The thread name got my hopes up: "Transformers Universe" was the name of the 4 Who's Who style issues that covered all the characters from the Marvel comics run, back in the late 80s.
And to be honest, I'd get more excited about a new discussion here about that old 4 issue set than I anticipate ever getting about any Michael-Bay-affiliated Transformers movie.
Just in case anyone with any power over any of this is reading: 1. Kick Michael Bay out and get a character-oriented director. 2. Get the writers from either the Marvel or IDW comics involved in writing your films. 3. The Transformers ARE the characters. It's okay to have a human-perspective character like Spike Witwicky was in the old G1 cartoons, but the STORY is that of the Transformers, not of some human(s) the Transformers interact with. 4. To that end, film most of your movies with the camera perspective showing characters like Bumblebee at "person size", and scale from there, even if that makes humans seem small. That's okay. More than okay. That would be perfect. 5. Feel free to use the original bright primary colors for the characters, and at the very least make sure the characters are easily distinguished from one another. 6. The VOICES of these characters matter - if you can't get the G1 actors (and sadly some of them have passed on), use sound-alikes. 7. I understand that Volkswagon won't cooperate with Bumblebee being one of their cars anymore. Well, beg them. Failing that, this isn't an excuse to make him a muscle car or completely rewrite who he is. Make him a similar car - maybe a Mini Cooper, or a Ford Festiva, or (since you seem to have a deal with GM) a Chevy Sonic. Something of similar stature. 8. Gestalts. Do them correctly, and these movies can rule the world. I don't know what the hell that was in the second Bay movie, but it what it was NOT was Devastator. 9. You may think you don't NEED the fandom with the ticket sales you're already getting. You're probably right. BUT, the people seeing the movies now who *aren't* the fandom largely don't care and just want to see big robots fight - so they *would* still come if you made the fandom happy, too. And you may not need that, but you WANT that, because if you do it right, like you care, then we will give you positive word of mouth rather than the negative we're largely giving you now - and that can only put more butts in the seats and cash in your coffers. )
