With Transformers: Rise of the Beasts out on digital and now streaming on Paramount+, eyes are on the future of the franchise as a potential crossover between Transformers and G.I. Joe looks to be in the works after the tease at the end of the latest Transformers film.
Rather than play out in a post-credits scene, the final scene of Transformers: Rise of the Beasts saw Anthony Ramos’ Noah Diaz meeting with Michael Kelly’s mysterious Agent Burke for a job interview that was actually a recruitment pitch for Noah to join the G.I. Joes in their fight to protect the world from unknown enemies and further transformers. However, this tease to a team-up between the Autobots and Joes almost never happened due to former Transformers director Michael Bay’s reluctance.
In a piece from Variety, Paramount CEO Brian Robbins described how his thought of having the two franchises exist within the same onscreen universe might provide both with a jolt in the arm that would attract new viewers and the difficulties of convincing Transformers and G.I. Joe owner Hasbro as well as Transformers producers Steven Spielberg and Michael Bay to let them plant the crossover tease.
Bay was seemingly reluctant do so as Variety claims he felt merging the franchises would “cheapen” the previous Transformers film, all of which with the exception of Bumblebee and Rise of the Beasts he directed. “I called him 50 times,” Robbins said of his efforts to convince Bay of the shared universe. “I would not let him off the hook. And when he finally stopped dodging my calls, we got him to sign off.”
While a sequel to Transformers: Rise of the Beasts or a Transformers/G.I. Joe crossover has not been greenlit, it hasn’t stopped producer Lorenzo Di Bonaventura describing what their team-up could look like and build to an actual crossover rather than quickly bring their worlds together in the next film.
Transformers: Rise of the Beasts is currently on digital platforms and still playing in a limited number of theaters.
Returning to the action and spectacle that have captured moviegoers around the world, Transformers: Rise of the Beasts will take audiences on a ’90s globetrotting adventure with the Autobots and introduce a whole new faction of Transformer – the Maximals – to the existing battle on earth between Autobots and Decepticons.
Transformers: Rise of the Beasts is directed by Steven Caple Jr. (Creed II) and features a cast that includes Anthony Ramos, Dominique Fishback, Luna Lauren Velez, and Tobe Nwigwe, along with Peter Cullen as Optimus Prime, Ron Perlman as Optimus Primal, Michelle Yeoh as Airazor and Pete Davidson as Mirage.
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