The Footage I Saw of The New BUMBLEBEE Movie Had More Heart Than Any of Michael Bay's TRANSFORMERS Films

Paramount Pictures screened the first footage ever to an audience of their upcoming Bumblebee during their CinemaCon presentation. I have to tell you, this little bit of footage that I saw was way better and had more heart than any of the Transformers films that Michael Bay has made!

The Bumblebee movie looks like what the Transformers film franchise should have been all along. The movie was directed by Travis Knight (Kubo and the Two Strings) and you can tell that he brought that same sense of wonderful storytelling that we've seen in his Laika films to this Bumblebee movie, and if you're not excited, this is one Transformers film you should be excited about! Knight told the audience:

"I wanted to return to the essences of what made the transform franchise so impactful right from the beginning: character, emotion, spectacle and explosions, lots and lots of explosions."

The footage we saw starts off with a clip featuring Hailee Steinfeld's character Charlie Watson waking up in the morning and grudgingly getting ready for her day. She is listening to music on her Walkman while she is brushing her teeth. When she turns the Walkman off she hears the same song she was listening to playing in the garage. When she goes into the garage she finds a yellow VW bug.

When she walks into the garage the music in the car stops playing. As she is inspecting the car she hears something drop underneath it. So, she grabs a flashlight and a wrench and gets under the car to fix whatever broke and as she is looking around she notices a face under the car. She's a little startled when the eyes light up and the car starts to Transformer around her and she ends up looking up at Bumblebee in his robot form. 

Bumblebee is stumbling around the garage and she is watching it in awe. She then realizes she should probably get the hell out of there and she runs to the door to leave but as she looks back, she sees Bumblebee cowering in the corner with fear. 

She cautiously approaches him and says "Hi". Bumblebee chirps back at her, still a little frightened. She asks if he can understand her and he nods. He then stands up, holding his neck, after seeing the wrench in her hand. She puts the wrench away to let him know she's not a threat. As she puts her hands up to show him she's not going to hurt him, he analyzes her hands and then comes in close to her so that her hands are touching his face as if he hasn't been touched by someone in a long time and he is relishing the feeling of a connection with someone else. 

There is a connection here, there is a lot of emotion, especially in the eyes of the robot and in the girl. "What are you?" she asks. "Where did you come from?" He shies away from answering. He then points to her shirt. He is asking who she is. She tells him that she's Charlie Watson, and "I'm 18 today. Actually, it's my birthday today. What's your name?" He shies away, and she says, "You sound like a little bumblebee. That's what I'm going to call you. Matches your outfit, too.

Then the scene comes to a close. It was a very sweet and tender moment between two people who are obviously looking for something in their lives. 

We are then treated to a bunch of cool action shots involving Bumblebee and the military. Bumblebee is running from a helicopter, we see him blasting away with an arm cannon, there's a lot of gunfire, he fights fighter jets, and we even see a couple new Transformer robots introduced, so Bumblebee isn't the only one that will be in the movie. We also see Charlie and Bumblebee playing on the beach.

The movie has a very Iron Giant kind of vibe too it, and I love it! Here's the official synopsis for the film:

On the run in the year 1987, Bumblebee finds refuge in a junkyard in a small Californian beach town. Charlie (Hailee Steinfeld), on the cusp of turning 18 and trying to find her place in the world, discovers Bumblebee, battle-scarred and broken. When Charlie revives him, she quickly learns this is no ordinary, yellow VW bug.

The movie was written by Christina Hodson, and it will be released on December 21st.