When the planet devouring Unicron destroys the home of the transforming Maximals they flee to Earth and hide the warp key that Unicron seeks. Thousands of years later the key is discovered and the Autobots see it as a way home whilst Unicron’s head lackey Scourge seeks it out for his master. 

Rise of the Beasts is the seventh Transformers film (check out my article Are You Summer Blockbuster Ready? for the full list) but only the second in its chronological timeline after Bumblebee. This means it is set in 1994 and allows them to avoid the fairly complex plot lines they have created for the main series, feature a rather ominous image of the New York skyline featuring the twin towers as billowing and scary clouds cover the area and crack a joke about how Marky Mark is leaving music to focus on acting (Mark Wahlberg of course was the star of Age of Extinction and The Last Knight Transformers films). 

Overall my general feeling leaving the cinema after Rise of the Beasts was one of indifference. The mainstream Transformers movies have set the bar so low in terms of quality that I almost felt that an utterly mediocre film was possibly a win. And there was the added bonus that my daughter had taken a liking to the trailer for this one and had asked me to take her along. Giving her a précis of the Transformers universe on the drive to the cinema, discussing my love of the toys as a child and then seeing how much fun she had afterwards was enough to make this visit to the cinema thoroughly worthwhile. But ultimately there is not much here to love apart from that very personal experience for me. 

Let’s start with the Maximals. They barely feature and barely do anything. Plus they add so many questions along the lines of, “why do robots from another planet that have existed for thousands of years look like animals that have evolved on Earth?” And “how do they hide in the background when animals are not made of metal and are not that big?”. But ignore all of that and they still just do not do much in the film. Michelle Yeoh voiced Airazor has the most screen time but mostly just explains the plot. Otherwise they are just a new spin on reigniting an old toy line. 

Next there is Unicron and Scourge voiced by Colman Domingo and Peter Dinklage. As a massive fan of 1986’s The Transformers: The Movie I was frankly left rather bereft here. Unicron barely features and is just a far away threat whilst Scourge is just a very one dimensional baddie with unnamed henchmen. 

Then for the Autobots we have Peter Cullen voicing an incredibly over earnest Optimus Prime which leaves Mirage (Pete Davidson) and Bumblebee to do all the heavy lifting. Those two are by far and away the most fun here. 

As for the human contingent Anthony Ramos and Dominique Fishback are completely fine. But Ramos’ characters superhero style ending just fell completely flat for me. 

There is even a bit of an effort to set up a new franchise in the final moments and credits which left me totally nonplussed as well. 

Overall my enjoyment came entirely from Mirage and Bumblebee, slow motion transforming and my shared experience with my daughter. Otherwise its other redeeming factor is it only runs at 127 minutes which makes it the second shortest running Transformer film. Unless the box office for this is massive I am not sure we will see these Beasts in future films.