Today at CinemaCon, Paramount announced Transformers: One, a new, animated prequel that will feature a star-studded lineup of voice talent playing younger iterations of the characters, from the days before Optimus Prime and Megatron were the leaders of the Autobots and Decepticons. With a title that’s a riff on the Autobot mantra “Till all are one,” Transformers: One will star Chris Hemsworth as a young Optimus Prime, Brian Tyree Henry as Megatron, Scarlett Johansson as Elita, Keegan-Michael Key as Bumblebee, Jon Hamm as Sentinel Prime, and Laurence Fishburne as Alpha Trion.
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Toy Story‘s Josh Cooley is directing the film, from a screenplay by Andrew Barrer and Gabriel Ferrari. It is not clear whether this animated prequel is meant to tie into the events of the current wave of live-action movies, which includes this year’s Transformers: Rise of the Beasts. It’s unlikely it will have direct ties, though. Even in this era of shared universes, there have been numerous animated projects released since Transformers hit theaters in 2007, and none of them have “counted” in the live-action realm.
“I’m so excited and proud to be working with Hasbro and eOne to bring the first animated Transformers movie to theaters for a never-before-told story,” said Ramsey Naito, president of Paramount Animation and Nickelodeon Animation (via Variety). “I’m honored to have such incredible talents come together to portray these well-known and much-loved characters in an origin story at the heart of the franchise.”
This is not the first theatrical release for an animated Transformers movie; that honor would go to 1986’s Transformers: The Movie, which starred Orson Welles in the role of Unicron, Judd Nelson as Hot Rod, and Leonard Nimoy as Galvatron.
This is one of the rare instances when someone other than Peter Cullen will voice Optimus Prime, presumably something the studio didn’t struggle too much with, since this is an entirely new franchise and their Optimus will be very young. Cullen, now 81 years old, has been voicing Prime since 1984, when the original animated series launched. Cullen did play a younger version of Prime in 2007’s animated Transformers: Beginnings.
Steven Spielberg serves as producer on the series, along with with Brian Goldner, Brian Oliver, Bradley J. Fischer and Valerii An. Producers include Lorenzo di Bonaventura, Tom DeSanto, Don Murphy, Michael Bay, Mark Vahradian and Aaron Dem.
Transformers: One is expected to be in theaters on July 19, 2024.
