Michael Bay Explains Why He Will Return to Direct TRANSFORMERS 4

Bay, who directed the widely successful Transformers trilogy for Paramount Pictures and Hasbro, returns to continue the franchise with a fourth film that will introduce a new "cast" of Autobots and Decepticons.

Recently, Hasbro CEO Brian Goldner confirmed that Transformers 4 will in fact not be a reboot and maintain the history of the three previous films while introducing a completely new roster of characters. Director Michael Bay is slotted to helm the project after completing his upcoming action thriller Pain & Gain starring Dwayne Johnson, and now offers insight into why he chose to come back for another installment:

"I thought I was done. Then the ride came out [at Universal Studios Hollywood] and the two-and-a-half-hour lines. And then you’re thinking, Oh my God, someone’s going to take this over. And you start doing a lot of soul-searching. Like, OK, I’m about to do a little movie, Pain & Gain … and the studio says they want to restart the franchise. And someone could come in here and screw it up, you know? So I’m thinking that if I do this last one, we set it on a new footing, we change a lot of things — but we keep the history of the three in place. But we broaden it so it can be set up and be carried on — it would have a better chance for survival, I guess. You know?

"So it was just one of those things. It’s like, when you look what’s going on in the film business with the franchise frenzy right now, why is Cameron doing two more Avatar movies? Why is Peter Jackson doing three more Hobbit movies that are in the same world as Lord of the Rings? When you have a franchise, it’s very hard to give it up.'"

Transformers 4 is currently slated for theatrical release in June 2014.