Armageddon and Transformers director Michael Bay is set to collaborate with an even bigger director on a new cinematic universe. That’s right, he’s teaming up with Alexey Gerasimov!
Hold up. You don’t know the name Alexey Gerasimov? The Georgian (as in the country, not the state) filmmaker is only one of the most popular creators working in the contemporary digital space. He’s the guy who makes Skibidi Toilet, the absolutely inscrutable machinima web series about a race of toilets with long-necked, bug-eyed heads popping out of them. Gerasimov has released 76 episodes so far on his DaFuq!?Boom! YouTube channel, which has 43 million subscribers. The total view count? Over 17 billion. That puts these little toilet freaks in the territory of a big league little toilet freak like Mr. Beast.
The news dropped on an episode of the Variety podcast Strictly Business, when guest Adam Goodman, former president of Paramount Pictures, said Bay and his longtime collaborator, Jeffrey Beecroft, are trying to adapt the videos into a “hybrid animated–live action†film and television series. Goodman said Bay is working with Gerasimov to “professionalize the kind of back engine of this,†which is to say Bay probably won’t be making an entire film with video-game mods. Goodman sees an “opportunity for this to grow and to really see the storytelling grow,†and I can personally concur that, based on the few minutes I tried to make it through the series on YouTube, yes, there is certainly opportunity for the storytelling to grow.
It’s interesting to see Establishment Hollywood try to launch a new cinematic universe with Generation Alpha primarily in mind. Although no studios or streaming services are officially attached yet, Michael Bay’s Skibidi Toilet feels like a harbinger for the future of Hollywood. Keep an eye out for Christopher Nolan’s Cocomelon.