After five Michael Bay films, Bumblebee is finally getting a voice. IGN reports that Dylan O’Brien, best known for his leading role in “The Maze Runner” trilogy and for headlining MTV‘s “Teen Wolf” series, will supply dialogue for the popular Autobot.

“Dylan has that great quality in his voice of youthful exuberance, and also sort of trustworthiness,” producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura tells the outlet. “I think those are the two qualities that we wanted Bumblebee to have.”

O’Brien joins a cast that also includes Hailee Steinfeld, John Cena, Justin Theroux, Angela Bassett, Martin Short, Pamela Adlon and Megyn Price.

From Paramount Pictures, “Bumblebee” is set in the year 1987, catching up with the title hero on the run. He soon finds refuge in a small Californian beach town junkyard. Charlie Watson (Steinfeld), on the cusp of turning 18 and trying to find her place in the world, discovers a battle-scarred and broken Bumblebee. When Charlie revives him, she quickly learns this is no ordinary yellow VW bug.

“Bumblebee” represents a few firsts for the “Transformers” franchise. Not only does the film mark the series’ first spinoff and first prequel, “Bumblebee” is the first live action “Transformers” movie not to be directed by Michael Bay. This time, Laika Studios founder Travis Knight is helming from a screenplay by Christina Hodson. Knight, who has long served as an animator, made his directorial debut with the 2016 stop-motion adventure “Kubo and the Two Strings.”

Catch “Bumblebee” on the big screen December 21st with special early screenings this Saturday, December 8th.

Silas Lesnick is the Senior Editor of Moviebill. He has been covering entertainment news out of Los Angeles for more than a decade. You can reach him via e-mail or on Twitter.

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