An immensely talented actor and filmmaker, Shia LaBeouf is a talent powerhouse. The actor started his career around 1998, however, he kissed stardom in a short period with the superhit franchise Transformers. He played the role of Sam Witwicky, a kind and noble hero who gets stuck at the center of a battle between robots in disguise. He was part of the franchise for the first three installments.
Shia LaBeouf revealed in an interview that despite the massive box office success of Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, it was a film without a script.
Shia LaBeouf’s Transformers 2 suffered due to a lack of script
The success of the first film Transformer had risen hopes of the viewers about the second one being more entertaining and thrilling. The second film featured Shia LaBeouf and Megan Fox in the lead roles. The film had the perfect cast, ample resources, a prominent director Michael Bay, and everything needed except a script. The situation was quite serious, and it was because of the ongoing 2007–2008 Writers Guild of America strike. Hence, getting hold of a good script was a difficult task.
In an interview with Kevin McCarthy for Transformers: Dark of the Moon, then-franchise star Shia LaBeouf spoke about the situation during the filming of Revenge of the Fallen.
“We were given a date, we were given a bunch of money, we were given a bunch of toys, and we had no script. And it was a writer’s strike, so you couldn’t get one if you wanted one.”
Despite being one of the worst movies of the year it grossed $836.3 million. It was even more than its predecessor, released in 2007.
Shia LaBeouf reveals the reason for his exit from the Transformers franchise
The actor rose to stardom with the Transformers franchise. He was just seventeen when he was cast as the lead in a science fiction action film. It was based on Hasbro’s toy line of the same name, and he was part of three installments of the Transformers live-action film series.
In an interview with E Online, Shia LaBeouf shared that he believed in the strength of the third installment, Transformers: Dark of the Moon. However, he was not surprised by the critical failure of the second installment. He said,
“We didn’t have a script the second time! It was like a two-hour SNL skit with explosions. We were sort of riffing.”
He added that the script of Dark of the Moon was the best they have ever received.
The actor left the franchise after the third installment in 2011. In an interview, he talked reason for leaving the franchise for good.
“My hang-up with those films was that they felt irrelevant. They felt dated as f*ck… You come up with these stories about Easy Rider and Raging Bull and De Niro and Scorsese and Hopper, and you find value in what they do. Meanwhile, you’re chasing energon crystals. It’s very hard to keep doing what you’re doing when you feel like it’s the antithesis of your purpose on this planet.”
He had also shared with E Online that though he is leaving the film, the makers will continue to make more and reboot at some point with another actor.
Transformers: Age of Extinction was released in 2014 and features Mark Wahlberg in the lead role.
Source- Slash Film
