In the 1980s, Hasbro’s Transformers line of toys was so famous that it led to an animated show, an animated movie, and a run of comics. During the ’90s and ’00s, new cartoons were added to the story, but it wasn’t until 2007 that these robots in disguise got their live-action movie.
The live-action Transformers movie by Michael Bay blew people away with its top-notch special effects and exciting action. Since this first big hit, the franchise has put out five more live-action movies, with the next one, Transformers: Rise of the Beasts, coming out on June 9, 2023.
So, what is the order of these movies? Do you want to watch them in the order they came out, or has Bumblebee, the prequel in 2018, made you want to watch them all at once? No matter what, you can find both lists of Transformers in Order below.
Transformers Movies in Chronological Order
Bumblebee
The sixth movie in the series comes first in the order of events. Bumblebee, which came out in 2018, is primarily set in 1987 and tells how Bumblebee came to be on Earth. The Autobots are preparing to leave Cybertron because they are about to lose the war against the Decepticons. Leader Optimus Prime sends scout B-127 to Earth to set up a base, but Blitzwing follows him, hurting him by ripping out his voice box. Before he died, B-127 scanned a 1966 Volkswagen Beetle and took the shape of it.
Charlie Watson (Hailee Steinfeld) turns 18 and gets what she thinks is an ordinary Volkswagen Beetle as a gift. When she starts the car, she is pulled into the war between the Autobots and the Decepticons and has to stay away from the military. The movie’s main focus is helping Bumblebee remember who he is and get back together with the other Autobots.
Transformers: Rise Of The Beasts
The upcoming seventh Transformers movie, Transformers: Rise Of The Beasts, takes place in 1994 and is a follow-up to the Bumblebee and a Beast Wars movie. The main humans in the movie are Anthony Ramos, Dominique Fishback, Lauren Vélez, and Tobe Nwigwe. Some of the Transformers in the movie are voiced by Peter Cullen, Ron Perlman, Peter Dinklage, and John DiMaggio.
Artifact hunting puts humans in a long-ago war between Transformers and introduces them to the Maximals, the Predacons, and the Terrorcons. The Maximals are more like the Autobots; their leader is Optimus Primal, a huge robot gorilla. On the other hand, the Predacons and Terrorcons are more like the Decepticons, and they are made up of many deadly robot versions of insects and spiders.
Transformers
In order, the first movie in the series comes third. Starring Shia LaBeouf, Megan Fox, Josh Duhamel, and John Turturro, it came out in 2007. Sam Witwicky, played by Shia LaBeouf, is the descendant of an Arctic explorer who found Megatron in the ice and got the coordinates of the All Spark by accident because they were written on his glasses. When Sam decides to sell the drinks on eBay, the Decepticons follow him. This makes Bumblebee come out and protect Sam.
As both the Autobots and the Decepticons try to get their hands on the All Spark, they fight. As the fight gets bigger and bigger, the Autobots and humans, including the human agency Sector 7, join forces. In the end, the Autobots beat the Decepticons and kill Megatron so that the Autobots can start over on Earth.
Transformers: Revenge of The Fallen
In the 2009 sequel to Transformers, which continues Sam Witwicky’s story, the Decepticons and Megatron return from the dead. After he talks to the All Spark, Sam sees Cybertronian symbols, and the Decepticons think the signs lead to a new source of Energon. The movie shows that Transformers have been to Earth before, a long time ago. Those called the Primes made the Autobots, while those called the Seekers were left on Earth. The Primes put one of their own, The Fallen, who was the source of the Decepticons, in jail.
The humans and Autobots have to fight the Decepticons and their ancestor, The Fallen, again while they still get over the loss of Optimus Prime. The movie is a way to learn more about the Transformers’ history and to meet new characters and a new type of ancient energy.
Transformers: Dark of The Moon
Sam Witwicky’s story with the Transformers continues and ends here: In Dark of the Moon, the lost Cybertron spaceship The Ark is found on the Moon’s dark side. It turns out that NASA and the government have known about this ship for decades and that any mission to the Moon has been used to look into “The Ark.” Once the Autobots find out about this, they find a sleeping Sentinel Prime and technology that can make a “space bridge,” which is a way to travel through space like a wormhole.
The Decepticons are killing anyone who knows about the human missions to Ark. This puts Sam and his girlfriend in danger. In the end, Sentinal Prime is brought back to life, but he betrays the Autobots by teaming up with the Decepticons to change Earth into a copy of Cybertron. In the end, there is much violence, and Optimus Prime kills Megatron and Sentinel Prime to save the Earth and let the Autobots live there permanently.
Transformers: Age of Extinction
In the 2014 sequel to the Transformers series, a whole new group of people helps the alien robots on Earth. Mark Wahlberg played Cade Yeager, an inventor having trouble making a living. He finds a badly hurt Optimus Prime and gets caught up in a much more hostile relationship between humans and Transformers. Cade, his daughter Tessa (Nicola Peltz), and her secret boyfriend, Irish rally driver Shane (Jack Reynor), have to deal with the human government’s hostility and threats, as well as the reincarnation of Megatron.
In the movie, we also meet the Dinobots, who join the Autobots after a trial by combat, and the Transformer drones, made by melting down dead Transformers and a metal called Transformium that has been on Earth since the dinosaurs.
Transformers: The Last Knight
Mark Wahlberg returns as Cade Yaeger in The Last Knight, which is the last movie set in the present. Cade continues to help Transformers in trouble by hiding them in his junkyard. The plot also shows that Merlin and the Knights of King Arthur met a group of Autobots in 484 AD, and that the Autobots helped them beat the Saxons. They also gave Merlin a staff, which they told him to hide.
This movie bombed at the box office because the plot was hard to follow. It involved a crazy Cybertron goddess, brainwashing, and a silly Arthurian legend. Most likely, the soft reboots and prequels that came after The Last Knight were made because of how poorly received it was.
