Here’s the first teaser trailer for Transformers prequel Bumblebee

There are god damn actual bees in this teaser

Did you think that the pit of despair that was Transformers: The Last Knight might give us a reprieve from Transformers movies for a little while? Ha! You fool. They’ll never stop. We will be awash in cars that are more than meets the eye for all eternity.

Paramount is attempting to expand the Transformers universe from a single stream of sequels to a — wait for it — cinematic universe! And Bumblebee, for which we have the first teaser right here, is the first step. It’s a prequel to all the other films that is set in the 80s and involves Hailee Steinfeld finding the titular transformer in a junkyard where HE HAS ACTUAL BUMBLEBEES ON HIM. Looks like Michael Bay’s inability to do anything subtly is making its way over here just fine.

OK, now let me be less jaded for a second. This could also work. Travis Knight of the incredible Kubo and the Two Strings is directing and that seems like a really good fit for the Bumblebee character. Also, it’s not Michael Bay. Knight has a touch for personal stories as he’s shown with all his work with the animation studio LAIKA so hopefully that actually transfers over. On top of that, the retro redesign of Bumblebee is fantastic, peeling back the five movie’s worth of horrendous redesigns that eventually led all the Transformers to look like jagged pieces of scrap metal someone had glued together. The new poster is far more charming then it deserves to be as well. This is all kind of promising. 

Then again, it’s a Transformers movie.

Bumblebee opens on December 21 nationwide.