It was loud. Man, was it loud. When Michael Bay dropped Transformers: The Last Knight back in 2017, nobody expected a quiet library experience, but what we got was a fever dream of Arthurian legend, world-ending stakes, and more aspect ratio changes than a TikTok compilation. It’s been years, and yet, the movie remains this weird, polarizing artifact in the Hasbro cinematic universe. Some fans swear it's the peak of "Bayhem," while others still can't get over the fact that King Arthur was apparently best friends with a giant robot from outer space.
Honestly, the movie is a lot to process.
You've got Mark Wahlberg returning as Cade Yeager, but this time he’s a fugitive living in a junkyard with a bunch of Dinobots that act like oversized golden retrievers. The plot is basically a scavenger hunt across history. We find out that Transformers have been on Earth for centuries—fighting in the American Revolution, helping out in World War II, and apparently keeping the Round Table round. It’s a massive pivot from the relatively grounded (well, for giant robots) vibe of the first film. But that’s the thing about this fifth installment; it stopped trying to be a "movie" in the traditional sense and became a pure, unadulterated spectacle.
The Myth of the 12 Knights and the Arthurian Connection
The biggest swing the film takes is the prologue. We’re tossed into 484 AD. Standard Dark Ages stuff—arrows flying, mud everywhere, and a drunk Merlin, played by Stanley Tucci, begging for help. It turns out Merlin didn't have magic; he just had a high-tech "Staff of Power" given to him by a group of Transformers known as the Guardian Knights. These guys could combine into a massive three-headed dragon called Dragonstorm.
Why the Lore Messes with People
For long-time fans, this was a tough pill to swallow. It basically retconned everything we knew about the Transformers' arrival on Earth. If they had been here for over a thousand years, why did Megatron landing in the Arctic in the first movie matter so much? The movie doesn't really care about the "why." It cares about the "how cool does this look?"
The Guardian Knights are actually pretty tragic figures if you look at the subtext. They betrayed their own creator, Quintessa, to protect humanity. This introduces a level of cosmic stakes that the previous movies only hinted at. We aren't just talking about a war between two factions anymore; we're talking about the soul of the planet. Or, more accurately, the fact that the planet itself is Unicron.
Sir Anthony Hopkins and the Wit of Cogman
If you ask anyone what the best part of Transformers: The Last Knight is, they’ll probably say Sir Anthony Hopkins. Watching a legendary Oscar winner run around the English countryside yelling at robots is something you just don't see every day. He plays Sir Edmund Burton, the last of the "Witwiccans"—a secret society dedicated to keeping the Transformers' history a secret.
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His sidekick, Cogman, is a "Headmaster" Transformer who is roughly the size of a human and has a serious anger management problem. Cogman is hilarious. He's a sociopathic butler who plays organ music to add "dramatic flare" to conversations. He’s arguably the most "human" character in the movie despite being a metallic psychopath.
- The Witwiccans included people like Leonardo da Vinci and William Shakespeare.
- Burton’s estate is full of historical artifacts that are actually dormant Transformers.
- The movie suggests that every major turning point in human history had a giant robot standing in the shadows.
The Visual Chaos of the Aspect Ratio
Let's talk about the technical side for a second, because this is where Michael Bay really went off the rails. Transformers: The Last Knight was shot using a dizzying array of cameras. We're talking RED, IMAX 3D rigs, and more. Because of this, the aspect ratio changes constantly. In one scene, the black bars at the top and bottom of your screen might disappear, then reappear five seconds later in a different size.
For some, this is a cinematic nightmare. It’s jarring. For others, it creates a sense of frantic energy that matches the action. Whether you love it or hate it, you have to admit the VFX are incredible. Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) put in some of their best work here. The detail on characters like Bumblebee and the newly redesigned Optimus Prime (who spends half the movie being "Nemesis Prime") is staggering. You can see every gear, every scratch, and every drop of "Energon" during the fight scenes.
Nemesis Prime and the Quest for Redemption
One of the big marketing hooks was the "Evil Optimus" storyline. Quintessa, a mysterious space sorceress who claims to be the maker of the Transformers, brainwashes Optimus. She renames him Nemesis Prime and sends him to Earth to retrieve Merlin’s staff so she can suck the life out of our planet to restore Cybertron.
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It’s a classic trope. The hero turns against his friends. The fight between Bumblebee and Nemesis Prime on the hull of a sinking ship is the emotional core of the film. When Bumblebee finally uses his actual voice—not the radio—to snap Optimus out of it, it’s a moment that actually lands. It reminds you that underneath the explosions, there's a decade-long relationship between these two characters that fans genuinely care about.
Why It Failed at the Box Office (Relatively Speaking)
Look, "failed" is a strong word for a movie that made over $600 million. But compared to Age of Extinction, which cleared a billion, it was a disappointment for Paramount. Why did it stumble?
Basically, the audience was tired. The movie is long. At nearly two and a half hours, it’s an endurance test. The plot is also incredibly dense. You have to keep track of the Staff, the Medallion, the Witwiccans, Quintessa, the TRF (Transformers Reaction Force), and the fact that Earth is actually a sleeping giant robot. It's a lot for a popcorn flick.
There's also the "Bumblebee" factor. Shortly after this, the franchise shifted toward the smaller, more heartfelt Bumblebee (2018) directed by Travis Knight. That movie was the polar opposite of The Last Knight. It was quiet, focused on one girl and her car, and had a 1980s Amblin vibe. The contrast made the excess of the fifth movie look even more extreme in hindsight.
The Unfinished Business: Unicron
The biggest "what if" left by the film is the Unicron reveal. In the final act, we learn that the six horns rising out of the Earth are part of Unicron, the ancient enemy of Cybertron. The movie ends on a massive cliffhanger with Quintessa, disguised as a human, approaching a group of scientists and telling them she knows how to kill him.
We never got the payoff.
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Because the series did a soft reboot with Bumblebee and Transformers: Rise of the Beasts, the "Earth is Unicron" storyline has been mostly abandoned. It’s a shame, honestly. A full-scale war between the Autobots and a planet-sized Transformer is exactly the kind of insanity this franchise was built for.
Moving Forward: How to Watch It Now
If you’re going to revisit the film today, don't try to make it make sense. Don't worry about the timeline inconsistencies with the 2007 movie. Just lean into the spectacle.
- Watch it on the biggest screen possible. The scale of the final battle at Stonehenge and in the upper atmosphere is genuinely impressive.
- Focus on the background. Michael Bay loves "environmental storytelling." There are tiny details in the junkyard and in Burton’s castle that flesh out the world more than the dialogue does.
- Appreciate the sound design. It won an Oscar nomination for Sound Editing for a reason. Every transformation sounds heavy, metallic, and dangerous.
Transformers: The Last Knight is a loud, messy, beautiful disaster. It represents the end of an era—the final time Michael Bay would sit in the director's chair for this series. It pushed the limits of what digital effects could do and tested the patience of audiences everywhere. Whether it's a misunderstood masterpiece of action or a bloated relic of the 2010s, it’s a movie that refuses to be ignored.
To get the most out of the experience, try tracking down the 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray. It’s one of the few ways to see the shifting aspect ratios exactly as Bay intended, providing a level of visual clarity that streaming services often compress. After watching, compare the historical lore presented here with the "Beast Wars" mythology in Rise of the Beasts to see how the franchise's approach to Earth's history has evolved.