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AARON ARCHER: "The G1 version of Jazz transformed into a Porsche race car, complete with number and sponsor decals. For the flick, we kept him sporty, but went with a Pontiac Solstice."
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AARON ARCHER: "Michael Bay and the writers wanted to make Bumblebee cool and relevant, so they went with a concept Camaro instead of a Volkswagen Beetle. But he's still got the yellow paint job and the same head shape from the '80s."
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AARON ARCHER: "Since Optimus is the hero, we remained loyal to his original design—he's a truck, his chest is red [accented with flames], and his head is the same. But in order to make it believable that a thirtysomething-foot robot could physically manipulate itself from the vehicle's parts, we used a long-nose truck instead of a short nose. The toy's just a scaled-down replica."
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AARON ARCHER: "We upgraded Starscream from an F-15 to and F-22 fighter jet, so we took him a little further away from his G1 roots. The robot looks much different too. We figured we could get away with some reinvention since he doesn't get a lot of on-screen time."
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AARON ARCHER: "Megatron is way different. For a movie about a space invasion we basically had to design the scariest robot ever. He also transforms into an alien jet, cause you can't have your villain transforming into a tiny pistol!"