Could Bumblebee Actually Be Good?

This is honestly something I wasn’t expecting to write at any point during 2018 – could an upcoming Transformers movie actually be worth watching?

Given the previous movies went from shiny interesting to incredibly overblown and bland, to expect anything more than another explosion fest would have been thought outlandish. But here we are, in the midst of a Marvel overload of awesome, and a new trailer drop for Bumblebee actually got me giddy. I mean, just look at it! Classic G1 character designs, Cybertron, Bumblebee in his classic VW getup, no overly sexual female characters … I mean, I could go on, but it kinda speaks for itself.

It’s still way too early to tell whether this prequel (of sorts) will pay off, but this is far more than I was anticipating. Digging a little deeper, I noticed the new director in the chair is none other than Travis Knight. You might not know who that is, but you should know him by his previous work, namely as director on Kubo and the Two Strings and lead animator for Coraline. Those two alone are two of my favourite animated movies, some would say underrated classics. Perhaps this new perspective on what makes Hasbro’s heroes so special might be the key to unlocking the franchise from its lens flare past.