‘Transformers 2′ Debut Set
Undeterred by a possible strike in the summer of 2008, Paramount has set a debut date of June 29th, 2009 for the sequel to the Michael Bay’s Transformers movie. Box Office Mojo has posted the summer 2009 date for the sequel that, like its predecessor, is based on Hasbro’s popular line of toys and the 1980s cartoons inspired by shape-changing robots. The Transformers movie was one of the major hits of last summer. It has already earned $313 million and will likely finish its run at either #2 or #3 for the year at the domestic box office. The movie also stimulated sales of the Transformers toys, which many analysts believe will be the number one boys’ action figure line of 2009 — and the movie’s success certainly didn’t hurt IDW’s successful revival of the Transformers comic book series.
Paramount is expecting that director Michael Bay and star Shia LeBeouf will return for the sequel, but timing could be difficult. With a possible strike looming in the summer of 2008 studios are scrambling to get films into production quickly so that principal photography is finished before a strike deadline, so it is likely that Paramount will try to get started on production of Transformers 2 as soon as possible.
