With Transformers: Dark of the Moon earning a massive $1.124 billion at the worldwide box office and sitting at No. 4 on the all-time list, a fourth film was to be expected. We’ve now learned that Paramount Pictures is eyeing a 2014 release date for the next film, though it has not been confirmed whether Michael Bay will be back in the director’s chair.
There’s still plenty of dates open in June and July of 2014 if the studio wants to go with a similar release date as the first three movies. The first was released in July of 2007, followed by the second in June of 2009 and the third in June of 2011.
We have also learned that Dwayne Johnson and Mark Wahlberg will start shooting Michael Bay’s Pain and Gain in Miami in April. That film is based on the true story of a group of bodybuilders who get caught up in a criminal enterprise in Florida.
Earlier today, at a Hasbro event for Paramount’s G.I. Joe: Retaliation, ComingSoon.net/SuperHeroHype had a chance to talk with producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura about the prospects of doing another “Transformers” movie.
“Well be there in the summer of 2014,” he confirmed, as well as addressing (albeit vaguely) whether Michael Bay will be returning as director or not. “Michael had a debate because he sort of felt at first that he’d done three. Michael and I are both the same in that we always like to top ourselves. That doesn’t necessarily mean bigger. It can be bigger in places, it just means different, but we’re going to push really hard as fresh and new as we can be.”
He compares doing a fourth “Transformers” movie to what they’re doing with the “G.I. Joe” sequel by having a few characters return as well as telling a story that does follow-up from a plot set-up in its predecessor without necessarily fully “rebooting.” “Again, we’re going to try to do a hybrid there where there will be some characters that come forward–we think, we’re still in the process of figuring it out–and some characters that don’t, but it will definitely be a different story.”
In the next month, Di Bonaventura will be finishing up G.I. Joe and preparing for Steven Soderbergh to start filming The Bitter Pill/The Side Effects in New York City–it was actually Di Bonaventuras first project as a producer post-Warner Bros.–but we did ask about some of the other sequels he has in development.
RED 2, the sequel to Di Bonaventura’s hit action movie, is going to shoot in the fall and while he wouldn’t tell us who is directing, he did confirm it would be a different director from the first movie.
They’re still working on the script for a planned sequel to his other hit action movie Salt, although they’ll also have to wait until Angelina Jolie is ready to do that movie. “I would not want to see ‘Salt’ without Angelina personally,” he told us. “I haven’t seen the ‘Bourne’ trailer but everyone tells me they’ve figured out how to make that transition really well.”
Look for more with Di Bonaventura and some of the cast of G.I. Joe: Retaliation, including Dwayne Johnson, over on SuperHeroHype sometime later this week.
