The "Transformers" timeline is getting a little convoluted for general audiences, and now with seven films, the order in which to watch the "Transformers" movies will change with each installment. That's because "Bumblebee," the prequel set in 1987, takes place before all of Michael Bay's films, and "Transformers: Rise of the Beasts" continues that story with a 1994 setting.
"We were thinking of it as a progression," Lorenzo di Bonaventura, producer of "Rise of the Beasts," told Collider. "'Bumblebee' was in 1987, so then how do we move it forward and also not run into the timeline of the Bay films?" Director Steven Caple Jr. added that he's a fan of all the "Transformers" movies but loved that "Bumblebee" took the series back to the '80s. "It adds nostalgia and something that people remember and connect to," he said. "So, I was curious where we'd be picking this thing up from, and Lorenzo said 1994."
From the sound of things, neither Di Bonaventura nor Caple Jr. is writing off Bay's films as non-canon, but instead, the rebooted series will work in the time periods leading up to those movies. This creative decision works best for the franchise, as it doesn't alienate fans of Bay's films while giving new filmmakers a relatively blank slate to work with within this new loose canon.
