Michael Bay's Next Film Could Be ...

With Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen absolutely demolishing the box office this week (it took in another $28 million on Thursday), Variety reports that DreamWorks is looking to pick up the film rights to the first book in an as-yet-unpublished six-book series for Michael Bay to produce and potentially direct. The book, titled I Am Number Four, tells of a group of earthbound alien teens who escaped their planet just as another hostile species was destroying it. Now, as they attempt to settle in and build new lives for themselves on earth, the main character discovers that he is being hunted by the same enemy that blew up his home planet.

The most surprising aspect of this whole thing is that while the book was being shopped around under a pseudonym, sources are saying that James Frey (the controversial author behind A Million Little Pieces) is one of the writers. (Hey, at least this time they're coming right out and saying it's a work of fiction.) Like Transformers, this deal puts Michael Bay back in business with Steven Spielberg, and the latter will most likely operate as an executive producer (or take on a "godfather role", as Variety calls it). I'd be curious to learn more about the series, as well as whether Bay directing could delay (or even squash) a potential third Transformers movie.

Discuss: Is it just me, or does the whole teenage aliens on earth in high school feel a little too Twilight-ish for the hardcore genre fan?