At the end of its box office run, Transformers: Rise of the Beasts is the lowest-grossing Transformers movie yet for a variety of reasons. Rise of the Beasts climbed to $157 million in North America and $435 million worldwide. While these are some pretty large numbers, they are disappointing for a movie of this scale, and one from a franchise that 10 years ago was raking in multiple billion dollar plus grosses.
While Paramount was hoping this would be one of their biggest hits of the year, Rise of the Beasts had a lot going against it, and its box office is proof of that. Many big movies underperformed this summer, but Transformers is one of the more interesting cases, as this once mega-franchise struggles to find its footing in a modern box office setting. This franchise is clearly no longer bulletproof.
9 Transformers: Rise Of The Beasts’ Reviews Weren’t Good
With the exception of Bumblebee, the Transformers films have never been a huge hit with critics. Rise of the Beasts was met with mixed to negative reactions from critics, with a 52% on Rotten Tomatoes and a 42 on Metacritic. Critics found the film mostly forgettable, with a few stand-out elements. It is hard to find any raves for the film, and it won’t be making many best-of-the-year lists.
These are some of the better reviews the series has seen, as only Bumblebee and the first film from 2007 got better reactions. However, these tepid to negative reviews don’t give newcomers to the franchise much interest, or reassure any fans who have been let down. When the multiplex is filled with exciting blockbusters with rave reviews, “well reviewed for a Transformers movie” is not enough to cut it.
8 There Is Less Interest In The Transformers Movies Without Michael Bay
Michael Bay is a controversial filmmaker. Some find his maximalist style nauseating and exhausting, while others believe he is an American auteur and one of the best filmmakers working in blockbusters today. His work on the Transformers franchise proved to be equally divisive, alienating many lifelong fans while the movies were also massive box-office hits. Bay’s work on the first five films, three and four in particular, led the franchise to become one of the biggest in Hollywood history, and his entries in the series still have plenty of fans.
Since Michael Bay left the Transformers franchise, it has struggled to match the same box-office highs. While Bumblebee and Beasts directors Travis Knight and Steven Caple Jr. are talented filmmakers, they do not bring the same scale and vision to the franchise that Bay did. Bay’s films were critiqued for lacking narrative cohesion and understandable plots, but he also brought a spectacle and sensibility that resonated with general audiences. While the films have been better received by fans since Bay’s departure, they have also failed to recapture the same place in the general zeitgeist.
7 The Transformers Franchise Box Office Has Been Declining For Years
With Dark of the Moon‘s $1.12 billion dollar worldwide gross, the franchise hit a box office high that it has never been able to match. While Age of Extinction was also a billion-dollar hit, mostly carried by its international gross, the franchise has been struggling ever since. Bumblebee only managed to make $465 million, somewhat understandable considering it was a smaller-scale movie, but Rise of the Beasts failed to even reach that number. Rise of the Beasts was meant to be a fresh start for the franchise, but it only managed to make a fraction of what the first film did in 2007, continuing the decade-long decline of the series.
6 Rise Of The Beasts Lacked Big Stars In The Human Roles
Director Steven Caple Jr. decided to cast young up-and-comers to lead his Transformers movie. Anthony Ramos and Dominique Fishback are very talented actors who have proven their dramatic chops. Fishback in particular has shown incredible range in projects like Judas and the Black Messiah and Swarm. However, they are not household names, nor are they driving audiences to theaters. While the main draw of the Transformers films has always been the robots, actors like Mark Wahlberg bring more recognizable faces and box office cache to the project. Ramos and Fishback were able to hold their own within the film, but their involvement did not spark more interest from general audiences.
5 The Transformers Continuity Is Confusing for General Audiences
Continuity shouldn’t matter for a series like Transformers. The appeal has always been the visual spectacle and production, not the interconnected lore. However, as the franchise has gone on, it has become more confusing to keep track of where the Transformers films rest in the timeline and what counts as canon. Rise of the Beasts was meant to serve as a sequel to Bumblebee while also being a prequel to the five Bay films, despite contradicting events that happened in both. The timeline is confusing enough for those who try to follow it, but for casual fans, it was unclear what movies, if any, Rise of the Beasts was connected to.
4 People Knew Transformers 7 Was Going To Be On Paramount+ Soon After Release
Since the pandemic, it has become harder for studios to convince audiences to rush out to theaters, especially since they have trained them to expect a streaming release only weeks after the theatrical opening. For movies people have tepid excitement for, they are happy to wait for a digital release. Rise of the Beasts hit streaming six weeks after its domestic opening weekend, giving audiences little time to find it in theaters. It’s understandable that Paramount would want to boost streaming numbers after a disappointing opening weekend, but they are hurting the theatrical module long-term, and devaluing their franchise.
3 The Marketing Failed to Communicate What Made This Transformers Movie Unique
Rise of the Beasts is the seventh live-action Transformers movie in 16 years, and the second to focus on the villainous Unicron. Audiences know what to expect from this franchise and the marketing for the latest installment did little to differentiate itself. Beasts‘ main selling point was the inclusion of the maximals, but more large robots were not enough to intrigue those who had soured on the franchise. Rise of the Beasts was another fetch quest movie, where Optimums Prime, Bumblebee, and a few other Autobots had to fight an army to save the world. It is a well-worn formula and isn’t as appealing as it once was.
2 Transformers: Rise Of The Beasts’ Release Date Was A Problem
Just one week before Transformers’ release, Across the Spider-verse exceeded all expectations and quickly became one of the biggest movies of the year. It was a box office juggernaut, that was appealing to a lot of the same audience as Rise of the Beasts. While no one could have predicted just how big Spider-verse was going to be, the studio did make the mistake of releasing Rise of the Beasts in the very crowded month of June. Transformers had barely a week of headlines before the release of The Flash and Elemental sucked the air out of the room.
Maybe if released in August, among Meg 2 and Gran Turismo, Transformers could have found more space in the marketplace and become a bigger hit. Hindsight is 20/20, but this summer was overstuffed with huge blockbusters, and there just was not enough room for all of them to succeed. Rise of the Beasts was the victim of an overcrowded marketplace, and better-received movies overshadowed it.
1 Most Pre-Established Franchises Struggled At The Box Office This Summer
While this summer found huge hits in Across the Spider-verse, Barbie, and Oppenheimer, many major movies were box office failures in 2023. Transformers: Rise of the Beasts, Indiana Jones, Fast X, The Flash, and even the much loved Mission: Impossible were financial disappointments and potential money losers. While all of these movies had multiple reasons for failing, they were all well-worn franchises that struggled against more exciting new properties by new voices. Transformers has been a behemoth franchise for almost two decades, so it’s only natural that audiences would grow tired of it and look for something new.
Sources: Rotten Tomatoes, Metacritic
