Transformers One has reached No. 6 on Netflix’s U.S. movie chart, giving the animated Optimus Prime and Megatron origin story a streaming boost after its $129 million global box-office run. According to FlixPatrol’s chart data cited by Polygon, it landed in the week’s top 10 between Twilight and Ice Age.
The ranking is a snapshot, not a theatrical comeback or proof of sustained viewing. Polygon reports that Transformers One recently joined Netflix after a multiyear run on Paramount Plus, where it remains available.
The 2024 prequel didn’t please every Transformers fan, but Polygon calls it one of the franchise’s best films to date and argues that its streaming attention is overdue. Its review describes the film as “sweet, occasionally heartbreaking, and utterly convincing in telling an origin story for friends-turned-foes Optimus Prime and Megatron.” The review credits a strong cast, a solid story and a classic hero’s journey with giving it a spark rarely found in the series.
Rather than opening with two commanders on opposite sides of a war, Transformers One introduces lifelong, genuine friends on their homeworld of Cybertron. Optimus is still Orion Pax, voiced by Chris Hemsworth, while the future Megatron is D-16, voiced by Brian Tyree Henry. They’re low-class miners extracting Energon, treated as cogs in a much bigger machine.
Both want more from life, including the ability to transform. Not every Cybertronian can do that, an important wrinkle for a franchise built around robots changing shape. The pair put their faith in Cybertron’s leader, Sentinel Prime, voiced by Jon Hamm, who is searching for the Matrix of Leadership to restore the planet to its former glory.
The voice cast also includes Laurence Fishburne as Alpha Trion, Scarlett Johansson as Elita-1, Keegan-Michael Key as B-127 and Steve Buscemi as Starscream. Polygon describes the film as dramatic and occasionally quite violent for an animated movie, but also packed with humor. In its assessment, almost all the jokes land, including references to the 1986 film The Transformers: The Movie and classic Key & Peele sketches.
That reception didn’t translate into a theatrical hit. Polygon characterizes the worldwide gross as a box-office bomb and says it sealed the fate of the planned spinoff franchise.
After Michael Bay’s original run, the franchise went in several new directions. Under Bay, the studio built a billion-dollar franchise across five live-action films, ending with his 2017 entry, Transformers: The Last Knight. The 2018 prequel Bumblebee found both critical and commercial success, unlike Bay’s films on the critical side, though it didn’t reach the billion-dollar heights of earlier installments. Then 2023’s Transformers: Rise of the Beasts failed to deliver the turnaround Paramount wanted.
Now Paramount is returning to live action. According to Polygon’s reporting on the next Transformers film, Paramount has enlisted Steven Spielberg to “focus on all creative aspects of the next live-action Transformers film.” It’s also bringing back Bay, whom Polygon describes as the franchise’s most proven director, to revive the brand.
Transformers One is streaming on both Netflix and Paramount Plus.
