Currently, with the release of the Rise of the Beasts, the official trailer for the next up-and-coming Transformers movie, I see a lot of confusion as to the state of the timeline/franchise, or whatever you want to call it. I see people not ignorant to the fact of when said movie takes place but more confused as to when the movie is set.
I see comments that range from this movie is a reboot to this movie isn’t “canon” to the Michael Bay section of movies, and while they are not 100% wrong, they are not right either. I’ll explain.
Firstly, the 2018 Bumblebee movie was originally designed as a prequel/spin-off for the character that started it all, Bee, who has been the main Autobot in pretty much all of the movies thus far. You can see throughout that movie that Bee is “new” to Earth.
While this is one of the “retcons” to “soft reboot” the franchise, there is other stuff in the movie that counteracts that point… mainly the design Bee transforms into at the end of the movie. The muscle car that none other than Sam Witwicky chooses in his movie.
People that have been commenting about the movie being a reboot don’t seem to know the actual date that the movies for this “reboot” takes place. Bumblebee is a prequel set in 1987, and Rise of the Beasts is set in 1994.
These two movies being set in the past can easily connect to what I’ll call “present-day” Transformers. For me, these two movies are just that, prequels. Any movie can have a prequel, Marvel, Star Wars, DC, and more.
Until these new movies go the distance and kill off either Bumblebee, Optimus Prime, or Megatron, then and only then will I call it a reboot, soft reboot, or not canon.
