Entertainment Weekly has posted an alternate version of their Transformers: Age of Extinction article that is in their latest newsstand issue along with a much better image of Grimlock. The new details include Michael Bay pointing out that Lockdown's ship is important to the trilogy and how elements that are part of the movie that can be explored in later in the trilogy. Below are the key new bits of information compared with the published version.

Bay isn’t revealing his own origin story for Grimlock just yet. “I like to keep things very much in the dark. But yes, you’ll understand why they’re there when you see the movie. If you think I’m supposed to give away a lot of story points? No way! Keep it secret.

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This week's issue of Entertainment Weekly, their Summer preview issue, has an article (image left) about Transformers: Age of Extinction. In it director Michael Bay confirms that Transformers 4 is the start of the next trilogy while Mark Wahlberg comments on the storyline and Jack Reynor talks about working on the set. The article also revealed a few factoids about the CGI version of Grimlock saying the character is "150 feet long from the tail to the nostrils, 63.5 feet tall from the ground to the top of his horns, and weigh 850 tons." Below is a transcript of the the comments from Bay and the others.

Bay: "It's kind of like a new Transformers. We had three, the first trilogy, and this is going to be the next. ...It's the first of a new trilogy. I'm not necessarily sure that I'm doing [the others], but that's what it's meant for."

Bay: "{Shia LaBeouf]'s a good guy, but three movies, the same guy, it's time. You know what I'm saying? It's always good to freshen it up and change the story."

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After a long absence, Michael Bay took to his official website to post a response to recent articles covering his comments about Transformers: Age of Extinction. Apparently he didn't like what was written. My best guess is he is referring to the recent Yahoo article where he suggested the difference between TF4 and previous entries is it will have less goofiness and appear more cinematic. Personally I just thought it was a typical sequel question with an expected "raise the stakes" type answer with nothing negative intended by his responses. My best guess is the more mainstream movie sites decided to go the other way on interpreting his answers. Any way from a fan perspective the key piece of news is he officially confirms the first trailer for the movie will arrive for the Super Bowl on February 2, 2014.

I Do Not Apologize For Any Transformers Movies

It is a drag talking to reporters on sets. Why? Because often times they take your words and skew things to their liking. Then the crazy, lazy game of reporting on what other writers story’s reported me saying and suddenly it becomes skewed Internet truth. So I waste my time to restate exactly what I did say, again.

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In an interview with Yahoo Movies that seems to have been done when Transformers: Age of Extinction was filming at the Detroit Hong Kong set, Michael Bay discussed how he changed his approach compared to the previous three films. Also Entertainment Tonight Canada teases their own set report from the set that will air sometime next week.

“I wanted the first Transformers to be very suburban and less cool,” Bay told us from the Detroit set of this fourth chapter. “This is a much more cinematic one. I focused on keeping this one slick. There won’t be any goofiness in this one. We went a bit too goofy [on the last one].”

But despite Optimus’s updated design, Bay is quick to point out that this really is the fourth in an ongoing series – “reboot” is a dirty word here. “It feels like a new chapter, this movie,” he says. “But it’s not a reboot. This movie lives in the history of the 'Transformers' movies, and this one starts three years after the last. It feels fresh.”

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A few days ago Empire Magazine revealed their cover with Optimus Prime for their January 2014 issue. Now ComicBookMovie.com has posted what I assume are the images that accompied the article which UK stands today. No text, just the images. Not really seeing much in spoilers except that first image with Bay wielding a green prop that probably represents a Decepticon hand to be inserted later by ILM. Thanks to Feris Othman for the link.

Update: Empire has posted clearer images of the same photos which I swapped out below. They also provide some more tidbits including full names for some of the characters and plot details.

This fourth film in the franchise is something of a fresh start, and sees an Earth scarred by the events of the last three films but moving on after the disappearance of all giant robots.

When Mark Wahlberg's inventor, Cade Yeager, discovers a buried Transformer, the stage is set for the return of the giant beasties. There will also be some business with Cade's daughter Tessa (Nicola Peltz); her secret racing driver boyfriend Shane; Stanley Tucci's Joshua; his geologist assistant Darcy (Sophia Myles); "the CEO of the Chinese Transformers", played by Li Bingbing; and Kelsey Grammer's Harold Attinger, the film's non-robot big bad.

Tuesday Entertainment Weekly posted a video from the set of Transformers: Age of Extinction in Detroit that was a proxy for Hong Kong. In this second set report, they are reporting from the actual city as production was on its final week of filming. More Bayhem was shown as cast discussed how they killed time on set. Michael Bay also dropped a cryptic (aka useless) hint about the movie saying "The world has progressed/modernized to a point it can almost cannibalize and kill itself."

This time its official per a tweet from Michael Bay.

It's a wrap on #transformers4 #michaelbay #tf4 #transformers
— Michael Bay Dot Com (@S4TE) November 5, 2013

Filming on Transformers: Age of Extinction may be complete but the work is only half done for Michael Bay and his crew as they enter the post-production phase. While the director has been editing the movie as he films and ILM has probably been working on the movie the entire time, at this point things shift into another gear as the June 27th deadline looms. Eight months seems like a lot but the more special effects a movie has, the more time it needs. On top of completing the CGI, there is recording the soundtrack, sound design, sound effects, voice recording, ADR, color correction and a whole lot more. All of which needs Bay's approval at every step of the way. The last time TF3 was complete the day of world premiere, I doubt Bay wants a repeat.

Congrats to the cast and crew. Also a big thanks to all the site readers who helped provides pictures, video, links and updates on the movie so we could follow along.

Despite two failed blackmail attempts, Michael Bay has nothing but praise for Hong Kong after completing two weeks of filming in the city. In an interview with South China Morning Post, the director discussed some of the challenges filming in the city and a little bit of the story. Below is the major portions of the interview but you can find the full article, with videos, here.

As for the image, that was created by Jeffrey Marshall of Pixel Rally with inspiration from the Prime renders and the TF4 logo. His work was unintentionally highlighted by Age of Extinction's Sophia Myles in a recent tweet when the hotel she was at used his unofficial Autobot logo to dress up her food delivery.

“Hong Kong is a very visual city,” he said in an exclusive interview with the South China Morning Post.

[In regards to the extortion attempts], “In the restaurants, in the hotel, I must have 30 people coming to me saying ‘I’m so sorry’. But it was such a silly incident,” Bay said. He was also surprised how the incidents got looped into international news reported on BBC and CNN.

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Michael Bay has added a note to his website to "set the record straight" about his experience with shooting Transformers: Age of Extinction in Hong Kong. The note is a response to the bad press China has been getting for two failed extortion attempts.

I’m here to set the record straight again . . . my crew and I have been having a great time in Hong Kong despite what you may have read about us being “rocked by a second extortion attempt.” Totally untrue. A few bad dudes have definitely not ruined the experience. We shoot from sun up to sun down, and the local HK crew have become part of our on-set family. We’re in the middle of busy streets, in businesses, and even in people’s homes, and everyone we’ve met has been very accommodating and generous. It’s been a once in a lifetime experience we’d all consider doing again.

Michael Bay

Transformers: Age of Extinction had a productive weekend as filming continued in Kong Kong as bunch of videos found by TFormers.com show. The first video shows the entire core cast as they filmed a sequence that involved Stanley Tucci and Mark Wahlberg carrying a body bag like shape (maybe filled with those Cybertronian swords/keys?) with Sophia Myles, Nicola Peltz and Jack Reynor following close behind. The 2nd video is Bay prepping for a vehicle sequence and the actors killing time during steups. The 3rd video is the Freightliner being chased by three different colored SUVs, next is quick video of 'Bee turning a corner. Fifth video is extra's running around a corner as pyrotechnic sounds are heard and a piece of building lands in the street. After that is essentially a smoke bomb going off on top of a bus going over a curved overpass, the 7th is more of Bay prepping a scene and the last video is a slideshow of images from filming. Speaking of images, click here for another gallery images of the actors filming the body bag scene and other things.
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The final leg of principle photography for Transformers: Age of Extinction has begun in Hong Kong, China. Unfortunately, the first day did not go smoothly. Hong Kong newspaper, Sharp Daily, is reporting that three men attacked the crew for not receiving part of the rent fee for using the location the production was at. Seibertron's translation indicates the altercation ended up involving the three suspects, three policemen and Michael Bay. I can't say surprised Bay got involved as I suspect he has a trait that (good) bosses should have - he can berate his team but beware anyone else that does it. It ended with the three under arrest and no one injured.
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In a post on the Shoot For the Edit forums, Nelson wrote about his visit to the set of Transformers: Age of Extinction. Since he works for Bay he left off all the juicy story details but he did drop some information on the origin of the various vehicles in the film. Also posted the pics of Michael Bay at work on the set.

As some of you know, I visited the TF4 set in Chicago a couple of weeks ago. I won't bore you with the details, but here are some things I noticed and discovered.

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It has been a quiet few days as Monday and Tuesday was Transformers: Age of Extinction's weekend off and for now we don't really know where they are currently filming in the Chicago area. However, that doesn't mean do not have some interesting pictures to look at thanks to cmraseye. He has posted new images from filming at the Damen Avenue silo to go with his set from Saturday. The pics show part of an explosion set off that day but also a great look at the spacecraft prop that the cast has been filming on here and there for the last month or so. He also added a few bonus pictures that are worth checking out from filming last month. The last pic is a new official picture from Transformers 4 that shows Michael Bay in the middle of the action. The rest of cmraseye TF4 gallery can be found here. Thanks to Jeffrey Marshall for the heads-up and KennyD for corrected pic.

Update: Added few more images from the gallery, turns out it had a page 2 I missed. Also provided a flipped version of what many of figure is probably the Pagani Huayra. I am not sure where some of the photos were taken but they look cool. Most look better than the official over photoshopped, color-corrected Bay picture.
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While in their rush to grab pictures from this site of this weekend's filming at the Damen Avenue abandoned silo without giving proper credit to Colin H, TFormers did manage to find a great video (below) of the explosives going off on top of the silo that destroyed the bridge joining the two sections. The boom was big enough to set off car alarms that were not exactly close to the site. In addition, TFW2005 used my link to cmarseye's TF4 gallery to catch something I didn't (dang it) - two pictures of two unknown Transformer robots from the first day of filming in Chicago on August 24th. The first is probably Bay approving something from ILM on his Macbook while the other was on the clapper (which is held upside down for some reason).

Update: Pictures pulled at the demand of Paramount Pictures

Today started the Chicago leg of principle photography for Transformers 4. To mark the occasion, MichaelBay.com has posted an official staged image that shows some of the cast and crew posing in front of some obelisk. The caption with the photo just identifies the men in the image, "Pictured left to right: Jack Reynor; Mark Wahlberg; 2nd Assistant B-Camera Casey “Walrus” Howard; 1st Assistant B-Camera John Kairis with back to camera; B-camera Operator Lukasz Bielan; Director Michael Bay; and Director of Photography Amir Mokri. High resolution photo: http://bayhem.com/1c0euov"

The Chicago Tribune has posted photos from the TF4 set at The Hyatt Regency McCormick Place that red taxis and other vehicles with Chinese characters that fit a lot of the props from Detroit so it seems that more from the Hong Kong, China setting is being filmed. Last, is a link bait article from Superherohype claiming that today's filming involves the Dinobots. That's it. Absolutely nothing to support the theory so take it with a grain of salt.

Saturday was another day of filming on the downtown Detroit set for Transformers 4. It seems security was beefed up around the Hong Kong, China set but Jerry B. did manage to snap a few images. I think his pics are the first I have seen of Sophia Myles on a Transformers 4 set since she joined the cast. Whatever was being filmed today seemed to involved the core actors as Michael Bay is seen discussing a scene with Mark Wahlberg, Nicola Peltz, Jack Reynor, Myles and Stanley Tucci. Myles outfit matches the outfit the unknown blonde girl from Thursday was wearing so safe to assume the pair that day are the stunt doubles (or stand-ins) for Myles and Tucci. Also below are a few videos. The first is from Friday and the other two are from Wednesday I think.

On a related note, Matt B. reports that Optimus Prime and the other vehicles are due to arrive on the set on Monday and that he was told the 2013 Lamborghini Aventador LP 700-4 Coup is the alt mode of Sideswipe.

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You can add Lockhart, Texas to the list of locations that Transformers 4 production visited this week. On Vacation Locations has posted images from the location that show Michael Bay in white with red hat directing soldiers as they do whatever it is they are doing in the small town. The full set of images taken by Linda Villarreal can be found here.

After months long drought, Michael Bay has posted a comment to the Shoot for the Edit forums about speculation on the sub-title of Transformers 4.

There are rumors flying around from various media sites about the title of the next Transformers.

I wanted you to hear from me directly that we have not yet chosen a title and anything being reported is absolutely not true.

When we have a title to announce, I promise you will hear it from me first.

-Michael

You are probably asking "what title rumors?". I have no idea what he is talking about. I have not read of any sites reporting to know what the sub-title is nor seen any attempt at a guess. With the previous movies' interesting choices of "Revenge of the Fallen" and "Dark of the Moon" about any mad-lib title that follows the potential format of " of " would work. So joining these pretend rumors, I am going to guess titles that use TF references like "Rise of the Primes", "Rise of Galvatron", "Fall of the Autobots", or "Rage of the Decepticons". If want to go in the "Moon" direction what about "Fasting of the Furious", "Chase of the Humans", "Building of the Ramp"... What are your mad-lib guesses?

Image courtesy of Jeffrey Marshall of Pixel Rally. Not an official logo of Transformers 4.

Michael Bay has posted a comment on the attic fire that occurred Tuesday night at the Plugerville, TX home they were filming at.

Shooting of Transformers 4 is going great with Wahlberg and the new cast. We are having a great time in Texas.

I’m reading how the news makes everything more dramatic than real life. I guess the truth was just too unexciting. Yes there was a small smoldering fire at a house and no, no one was injured during the fire. And no, no one “just narrowly escaped” as the news dramatically states. A crew member though twisted his ankle after falling in a gopher hole on the ranch.

The fire was put out in a brief 15 minutes by a great fire crew on set. It was an attic fire and cause is unknown. No we were not shooting in the attic, we were shooting outside on the ranch.

Michael

You can add Austin, Texas area to the list of locations that Transformers 4 will be shooting this summer. According to Dallas News (via Seibertron), sometime in June the production will be in the small towns of Lockhart, Taylor, Elgin and Pfugnerville. In Taylor the plan is to close downtown and a railroad overpass with a car explosion set for Robinson Park. For Lockhart, the Caldwell County Courthouse will be used. The cities are part of a chase between the Autobots and Decepticons through Central Texas. Filming is expected to start in June (location unknown) with production hitting Detroit, Chicago, Hong Kong, and other unknown locations in China.

Speaking of Chicago, Bay was spotted scouting locations in the city on April 25th. Locations he and his crew checked out include LaSalle Street near Randolph Street up to the Board of Trade Building. Not sure what can gleam from that story wise but mostly reinforces that TF4 is coming soon to the area. Thanks to Wynton R. for the links.