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Michael Bay confirms he’ll direct Transformers 5 and reveals TMNT 2 villain

Transformers: Age Of Extinction
Image used with permission by copyright holder
No matter how you feel about the work of director Michael Bay, his box-office success is undeniable — and when it comes to the $4 billion Transformers franchise, it looks like he won’t be abdicating the director’s chair any time soon.

After hinting that 2014’s Transformers: Age of Extinction was the last installment of the series that he’d direct, Bay confirmed this week that he’d helm the still-untitled fifth film in the franchise, scheduled to hit theaters in 2017.

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Bay made it official during an interview with Rolling Stone in which he not only announced that he’d direct that film, but also [SPOILER ALERT] revealed that a fan-favorite villain would be making his debut in the upcoming sequel to last year’s live-action Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles reboot.

“I’m doing Transformers … 5, is it?” said Bay. “J.J. [Abrams] told me, ‘You’re the only guy that could do this.’ But it’s time to move on. One more.”

The fifth film in the Transformers franchise will feature a script penned by Iron Man screenwriters Art Marcum and Matt Holloway, as well as Black Hawk Down writer Ken Nolan. Mark Wahlberg is expected to reprise his role from Transformers: Age of Extinction.

During the outlet’s interview with Bay, the director also took a video call from visual-effects studio Industrial Light & Magic, which showed him an early rendering of a “crash-landed alien spaceship, then a new dump-truck Transformer with a cloak.” The call also involved some discussion of Krang, a popular villain from the original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles animated series that will be making the leap from the cartoon to the live-action movie universe in the upcoming Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows.

“So we’ve eliminated the tentacles,” the ILM supervisor told Bay, concerning Krang. “Is it too monster-ish?”

“He could have some tentacles,” responded Bay, who serves as a producer on the franchise. “I just don’t want them coming out of the side. He looks like a stupid octopus.”

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows is scheduled to hit theaters June 3.

Rick Marshall
A veteran journalist with more than two decades of experience covering local and national news, arts and entertainment, and…
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