From being associated with other works or due to having smaller roles, the Transformers movies feature many accomplished actors who are not typically remembered for their involvement in the long-running franchise. Other actors’ legacies are deeply intertwined with Transformers, including Peter Cullen, who voiced Optimus Prime in the 1980s animated series and in the live-action movies. Decades later, 2007’s Transformers served as Megan Fox’s breakout role through her portrayal of the human character Mikaela Banes.
Many other actors are not primarily known for Transformers, but still greatly contributed to the franchise. In one of his final roles, Orson Welles voiced the formidable Unicron in The Transformers: The Movie. Hugo Weaving voiced Megatron when the Decepticon leader made his live-action debut, while Shia LaBeouf, Mark Wahlberg, Hailee Steinfeld, and Anthony Hopkins played important human characters. Other human and Transformer characters were played by well-known actors, despite some of them not being commonly remembered for these roles.
|
Movie |
Release Year |
|---|---|
|
The Transformers: The Movie |
1986 |
|
Transformers |
2007 |
|
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen |
2009 |
|
Transformers: Dark of the Moon |
2011 |
|
Transformers: Age of Extinction |
2014 |
|
Transformers: The Last Knight |
2017 |
|
Bumblebee |
2018 |
|
Transformers: Rise of the Beasts |
2023 |
|
Transformers One |
2024 |
10 Bernie Mac
Transformers (2007)
In the first live-action Transformers movie, Bernie Mac plays an overzealous used car salesperson named Bobby Bolivia who runs Bolivia’s Finest Quality Used Cars And Petting Zoo. Bobby plays an important role in setting Sam Witwicky (LaBeouf) on his hero’s journey due to the beat-up black and yellow Chevrolet Camaro he sells to Sam. The car is, of course, the Autobot known as Bumblebee, who becomes Sam’s guardian and further connects him to the ancient conflict between the Autobots and Decepticons.
Mac adds a great deal of humor to a character who could have been uninteresting if he had been played by a different actor, as the scene is more about connecting Sam to Bumblebee than it is about the car salesperson. Bobby even delivers one of the 2007 Transformers‘ best quotes when he says, “A driver don’t pick the car, the car picks the driver. It’s a mystical bond between man and machine.” Transformers became one of Mac’s final roles before he passed away in 2008.
Related Transformers Movies In Order
Transformers has released numerous films, leading to the franchise’s release order being different from its chronological viewing order.
9 Rainn Wilson
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (2009)
When Sam goes to college in Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, he takes an astronomy class taught by Professor Colan, played by The Office‘s Rainn Wilson. Much like Dwight Schrute, Professor Colan has a flair for the dramatic, and can be unsettling. He begins his first class of the semester by uttering the words, “Space, time, gravity,” before taking a singular bite out of an apple and letting it fall to the floor, where it rolls toward a female student, who he encourages to finish eating the apple for him.
Professor Colan takes an immediate dislike to Sam, who is experiencing visions of Cybertronian symbols caused by a shard of the AllSpark. Sam interrupts Colan’s lecture and begins drawing the symbols on the chalkboard and explaining concepts beyond human comprehension, causing him to be kicked out of the class. This is Wilson’s only scene in Revenge of the Fallen and throughout the franchise, making it easy to forget the professor he played.
8 Frances McDormand
Transformers: Dark of the Moon (2011)
The Academy Award and Emmy Award-winning Frances McDormand played Charlotte Mearing in Transformers: Dark of the Moon. As the United States’ Director of National Intelligence, Mearing is involved in N.E.S.T., a secret operation in which Autobots work with human strike teams from the U.S. and the United Kingdom. Mearing also has a personal history with recurring Transformers character Seymour Simmons (John Turturro) that she is not fond of recollecting or rekindling.
Unlike much of her work, which is critically acclaimed but not necessarily a box office hit,
Dark of the Moo
n was critically panned, receiving a 35% Tomatometer score on Rotten Tomatoes.
While Mearing is an important character, McDormand is better known for her award-winning roles in Fargo, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, and Nomadland. Unlike much of her work, which is critically acclaimed but not necessarily a box office hit, Dark of the Moon was critically panned, receiving a 35% Tomatometer score on Rotten Tomatoes. According to Box Office Mojo, Dark of the Moon was a significant box office success, grossing $1.124 billion against a $195 million budget.
7 John Malkovich
Transformers: Dark of the Moon (2011)
Despite helping the Autobots save Earth from the Decepticons twice, Sam has a difficult time finding a job after graduating from college, and is left with no choice but to work for the deeply unpleasant Bruce Brazos (John Malkovich). Brazos is the CEO of the telecommunications company Accurretta Systems and is highly controlling, insisting that every floor of the business is color-coordinated, and becoming upset when he sees an employee using a red cup from the red floor when they are on the yellow floor. He describes this incident as “a visual and, therefore, visceral betrayal.”
Brazos repeatedly tells Sam to
“impress me”
during Sam’s job interview
.
Brazos’ penchant for being overdramatic continues when he later delivers information to Sam’s apartment and sees Bumblebee and makes the mistake of provoking the Autobot. Like many of Malkovich’s roles, Brazos is an eccentric individual, but once Sam becomes embroiled in the main plot involving the latest Deception threat, Brazos becomes irrelevant to the story. Dark of the Moon did serve as a reunion for Malkovich and McDormand after they previously worked on Burn After Reading.
6 Alan Tudyk
Transformers: Dark of the Moon (2011)
Simmons returns in Dark of the Moon, accompanied by a personal assistant named Dutch, who is played by Alan Tudyk. When guns are pointed at him, Simmons, and Sam in a Russian bar, Dutch effortlessly disarms his potential enemies, and then apologizes for acting like “the old me.” In less life-threatening situations, Dutch is also a useful ally, as he helps manage Simmons’ life and his daily calendar after Simmons writes and publishes his book.
Tudyk revealed to The A.V. Club that Dark of the Moon‘s Dutch is the same character that he previously played 11 years earlier in the Sandra Bullock movie 28 Days. Despite this intriguing connection between the otherwise unrelated movies, Tudyk is best known for his roles in other movies and television series. This includes the short-lived but beloved Firefly, the ongoing Resident Alien, and his motion capture work as the reprogrammed Imperial droid K-2SO in Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, a role he will reprise in Andor season 2.
Related Alan Tudyk’s 10 Best Movies & TV Shows, Ranked
Alan Tudyk is an incredibly versatile actor known for his voice performances, motion capture roles, and often being cast as the villain.
5 Leonard Nimoy
The Transformers: The Movie (1986) and Transformers: Dark of the Moon (2011)
Close
Leonard Nimoy has the rare distinction of playing two different characters, with the first in 1986’s The Transformers: The Movie and the second decades later in Dark of the Moon. In The Transformers: The Movie, Nimoy voices Galvatron, the new form that Megatron takes on in the animated story. In Dark of the Moon, Nimoy voices the former Autobot leader Sentinel Prime, whose whereabouts and motivations are integral to the Transformers‘ third live-action installment.
Nimoy, of course, is best known for playing Spock in the original Star Trek series, along with continuing to play the iconic half-Vulcan character in many subsequent Star Trek stories. 2013’s Star Trek: Into Darkness became Nimoy’s final movie role before the legendary science-fiction actor passed away in 2015. Dark of the Moon saw him reuniting with Peter Cullen, who continued to voice Optimus Prime years after the 1980s Transformers animated series and movie.
4 Ken Jeong
Transformers: Dark of the Moon (2011)
Ken Jeong plays Jerry Wang, a former NASA employee who works at Accuretta Systems, the same company where Sam works. Jerry has insights about the Decepticons’ latest plan and tries to urge Sam to tell the government through his connections, but Sam does not take Jerry seriously, as he seems to be spouting nonsensical conspiracy theories that only make sense in hindsight. When confronted by a Decepticon named Laserbeak, Jerry takes out two guns he had stowed away, but is unable to do any damage before he is pushed out of a window and to his death.
It speaks volumes about
Dark of the Moon
‘s star-studded cast that there is a scene where Jeong and Malkovich’s characters have a confrontation, and it is not among the movie’s most memorable parts.
Even with his antics, Jerry is not Dark of the Moon‘s most memorable character, partially because he dies early on in the story. Jeong is more well-known for his roles in The Hangover movies, Community, Crazy Rich Asians, and as a panelist on the reality series The Masked Singer. It speaks volumes about Dark of the Moon‘s star-studded cast that there is a scene where Jeong and Malkovich’s characters have a confrontation, and it is not among the movie’s most memorable parts.
3 John Goodman
Transformers: Age of Extinction (2014) & Transformers: The Last Knight (2017)
John Goodman voices Hound, an Autobot who appears in both Transformers: Age of Extinction and in Transformers: The Last Knight, the two Michael Bay-directed movies featuring Cade Yeager (Wahlberg) replacing Sam as Transformers‘ new protagonist. Hound is an important ally to Optimus Prime and serves as the Autobot leader’s second in command during Age of Extinction. He consistently proves to be a loyal and formidable member of the Autobots.
Goodman’s guttural, lovable delivery makes Hound a highlight in Age of Extinction and The Last Knight. From The Emperor’s New Groove to Monsters. Inc., Goodman is no stranger to voice work, but he is more associated with those roles than he is as Hound. Goodman is also more so associated with some of the movies and television series where he physically appears, including the Coen Brothers’ The Big Lebowski, Roseanne, and The Conners.
2 Angela Bassett
Bumblebee (2018)
The Emmy Award-winning and Academy Award-nominated Angela Bassett voices Shatter, one of the main villains in Bumblebee. Shatter is sent to Earth to hunt down Bumblebee and partners with another Decepticon, Dropkick, to try and reach their elusive target. Bumblebee ultimately kills Shatter by triggering a flood, the destruction of which obliterates Shatter, ending the threat that she poses to Bumblebee and Charlie Watson (Steinfeld).
Bumblebee
takes place in 1987.
Bassett brings an appropriately sinister edge to all of Shatter’s lines. Prior to Bumblebee, Bassett primarily performed in live-action projects, ranging from Boyz n the Hood and Malcolm X to American Horror Story and as Queen Ramonda in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. She has since taken on more voice roles in Pixar’s Soul, along with Netflix’s Wendell & Wild and Orion and the Dark, but it is still easy not to recognize the acclaimed actor’s voice in Bumblebee.
1 Justin Theroux
Bumblebee (2018)
Shatter’s villainous partner, Dropkick, is also voiced by a surprising actor, with Justin Theroux lending his talents to bring the Decepticon to life. He works closely with Shatter to find Bumblebee, but is also ultimately unsuccessful in his pursuit. When fighting Bumblebee, the Autobot wraps a chain around Dropkick and pulls until the Decepticon is wrenched apart and explodes, enduring an ignominious end despite the dangers he previously posed.
From his leading role as Kevin Garvey in HBO’s critically acclaimed series The Leftovers to his more recent role as Lydia Deetz’s boyfriend Rory in Tim Burton’s legacy sequel Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, Theroux has run the gamut of excellent dramas and comedies. Regardless of the diverse works he has starred in, it is still surprising to realize that Theroux is in Bumblebee, especially since he has a more gravelly voice than he uses in his other works. Theroux is one of many well-regarded actors whose Transformers franchise role should not be forgotten.
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Transformers is a multimedia franchise consisting of movies, TV Shows, video games, and comics. The franchise centers on a race of humanoid robots called the autobots who must protect Earth from the Decepticons. Some of the most popular characters include Megatron, Optimus Prime, and Bumblebee. In 2007, the first live-action movie in the franchise was released starring Shia Labeouf.
Created by Hasbro First Film Transformers (2007) Latest Film Transformers: Rise of the Beasts Upcoming Films Transformers One First TV Show The Transformers First Episode Air Date September 17, 1984 Cast Frank Welker , Peter Cullen , Corey Burton , John Stephenson , Jack Angel , Michael Bell , Dan Gilvezan , Casey Kasem , Christopher Collins , Shia LaBeouf , Megan Fox , Josh Duhamel , Tyrese Gibson , John Turturro , Rosie Huntington-Whiteley , Mark Wahlberg , Hailee Steinfeld , Anthony Ramos Latest TV Show Transformers: EarthSpark Expand