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Weak! No carrier-robot in next Transformers

Sailors and Navy devotees upset that the sea service got almost no screen time in Michael Bay’s 2007 blockbuster “Transformers” — which spotlighted the rest of the military — won’t be pleased with the latest news about the sequel: Producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura denied rumors May 7 that the next installment in the popcorn franchise would include a giant, transforming aircraft carrier.

“A transforming aircraft carrier? We saw a Japanese film that had something like that, so maybe that’s where that comes from,” Bonaventura told MTV.com. “We never really talked about that, practically speaking.”

Web scuttlebutt held that action auteur Michael Bay — who has also helmed other mega-movies such as “Armageddon;” “Bad Boys;” and “The Rock;” — wanted to call the transforming carrier “Broadside” and include it in the first movie, but it would’ve cost too much.

Not so, Bonaventura said. Beyond that, there were few other details about the sequel, scheduled for release in 2009.

The first “Transformers,” and more recently, “Iron Man,” each was made with extensive cooperation by the Defense Department, which provided planes, tanks, helicopters and Air Force extras for a few scenes. Many of “Transformers’” nonrobot heroes were Air Force officers, and two featured nontransforming aircraft were an Air Force AC-130 Spectre gunship and Air Force F-22 Raptor fighters. After a special preview screening in Washington last summer, soldiers and airmen praised the movie for its depiction of the Pentagon’s vision of “net-centric warfare.”

“Obviously, the military has never fought giant robots, and hopefully we never will. But the way this film is structured, if we ever had to do it, this is probably how we would do it,” said Army spokesman Lt. Col Paul Sinor, in a DoD announcement after the screening.