It seemed like the once lucrative Transformers franchise had reached its end after 2017’s abysmal “The Last Knight”. It was the fifth film in the series and easily the most expensive. But it flopped at the box office, losing the studio over $100 million. Not long after director Michael Bay would step away and the future of the Transformers on the big screen was in doubt.

But then came “Bumblebee”, an unexpected hit with fans and critics. The film was a spin-off prequel that didn’t come close to cracking the $1 billion mark reached by the Transformers films during their heyday. But it also didn’t cost nearly as much. Even better, it told a smaller scaled and more intimate story that revolves around human characters that audiences could genuinely invest in. The results were pretty great.

Now five years later we have a new Transformers movie called “Rise of the Beasts”. The film is a standalone sequel to 2018’s “Bumblebee”; one that continues the prequel storyline which leads up to the original 2007 film. The film is directed by Steven Caple Jr. (“Creed II”) and is written by a team of five screenwriters. That’s not always a good sign but the script is actually pretty good and their story definitely follows closer to “Bumblebee” than the final Bay film.

Set in 1994, Anthony Ramos takes the lead human role playing an ex-military electronics expert named Noah Diaz. He lives in Brooklyn where he struggles to help support his hard-working mother, Breanna (Lauren Vélez) and his 11-year-old brother, Kris (Dean Scott Vazquez). Making things tougher, Kris is fighting sickle cell disease and he risks losing his access to much needed healthcare because of mounting hospital bills.

Elsewhere in the city, Elena Wallace (Dominique Fishback) works at a museum as a researcher of newly discovered artifacts. She’s good at her job. Unfortunately she works for a boss who is always taking credit for her hard work. Elena begins studying a falcon statue, taking a special interest in the unknown insignia engraved on its chest. In doing so she accidentally cracks it open revealing a mysterious glowing shard.

After Kris is turned down for treatment, Noah turns to his streetwise friend Reek (Tobe Nwigwe) who convinces him to steal a shiny silver Porsche for some quick and much-needed cash. It goes about as well as you’d expect. The Porsche is actually a Transformer named Mirage (voiced by a hit-or-miss Pete Davidson) and he’s answering the call of his leader Optimus Prime (Peter Cullen). We learn Optimus has summoned his fellow Autobots after picking up the signature of the Transwarp Key – yep, the very shard Elena has discovered inside the Falcon.

We learn the Transwarp Key can open a portal between time and space. The few Autobots hiding themselves on earth want to use it to get back to their home planet of Cybertron. But a planet-devouring entity named Unicron (Colman Domingo) also wants it as it would give him access to an unlimited number of worlds to consume. So Unicron sends his ruthless henchman Scourge (Peter Dinklage) to earth to retrieve it.

Of course that leads to a series of battles between Scourge and the Autobots. We’re also introduced to an ancient group of Transformers long hidden on earth called Maximals. And then there’s Noah and Elena who find themselves thrust into the middle of a war with their planet’s survival on the line. All fit nicely into the story and there are some surprisingly interesting storylines that play out. Better yet, the human characters have some emotional weight. Solid performances from Ramos and Fishback are a big help.

Of course you also have the action sequences, most of them well staged and with just enough restraint to keep from boiling over into mind-melting excess. And even though everything culminates in a sprawling king-sized CGI showdown, the action as a whole has a smaller and more focused feel to it – again, more like “Bumblebee” and less like the five Bay films.

I doubt “Rise of the Beasts” will win over the franchise’s more hardened detractors. And to be fair it’s not without its flaws. Davidson’s comic routine wears thin after a while. Some of needle-drops are laughably bad. And the movie does something with Ramos’ character during its big climax that is beyond goofy. Still Caple Jr. proves to be a sharp and capable filmmaker who does a good job balancing humanity with that big robot entertainment many audiences want from a Transformers movie.

VERDICT – 3.5 STARS