Within the realm of sci-fi movies, the long-running Transformers franchise has been entertaining audiences for almost 20 years at this point. The original five-film run from director Michael Bay kicked things off with a very serialized storyline that built the mythos of the feature film saga pretty strongly. The relevance of that canon has been questioned by fans in a post-Bumblebee world, and the debate has returned in the lead-up to the release of Transformers: Rise of the Beasts. It’s time for an expert to step in, and as luck would have it, producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura has a clear answer for how director Steven Caple Jr.’s movie connects to the Bay-verse.
I was present for the Rise of the Beasts press day, and the veteran producer was on hand to talk about the past, present, and future of the Transformers franchise. As one might expect, the Michael Bay-helmed movies absolutely do play into the events of the more recent narrative throwbacks. Speaking with CinemaBlend, Lorenzo di Bonavenura clarified how Optimus Prime (Peter Cullen) is the key to understanding how everything is connected:
