Di Bonaventura Talks Transformers/G.I. Joe Crossover Movie

Lorenzo Di Bonaventura is a producer for the Transformers movie franchise. He is also a producer for G.I. Joe. Continuing the trend, both franchises are owned by Hasbro and distributed by Paramount Pictures. So should there be a crossover similar to something like... The Avengers? In an interview with Cinema Blend, Di Bonaventura discusses the possibility of such a movie.

Once again, getting back to the evolution of the blockbuster movie franchise, one of the things that we are seeing a lot of right now, and it’s in great deal due to The Avengers and The Expendables is kind of the idea of both continuity explosion, like the idea of creating a larger universe and also just creating a team and I’m just curious, what’s your perspective on that personally and is it something you could see being part of future projects you’re working on? 

In terms of Joe or just in...

Well, in terms of Joe, for example like G.I. Joe and Transformers both happen to be Hasbro, Paramount and you.

I guess it’s possible. I don’t know. I think I probably at this moment, I resist it. I don’t know necessarily why, but I just think there’s so much that’s so rich in the mythologies that I don’t think they need to draw from the other. I think, I didn’t rule it out for me and I think those things have somehow for me, sort of in the past, they made me feel like a little bit cynical exercises in just drawing money out of something. It’s not to say you couldn’t do it well, but both these properties have such rich mythologies with so many characters, that you could go a lot of movies before you start running out of ideas of what to do. But it’s not to say, if we found the right... I’d hate to set out to do that, but if I heard a story where we went, “Oh my God...,” I could see a story right now about machination, machination of war and that could lead you sort of intrinsically to a Transformer.

Did I just light the fuse?

Yeah! [laughs] But I think in general, Marvel is doing it within their own universe, right? And so it doesn’t feel gimmicky in that way. I think that’s what I would really try to resist.