According to longtime Transformers director Michael Bay, there’s 14 more movies in the franchise on the way including the spinoffs, and he’s interested in making one of those spinoffs. Now, before we shake our heads in (not so surprised) disbelief, let’s just get one thing out of the way first. Transformers: The Last Knight is supposed to be Bay’s last film in the franchise. At least that’s what he’s said. Remember, he previously told the press that for Transformers: Dark of the Moon. So it doesn’t come as a shock when he also says he’d like to do one of the spinoffs.

Secondly, 14 more Transformers films was not unexpected. At least not when Bay, Akvia Goldsman, and Steven Spielberg gathered a group of writers to pitch ideas to expand the franchise into a shared universe. More on the story below.

This past summer, Paramount Studios hired 12 writers to write out the bible for the Transformers cinematic universe. The plan was for the writers to come up with ideas that would expand beyond the canon films with spinoffs and prequels. Of the proposed works there were plans for a Bumblebee spinoff, Beast Wars, and more.

Of the nine pitches that were sent to the Transformers brain trust — Michael Bay, Akiva Goldsman, Steven Spielberg, Mark Vahradian, and Lorenzo di Bonaventura, as well as Hasbro’s Brian Goldner — only five were approved. Of those five, a Transformers Cybertron animated origins film will be helmed by Ant-Man co-writers Andrew Barrer and Gabriel Ferrari, while Goldsman is confirmed to be scripting Transformers 5. Bay has yet to announce if he will return to direct the fifth untitled Transformers film. It’s still not clear if the other three unnamed projects are spinoffs or prequels, but Hasbro announced that there will be four more Transformers films in the next decade. More on the story below.