Paramount will be going back in time with their new Bumblebee spin-off film. The film is set to begin principal photography later this year, with a 2018 release date currently set. That means that Bumblebee will be hitting theaters one year after this summer’s Transformers: The Last Knight. Where that film marks the end of an era for the franchise, with Michael Bay confirming it’s his last Transformers film as director, Bumblebee promises to be the start of an entirely new age in the franchise – as director Travis Knight sets out to tell a solo story focused entirely around Optimus Prime’s beloved second Autobot in command.
Bumblebee will be set in the 1980s, and will feature a much lower number of actual Transformers than any of the previous films. Based on a screenplay written by Christina Hodson, the setting will apparently help the studio skew the film towards a younger demographic than the Bay-directed outings. So far, the only reported Bumblee cast member is Hailee Steinfeld (of True Grit, Pitch Perfect 2 and The Edge of Seventeen fame).