’s directorial debut. Despite the warm reception towards Bumblebee, his live action debut, it seems Knight’s tenure in the Transformers franchise will be left short and sweet.

Transformers News: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Retire from Transformers

Are you saddened that Knight will not continue to work with Transformers, or do you prefer his work at Laika? Perhaps you wish that Knight was indeed taking the helm for the third Guardians movie. Let us know what you think in the Energon Pub and stay tuned here at Seibertron.com for all the latest Transformers news and reviews!
Credit(s): Bad Taste

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Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1998609)
Posted by william-james88 on December 13th, 2018 @ 8:14am CST
15ngcs1 wrote:I think he's following Steven Spielberg's footsteps. Spielberg never directs sequels. He only executive produces them.


LOL WOT?

Image
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1998610)
Posted by ZeroWolf on December 13th, 2018 @ 8:17am CST
Jurassic Park The Lost World wants to say hello as well
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1998611)
Posted by 15ngcs1 on December 13th, 2018 @ 8:27am CST
Fine Spielberg said he rarely directs sequels
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1998617)
Posted by william-james88 on December 13th, 2018 @ 8:41am CST
15ngcs1 wrote:Fine Spielberg said he rarely directs sequels

Maybe he talks about these days, but when you look at his career he has 4 sequels out of 32 films. That's way more than rarely.
And guess what film he will be working on soon, ANOTHER SEQUEL to Indiana Jones

https://variety.com/2018/film/news/indi ... 202861005/
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1998619)
Posted by 15ngcs1 on December 13th, 2018 @ 8:51am CST
he's very dedicated to that particular franchise if he chose to direct all of them
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1998620)
Posted by snavej on December 13th, 2018 @ 9:03am CST
Film cut? I'll have to see an uncut version for Bumblebee's Hot Rod, then!
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1998621)
Posted by ZeroWolf on December 13th, 2018 @ 9:05am CST
:lol: if only hot rod was in the film to begin with!
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1998631)
Posted by chaddicus on December 13th, 2018 @ 10:06am CST
Nowhere in this short article does it have anything saying he is retiring from the Transformers films, aside from the title. All it says is he's going to go work on animation projects, which if you're a director, you move on to your next job. He could easily come back for the next instalment, if there is a next instalment, which would be years away.
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1998632)
Posted by 15ngcs1 on December 13th, 2018 @ 10:07am CST
true. these titles are always misleading.
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1998633)
Posted by ZeroWolf on December 13th, 2018 @ 10:11am CST
Basically he's not doing the next one there's talk that Paramount are looking at other people for the Optimus Prime movie.
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1998960)
Posted by noctorro on December 15th, 2018 @ 3:02am CST
Well, I'm going to need to drop my opinion here as well as an '85 kid who grew up with G1


Bumblebee was awesome! I agree with the person who said I'd spend another whatever bucks on the 5 minutes of Cybertron alone.

Damn I love this movie. It starts with action, we actually have flying Tran...

Spoilers!!!!

No, no spoilers. I love the movie, it has character development, it has humor. It has slow parts and takes it's time with scenes and moments. The action is great! I do think the forrest battle is still thé best battle. But man would that forrest battle have looked good with Transformers looking Transformers.

I love the very few Transformers in the movie so that they actually have screentime. I know everybody loves the first movie but Megatron and Starscream had a 4 second dialogue wich made it look like they were an adaptation of anything. Otherwise the cons were just mindless drones to be brutally murdered by peace loving Autobots.

I like he humans, I was very unsure about John Cena (European and don't watch/follow any of that WWE stuff a lot of Americans are crazy about, I do like the womens WWE, sick moves and hot chicks). I liked the family, a bit cheesy at times but not overly and actually had some deep elements.

I loved the relationship between Charlie and Bee, and Charlie and afro boy. It was sweet. If Bay directed this than afro boy would be spying on Charlie taking showers. My god it's so fresh no not see that depraved sexuality we have nowadays with 16 and pregnant, instaho's, Nicki Minaj and women getting to be celebrities and influencers by effing some rich black dude. Man that part of our pop culture is destructive and lizard brain sad as hell.

Ontopic, Cybertron man... Cybertron.

Travis Knight knows his stuff and made his film and I love it. He loves Transformers and I hope this director get's another chance at my most favorite franchise.

SPOILERS....
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..
The last scene where Bumblebee takes off on the bridge, damn man, chills and almost tears...

I had a great time watching the early screenings of Bumblebee and am going to watch it with the waifu again soon, and at least one more time solo after that. I love this film, I love the fact that the current toyline Siege looks a lot like the Cybertron parts.
They really changed a lot since there are no Cybertron scene toys on the shelf or in the making as far as we know. So the director really had power and took a stand to have that scene in.
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999160)
Posted by Evil Eye on December 16th, 2018 @ 9:10am CST
EDIT: Whoops, wrong thread!
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999246)
Posted by Salacious_Monk on December 16th, 2018 @ 8:17pm CST
ZeroWolf wrote:Basically he's not doing the next one there's talk that Paramount are looking at other people for the Optimus Prime movie.


Whoever the next director is, he should be somebody who grew up watching the G1 series...
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999268)
Posted by Burn on December 16th, 2018 @ 11:02pm CST
For those posting spoilers, we have a thread for it.

Salacious_Monk wrote:
ZeroWolf wrote:Basically he's not doing the next one there's talk that Paramount are looking at other people for the Optimus Prime movie.


Whoever the next director is, he should be somebody who grew up watching the G1 series...

Why?
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999281)
Posted by Salacious_Monk on December 17th, 2018 @ 1:34am CST
Burn wrote:For those posting spoilers, we have a thread for it.

Salacious_Monk wrote:
ZeroWolf wrote:Basically he's not doing the next one there's talk that Paramount are looking at other people for the Optimus Prime movie.


Whoever the next director is, he should be somebody who grew up watching the G1 series...

Why?

That's because otherwise the director will hardly understand how most fans fall in love with transformers in the place.
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999290)
Posted by Burn on December 17th, 2018 @ 3:12am CST
Salacious_Monk wrote:That's because otherwise the director will hardly understand how most fans fall in love with transformers in the place.

What about those fans who got into transformers because of Beast Wars?

Or those fans who got into Transformers because of Armada/Energon/Cybertron?
(Both groups are old enough to have disposable income now)

WHY does it constantly have to be G1? WHY can't it be something new and different? I mean it's only a franchise whose core concept is about change. Image
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999311)
Posted by ZeroWolf on December 17th, 2018 @ 7:12am CST
Burn wrote:
Salacious_Monk wrote:That's because otherwise the director will hardly understand how most fans fall in love with transformers in the place.

What about those fans who got into transformers because of Beast Wars?

Or those fans who got into Transformers because of Armada/Energon/Cybertron?
(Both groups are old enough to have disposable income now)

WHY does it constantly have to be G1? WHY can't it be something new and different? I mean it's only a franchise whose core concept is about change. Image

:BOWDOWN:

Maybe in thirty years time we'll get a beast wars movie, but who am I kidding, they'll still be beating the G1 horse's skeleton.
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999313)
Posted by Evil Eye on December 17th, 2018 @ 7:48am CST
Burn wrote:For those posting spoilers, we have a thread for it.

Ah, whoops! Sorry about that, I'll move the post to the relevant thread.
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999321)
Posted by Salacious_Monk on December 17th, 2018 @ 8:13am CST
Burn wrote:
Salacious_Monk wrote:That's because otherwise the director will hardly understand how most fans fall in love with transformers in the place.

What about those fans who got into transformers because of Beast Wars?

Or those fans who got into Transformers because of Armada/Energon/Cybertron?
(Both groups are old enough to have disposable income now)

WHY does it constantly have to be G1? WHY can't it be something new and different? I mean it's only a franchise whose core concept is about change. Image

These two series can never match the G1 series. The stories of these two series were OK. But the biggest problem is that there were too few characters. In addition, the robot designs in Beast Wars were utter horrible...
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999325)
Posted by ZeroWolf on December 17th, 2018 @ 8:22am CST
I'm afraid I must disagree as in my view (your milage will vary) both of those series are superior to G1 toon. The G1 toon was just a toy commercial where you bad characters appearing for no reason (hey Astrotrain where did you come from! And the protectorbots! At least the aerialbots, stunticons, combaticons and technobots got an introduction)
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999327)
Posted by Salacious_Monk on December 17th, 2018 @ 8:49am CST
ZeroWolf wrote:I'm afraid I must disagree as in my view (your milage will vary) both of those series are superior to G1 toon. The G1 toon was just a toy commercial where you bad characters appearing for no reason (hey Astrotrain where did you come from! And the protectorbots! At least the aerialbots, stunticons, combaticons and technobots got an introduction)

In terms of story, yes, the stories of the two series are OK. Some of the G1 stories are not well-written.
But if you have too few characters (like in Beast Wars and Armada), the WAR between autobots and decepticons will be just like a feud between two small gangs...
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999329)
Posted by Sabrblade on December 17th, 2018 @ 8:55am CST
Salacious_Monk wrote:
ZeroWolf wrote:I'm afraid I must disagree as in my view (your milage will vary) both of those series are superior to G1 toon. The G1 toon was just a toy commercial where you bad characters appearing for no reason (hey Astrotrain where did you come from! And the protectorbots! At least the aerialbots, stunticons, combaticons and technobots got an introduction)

In terms of story, yes, the stories of the two series are OK. Some of the G1 stories are not well-written.
But if you have too few characters (like in Beast Wars and Armada), the WAR between autobots and decepticons will be just like a feud between two small gangs...
Sometimes that smaller scale is more entertaining than a realistic portrayal of warfare. Said smaller scale is even one of the reasons this Bumblebee movie is drawing in so much more critical acclaim than all of the previous five films put together,

And it's not like the G1 cartoon always had every single Autobot and Decepticon go into every single battle in every single episode.
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999332)
Posted by ZeroWolf on December 17th, 2018 @ 9:31am CST
And the G1 fights were more of a comedic brawl then a war. You wanted a war you had two choices, your imagination or the comics. Having a larger cast means nothing.
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999348)
Posted by Sabrblade on December 17th, 2018 @ 10:54am CST
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999436)
Posted by Salacious_Monk on December 17th, 2018 @ 8:04pm CST
Sabrblade wrote:
Salacious_Monk wrote:
ZeroWolf wrote:I'm afraid I must disagree as in my view (your milage will vary) both of those series are superior to G1 toon. The G1 toon was just a toy commercial where you bad characters appearing for no reason (hey Astrotrain where did you come from! And the protectorbots! At least the aerialbots, stunticons, combaticons and technobots got an introduction)

In terms of story, yes, the stories of the two series are OK. Some of the G1 stories are not well-written.
But if you have too few characters (like in Beast Wars and Armada), the WAR between autobots and decepticons will be just like a feud between two small gangs...
Sometimes that smaller scale is more entertaining than a realistic portrayal of warfare. Said smaller scale is even one of the reasons this Bumblebee movie is drawing in so much more critical acclaim than all of the previous five films put together,

And it's not like the G1 cartoon always had every single Autobot and Decepticon go into every single battle in every single episode.

I don't think being small-scale is the reason that the bumblebee movies are attractive. The new movie is attractive because the transformers finally have their personalities and the robot designs are prettier. In the previous five movies, all the transformer characters were just paper-thin.
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999437)
Posted by Salacious_Monk on December 17th, 2018 @ 8:10pm CST
ZeroWolf wrote:And the G1 fights were more of a comedic brawl then a war. You wanted a war you had two choices, your imagination or the comics. Having a larger cast means nothing.

The G1 cartoons aimed at the kids so you couldn't give a realistic portray of a war. You still remember the reaction to Optimus's death in the movie? However, having a larger cast can provide you the foundation for making the transformers movies into an epic. The live-action movies are not just for kids. You can make them into something like the starwars series.
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999465)
Posted by ZeroWolf on December 18th, 2018 @ 3:25am CST
A larger cast is incredibly expensive though, hence why in revenge of the Fallen onwards the cons got bulked out by reskinned models that they had already used. The 07 movie had a smaller cast as well and is the most favourable of the live action movies (till Bee of course) in a movie setting you have two hours to keep people's attention. A large cast and making them distinct from each other is a very tall order, that's before you even think about plot. Until it changes, paramount will also keep the human element, which again requires time to develop them.

Now all of this is possible but you have to be careful with your choices. Marvel worked because they didn't throw the Avengers at you at the very beginning, each got a movie to sell themselves, so the Avengers movie could sell you them as a team. Only curveball with this approach is of course Guardians of the Galaxy, but we weren't getting them any other way, and their first film did suffer from marvel villain syndrome.
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999484)
Posted by Salacious_Monk on December 18th, 2018 @ 7:58am CST
ZeroWolf wrote:A larger cast is incredibly expensive though, hence why in revenge of the Fallen onwards the cons got bulked out by reskinned models that they had already used. The 07 movie had a smaller cast as well and is the most favourable of the live action movies (till Bee of course) in a movie setting you have two hours to keep people's attention. A large cast and making them distinct from each other is a very tall order, that's before you even think about plot. Until it changes, paramount will also keep the human element, which again requires time to develop them.

Now all of this is possible but you have to be careful with your choices. Marvel worked because they didn't throw the Avengers at you at the very beginning, each got a movie to sell themselves, so the Avengers movie could sell you them as a team. Only curveball with this approach is of course Guardians of the Galaxy, but we weren't getting them any other way, and their first film did suffer from marvel villain syndrome.

I doubt that a larger cast would be incredibly expensive. You think people like Scarlett Johansson or Robert Downey Jr. would be much cheaper than CGI? I have seen aquaman. It was full of CGI and was almost plotless but the budget was only around $180 million or so. You don't need to make the robots unnecessarily complex like Michael Bay did. That can save a lot of money. Making transformers distinguishable is not difficult. You can use colours. In the G1, Megatron was grey but Star was red, blue and white. But in Bay's movies, almost every decepticon was grey...
Paramount can try making the next movie 40% transformers (CGI) and 60% human and the one after that 50% transformers (CGI) and 50% human and so on. If the result is good, then in the end we can have a 100% CGI transformer movie.
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999510)
Posted by ZeroWolf on December 18th, 2018 @ 9:38am CST
We already have had a 100% cgi transformers movie, Predacons Rising.

That was also a smaller cast.

Bigger cast does not equal a great movie. Movie studios want their films to make as much money as possible, especially if based on a kids toy franchise like this, so they'll want to make as much for as least possible. But as I said earlier things may change but don't expect it to happen over night.
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999518)
Posted by Sabrblade on December 18th, 2018 @ 10:01am CST
If anything, a bigger cast would give less screen time to everyone except the one or two who'd get to be the main leads.

The G1 cartoon's cast was so big for its own good that, despite most of the following characters (and I use that term loosely) showing up often and frequently, I'd be hard pressed to tell you anything personal about Prowl, Bluestreak, Sideswipe, Windcharger, Mirage, Trailbreaker, Skywarp, Thundercracker, any of the Constructicons besides Long Haul, Skids, Dirge, Thrust, Ramjet, Air Raid, Skydive, Fireflight, any of the Stunticons besides Motormaster, any of the Combaticons besides Swindle, any of the Protectobots besides First Aid, Pipes, Swerve, Tailgate, Runabout, Runamuck, Broadside, any of the Predacons, any of the Terrorcons, any of the Technobots, any of the Throttlebots besides Goldbug (since he's just Bumblebee), Slugfest, Overkill, Fastlane, Cloudraker, Pounce, Wingspan, Punch, Chromedome, Skullcruncher, Weirdwolf, Apeface, Snapdragon, Pointblank, Sureshot, Crosshairs, Slugslinger, or Sixshot, just by going off the G1 cartoon alone without also consulting their toy bios and/or any of their comic depictions.

And most of the ones who were memorable were mostly because of an oft-repeated one-note quirk rather than a compelling fleshed out personality. And that was because the cast was too big to develop everyone equally.
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999522)
Posted by ZeroWolf on December 18th, 2018 @ 10:09am CST
Sabrblade wrote:If anything, a bigger cast would give less screen time to everyone except the one or two who'd get to be the main leads.

The G1 cartoon's cast was so big for its own good that, despite most of the following characters (and I use that term loosely) showing up often and frequently, I'd be hard pressed to tell you anything personally about Prowl, Bluestreak, Sideswipe, Windcharger, Mirage, Trailbreaker, Skywarp, Thundercracker, any of the Constructicons besides Long Haul, Skids, Dirge, Thrust, Ramjet, Air Raid, Skydive, Fireflight, any of the Stunticons besides Motormaster, any of the Combaticons besides Swindle, any of the Protectobots besides First Aid, Pipes, Swerve, Tailgate, Runabout, Runamuck, Broadside, any of the Predacons, any of the Terrorcons, any of the Technobots, any of the Throttlebots besides Goldbug (since he's just Bumblebee), Slugfest, Overkill, Fastlane, Cloudraker, Pounce, Wingspan, Punch, Chromedome, Skullcruncher, Weirdwolf, Apeface, Snapdragon, Pointblank, Sureshot, Crosshairs, Slugslinger, or Sixshot, just by going off the G1 cartoon alone without also consulting their toy bios and/or any of their comic depictions.

And most of the ones who were memorable were mostly because of an oft-repeated one-note quirk rather than a compelling fleshed out personality. And that was because the cast was too big to develop everyone equally.

Thank you Sabrblade, you've put it better than I did.
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999643)
Posted by Salacious_Monk on December 19th, 2018 @ 1:36am CST
Sabrblade wrote:If anything, a bigger cast would give less screen time to everyone except the one or two who'd get to be the main leads.

The G1 cartoon's cast was so big for its own good that, despite most of the following characters (and I use that term loosely) showing up often and frequently, I'd be hard pressed to tell you anything personal about Prowl, Bluestreak, Sideswipe, Windcharger, Mirage, Trailbreaker, Skywarp, Thundercracker, any of the Constructicons besides Long Haul, Skids, Dirge, Thrust, Ramjet, Air Raid, Skydive, Fireflight, any of the Stunticons besides Motormaster, any of the Combaticons besides Swindle, any of the Protectobots besides First Aid, Pipes, Swerve, Tailgate, Runabout, Runamuck, Broadside, any of the Predacons, any of the Terrorcons, any of the Technobots, any of the Throttlebots besides Goldbug (since he's just Bumblebee), Slugfest, Overkill, Fastlane, Cloudraker, Pounce, Wingspan, Punch, Chromedome, Skullcruncher, Weirdwolf, Apeface, Snapdragon, Pointblank, Sureshot, Crosshairs, Slugslinger, or Sixshot, just by going off the G1 cartoon alone without also consulting their toy bios and/or any of their comic depictions.

And most of the ones who were memorable were mostly because of an oft-repeated one-note quirk rather than a compelling fleshed out personality. And that was because the cast was too big to develop everyone equally.


Of course, but you can say the same thing to hawkeye, falcon and war machine...But why do avengers still have such a large cast? You don't need to flesh out all the characters in the movie. You can do it through comics or novels (making more money).
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999647)
Posted by Salacious_Monk on December 19th, 2018 @ 1:50am CST
ZeroWolf wrote:We already have had a 100% cgi transformers movie, Predacons Rising.

That was also a smaller cast.

Bigger cast does not equal a great movie. Movie studios want their films to make as much money as possible, especially if based on a kids toy franchise like this, so they'll want to make as much for as least possible. But as I said earlier things may change but don't expect it to happen over night.

Precons rising was a bit disappointing... Honestly, I think that Paramount should consider stagger autobot and decepticon movies. The next transformer movie can feature starscream (a decepticon movie) on how he tries to overthrow Megatron and then gets banished to the Earth where he builds his own troops (terrorcons/predacons/combaticons). The movie after next can feature Optimus Prime (an autobot movie) on how Megatron after having dealt with Starscream's rebellion starts to invade the Earth and how Optimus Prime defends the Earth.
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999678)
Posted by ZeroWolf on December 19th, 2018 @ 6:46am CST
Salacious_Monk wrote:
Sabrblade wrote:If anything, a bigger cast would give less screen time to everyone except the one or two who'd get to be the main leads.

The G1 cartoon's cast was so big for its own good that, despite most of the following characters (and I use that term loosely) showing up often and frequently, I'd be hard pressed to tell you anything personal about Prowl, Bluestreak, Sideswipe, Windcharger, Mirage, Trailbreaker, Skywarp, Thundercracker, any of the Constructicons besides Long Haul, Skids, Dirge, Thrust, Ramjet, Air Raid, Skydive, Fireflight, any of the Stunticons besides Motormaster, any of the Combaticons besides Swindle, any of the Protectobots besides First Aid, Pipes, Swerve, Tailgate, Runabout, Runamuck, Broadside, any of the Predacons, any of the Terrorcons, any of the Technobots, any of the Throttlebots besides Goldbug (since he's just Bumblebee), Slugfest, Overkill, Fastlane, Cloudraker, Pounce, Wingspan, Punch, Chromedome, Skullcruncher, Weirdwolf, Apeface, Snapdragon, Pointblank, Sureshot, Crosshairs, Slugslinger, or Sixshot, just by going off the G1 cartoon alone without also consulting their toy bios and/or any of their comic depictions.

And most of the ones who were memorable were mostly because of an oft-repeated one-note quirk rather than a compelling fleshed out personality. And that was because the cast was too big to develop everyone equally.


Of course, but you can say the same thing to hawkeye, falcon and war machine...But why do avengers still have such a large cast? You don't need to flesh out all the characters in the movie. You can do it through comics or novels (making more money).

Not everyone reads them plus they can be rendered pointless by the next film...look at all the tie ins to the live action tf movies.
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999697)
Posted by Salacious_Monk on December 19th, 2018 @ 8:46am CST
ZeroWolf wrote:
Salacious_Monk wrote:
Sabrblade wrote:If anything, a bigger cast would give less screen time to everyone except the one or two who'd get to be the main leads.

The G1 cartoon's cast was so big for its own good that, despite most of the following characters (and I use that term loosely) showing up often and frequently, I'd be hard pressed to tell you anything personal about Prowl, Bluestreak, Sideswipe, Windcharger, Mirage, Trailbreaker, Skywarp, Thundercracker, any of the Constructicons besides Long Haul, Skids, Dirge, Thrust, Ramjet, Air Raid, Skydive, Fireflight, any of the Stunticons besides Motormaster, any of the Combaticons besides Swindle, any of the Protectobots besides First Aid, Pipes, Swerve, Tailgate, Runabout, Runamuck, Broadside, any of the Predacons, any of the Terrorcons, any of the Technobots, any of the Throttlebots besides Goldbug (since he's just Bumblebee), Slugfest, Overkill, Fastlane, Cloudraker, Pounce, Wingspan, Punch, Chromedome, Skullcruncher, Weirdwolf, Apeface, Snapdragon, Pointblank, Sureshot, Crosshairs, Slugslinger, or Sixshot, just by going off the G1 cartoon alone without also consulting their toy bios and/or any of their comic depictions.

And most of the ones who were memorable were mostly because of an oft-repeated one-note quirk rather than a compelling fleshed out personality. And that was because the cast was too big to develop everyone equally.


Of course, but you can say the same thing to hawkeye, falcon and war machine...But why do avengers still have such a large cast? You don't need to flesh out all the characters in the movie. You can do it through comics or novels (making more money).

Not everyone reads them plus they can be rendered pointless by the next film...look at all the tie ins to the live action tf movies.

You don't need everybody to read them. You just need enough people to read in order to cover your cost and give you a profit. Not everybody uses an iphone but Apple still makes a lot of money from their iphone business.
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999698)
Posted by Sabrblade on December 19th, 2018 @ 8:53am CST
Salacious_Monk wrote:Of course, but you can say the same thing to hawkeye, falcon and war machine...But why do avengers still have such a large cast? You don't need to flesh out all the characters in the movie. You can do it through comics or novels (making more money).
The MCU is a whole a different animal. The Avengers films can handle having large main casts because they allowed the other movies leading up to each of them to give focus to all of if the main characters (or in Hawkeye's case, Age of Ultron gave particular focus to him). That's how the Avengers films themselves work as ensemble films. They bring together familiar faces that we've gotten to know on a more personal level in the surrounding MCU movies. And yet, somehow, the Avengers films also still manage to find a way to adequately juggle everyone's screentime focus relatively evenly.

Whereas the G1 cartoon just threw in everyone from 1984 right out of the gate, and only kept adding more characters as time went on, and yet still chose to give the majority focus to a fraction of its main cast, leaving the large remainder an army of dudes we saw all the time but barely ever got to know.

That's partly why every cartoon afterward and some* of the live action movies (especially this Bumblebee movie) scaled back the main cast roster to a core group of characters that get ample focus and development between each of them, allowing us to get to know each of them more personally than most of the G1 cartoon's cast ever got, thereby further enhancing the meaningfulness of both the narrative of the ongoing storyline and our viewing experience overall.


* -- By "some" of the live action movie I mean those like the 2007 one, AOE, and this Bumblebee movie, where the characters were more clearly defined in their smaller units. ROTF, DOTM, and TLK, meanwhile, had expanded rosters full of generics and nobodies added to their robot casts.
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999874)
Posted by Salacious_Monk on December 19th, 2018 @ 8:30pm CST
Sabrblade wrote:
Salacious_Monk wrote:Of course, but you can say the same thing to hawkeye, falcon and war machine...But why do avengers still have such a large cast? You don't need to flesh out all the characters in the movie. You can do it through comics or novels (making more money).
The MCU is a whole a different animal. The Avengers films can handle having large main casts because they allowed the other movies leading up to each of them to give focus to all of if the main characters (or in Hawkeye's case, Age of Ultron gave particular focus to him). That's how the Avengers films themselves work as ensemble films. They bring together familiar faces that we've gotten to know on a more personal level in the surrounding MCU movies. And yet, somehow, the Avengers films also still manage to find a way to adequately juggle everyone's screentime focus relatively evenly.

Whereas the G1 cartoon just threw in everyone from 1984 right out of the gate, and only kept adding more characters as time went on, and yet still chose to give the majority focus to a fraction of its main cast, leaving the large remainder an army of dudes we saw all the time but barely ever got to know.

That's partly why every cartoon afterward and some* of the live action movies (especially this Bumblebee movie) scaled back the main cast roster to a core group of characters that get ample focus and development between each of them, allowing us to get to know each of them more personally than most of the G1 cartoon's cast ever got, thereby further enhancing the meaningfulness of both the narrative of the ongoing storyline and our viewing experience overall.


* -- By "some" of the live action movie I mean those like the 2007 one, AOE, and this Bumblebee movie, where the characters were more clearly defined in their smaller units. ROTF, DOTM, and TLK, meanwhile, had expanded rosters full of generics and nobodies added to their robot casts.

I didn't mean to say that the strategy of G1 series was perfect. My point is that the G1 series had a large cast and it did you the impression that a war was going on. Unlike the avengers(superheros), Optimus Prime/Megatron was the commander but not the most powerful transformer. Later series scaled back the cast and this "war" atmosphere was no longer there. the movies were more like superhero movies and lost this "war" charm. You don't need to portray every soldier in the Lord of the Rings but you still need those soldiers to let the audience know a war was going on.
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999877)
Posted by Burn on December 19th, 2018 @ 8:38pm CST
So how about that Bumblebee movie ...
(Though I can understand why it's gone off topic, I don't know what purpose this thread even serves any more now that we have a spoiler one.)
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999881)
Posted by D-Maximal_Primal on December 19th, 2018 @ 8:49pm CST
Burn wrote:hough I can understand why it's gone off topic, I don't know what purpose this thread even serves any more now that we have a spoiler one.[/size]

Some of us have done our best to avoid spoilers and still keep up with marketing.

Gonna see it tomorrow night with some coworkers/friends though!
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999884)
Posted by william-james88 on December 19th, 2018 @ 8:58pm CST
Burn wrote:So how about that Bumblebee movie ...
(Though I can understand why it's gone off topic, I don't know what purpose this thread even serves any more now that we have a spoiler one.)

For adds and campaigns, like the news post I am about to write.
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (1999903)
Posted by william-james88 on December 19th, 2018 @ 9:34pm CST
For those not in the know, 2019 will be the last year Volkswagen will be releasing the Beetle. Their ad campaign for this farewell features the Bumblebee movie. The ads have been found in a variety of places. You can see a quick video below as well as a french ad from Montreal, Canada.

Of course, this isn't the same Beetle Bee transforms into, the car they wll be retiring is actually the second attempt at remaking the classic Beetle for the mdoern era.

Also remember, the Bumblebee Movie comes out tomorrow in several markets. If you wish to discuss everything about it including spoilers, you can head over to the spoiler thread.



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Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (2000016)
Posted by Short Circuit on December 20th, 2018 @ 11:41am CST
It's kinda saddening that such an iconic car is going away. I quite like the new beetles and the golf its based on isn't that inspiring... :(
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (2000106)
Posted by william-james88 on December 20th, 2018 @ 8:48pm CST
A big question regarding the Bumblebee movie was whether or not it was a reboot. We know the producer Lorenzo Di Bonventura said he would not call it that but now we have confirmation from the director, Travis Knight, that the Bumblebee movie is within the pre-established "Bayverse" continuity, whatever that may mean to you.

These were the exact words:

We set the film 20 years prior to the events of the first film, but so-we still needed some degree of continuity there.


So there you have it folks, the Bumblebee movie may be a step in the right direction, or a breath of fresh air, but it is not a full on reboot, and it is still embedded within the universe Michael Bay helped bring to life (Michael Bay is still a producer on this film after all).

Of course, that is not all Travis Knight had to say in the featurette below from IGN. He talks a lot about his choice behind the design changes we see in the movie and the heavy emphasis on G1. There is a really fun tidbit about Soundwave's chest window too, enjoy!

Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (2000108)
Posted by Sentinel_Primal on December 20th, 2018 @ 9:03pm CST
I really wish that they decided that Bumblebee would be a reboot... Would make the drastic shift in design easier to swallow... Now seeing that it's set in continuity, that makes me dislike the movie a bit because of things that occur in this movie that contradict previously established occurrences. It's still probably my favorite, but it's such a stark contrast that you'd think they'd ditch the Bay films. Especially cause it looked like they were setting it up to be the start of a new movie series at the end
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (2000109)
Posted by Deadput on December 20th, 2018 @ 9:05pm CST
Well, you know that they could easily turn around and make this a reboot though right?

I don't think there is any doubt this film went into production as a prequel or anything and no doubt the film makers still have a lot of the thought process of this being a prequel.

But if they decided to keep this as a prequel after the box office results are in then this will be franchise suicide.

The Bay continuity cannot be salvaged anymore, Bumblebee is a great film on it's own but it is a horrible prequel that breaks a lot more continuity for the first film alone then it does tie to it.

For the good of the brand this cannot be allowed to be a prequel, at least Hasbro should know this, with all the excitement about people thinking Bee is a reboot Paramount should realize it would be very profitable to go clean slate and start anew.

You lose all tension when you have characters like Jazz or Shockwave in the next film when you know they cannot die in that film due to their role in Bay's films but you also prevent a deeper emotional connection to these characters because they get killed in Bay's films.
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (2000113)
Posted by Lore Keeper on December 20th, 2018 @ 9:19pm CST
This really is a shame. The Bumblebee movie on its own is a great movie, but it works as well as a prequel as The Last Knight works as a sequel. It is a continuity nightmare with the 2007 movie.
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (2000114)
Posted by Octobotimus on December 20th, 2018 @ 9:25pm CST
considering everyone else working on the film, even hasbro execs, apparently want it to count as a reboot, seems more of a thing where bay is saying "plz say its connected travis, please !!!" i'll count it as confirmed if the next film isn't a reboot.
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (2000117)
Posted by SW's SilverHammer on December 20th, 2018 @ 9:26pm CST
XMen First Class was "prequel" in continuity with the other Xmen Movies. Then it was made part of a reboot sooooooo I'll wait and see how true this is in a year or two. >:oP
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (2000118)
Posted by Fires_Of_Inferno on December 20th, 2018 @ 9:28pm CST
This... has completely turned me off to seeing it. I was seriously hopeful,I didn't even know bay was still attached to the film. We don't need any damn continuity with the previous movies, what the hell is he thinking.

uuuuuuuuuurrrrrrrrrrgghh.

The movies themselves barely had any continuity with each other to begin with!
Re: Bumblebee Director Travis Knight to Return To Animation Studio Laika (2000119)
Posted by william-james88 on December 20th, 2018 @ 9:30pm CST
Both the Bumblebee movie music score and the soundtrack albums come out tomorrow in the US. We are told that the score is even available on iTunes right now (this may depend on your region). Below are the full track lists of each album where we can see that Stan Bush's the Touch is included as well (Good on you Stan!). We also have an interview with the Bumblebee music editor Mark Willsher to share with you. The interview is spoiler heavy, so you can click here to read it on Air Edel Music's web page.

The Score by Dario Marinelli includes the following tracks:

1. Cybertron Falls (1:53)
2. Bee on the Run (2:18)
3. Shutdown (3:45)
4. Charlie (3:07)
5. Meeting Bumblebee (4:07)
6. Dropkick & Shatter Arrive (1:38)
7. Chasing Mum (1:56)
8. Optimus Prime’s Message (2:05)
9. Desert Council (2:08)
10. Dad’s Old Videotapes (1:09)
11. Army Meeting (2:37)
12. A Diving Volunteer (1:32)
13. Pranking Tina (2:13)
14. Bee in the Kitchen (2:33)
15. Kitchen Chaos (1:45)
16. Double Ambush (2:21)
17. Charlie Sneaks Out (0:59)
18. Death and Resurrection (2:27)
19. Bee’s Had Enough (5:15)
20. Ron’s Driving (1:42)
21. Marina Tower (2:55)
22. Charlie Dives In (2:38)
23. Saying Goodbye (2:26)
24. Not Quite There (1:48)

The Soundtrack features the following songs:

1. Back to Life – Hailee Steinfeld (3:53)
2. Bigmouth Strikes Again – The Smiths (3:15)
3. Things Can Only Get Better – Howard Jones (3:56)
4. Runaway – Bon Jovi (3:52)
5. Save a Prayer – Duran Duran (3:46)
6. Higher Love – Steve Winwood (5:49)
7. Take On Me – a-ha (3:48)
8. Everybody Wants To Rule the World – Tears for Fears (4:12)
9. It Takes Two – Rob Base & DJ EZ Rock (5:01)
10. The Touch – Stan Bush (3:56)
11. I Can’t Wait – Nu Shooz (3:38)
12. I Can’t Drive 55 – Sammy Hagar (4:12)
13. Dance Hall Days – Wang Chung (4:00)
14. Girlfriend In a Coma – The Smiths (2:04)
15. Don’t You (Forget About Me) – Simple Minds (4:22)
16. Back to Life (80s Remix) [Bonus] – Hailee Steinfeld (3:13)

Image

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Transformers Podcast: Twincast / Podcast #346 - Gas Station Jamboree
Twincast / Podcast #346:
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