The following post contains SPOILERS for the ending of Transformers: Rise of the Beasts.
Transformers: Rise of the Beasts represents a significant turning point in the Transformers franchise — and it marks the first meeting between the movie version of the Transformers and their counterparts from the old Beast Wars cartoon, the Maximals like Optimus Primal, Airazor, and Cheetor. But the film’s ending also sets up an even bigger meeting of Hasbro properties.
The film’s surprising finale involves Rise of the Beasts’ human hero, Noah Diaz (played by Anthony Ramos) on a job interview where it turns out he is actually being recruited to join … G.I. Joe, another one of Hasbro’s signature toy properties (turned movie franchises) of the 1980s. That scene would seemingly set up a massive Transformers vs. G.I. Joe movie at some point in the future.
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In an interview with Geek Culture, Transformers producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura talked about the surprising twist, which he credited to Rise of the Beasts director Steven Caple Jr. As he put it:
[Caple] very early on brought up G.I. Joe and my reaction was ‘Listen, we’ve thought about it. I’m very open; how do you think it works?’ And he wasn’t sure at that point. So what happened was as we were developing the script, and including his world point-of-view, how he looked at the Beasts, for instance, because he grew up with them. He had a very specific thing. What happened was, we kept coming back to G.I. Joe.
Di Bonaventura said the main hurdle to launching this crossover was figuring out how G.I. Joe would know about the Transformers in a world where they have consistently emphasized throughout the franchise that no one knows the Autobots exist on Earth.
“Why would any organization know? And actually what was cool about it was we suddenly went ‘Because they’re G.I. Joe! They would know,’” di Bonaventura explained. He also admitted that this explanation is “not entirely logical, but it’s emotionally logical.”
Even if this Transformers vs G.I. Joe movie comes together down the line, it won’t be the first time the two longtime Hasbro properties have met. Hasbro itself has made a number of G.I. Joe vehicles that transform into Transformer characters, and both Marvel and IDW have released their own Transformers/G.I. Joe crossover comics. Still, a massive $100 million+ crossover film would be a much bigger endeavor than anything the company has ever attempted before.
Transformers: Rise of the Beasts is now playing in theaters. You can watch di Bonaventura’s full comments on a potential G.I. Joe and Transformers crossover below.
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