Michael Bay now looking at Mark Wahlberg for 'Transformers 4'

Is it possible Michael Bay is just screwing with us, or has the Internet media actually steered his thinking on Transformers 4? A couple of weeks ago a rumor surfaced that Bay was targeting Mark Wahlberg for his final chapter in the Transformers series. Since the two had just finished up his indie crime flick, Pain and Gain, the connection was logical. He quickly popped up on his site to debunk the talk, revealing that the two were working on a mystery project together instead.

But now it looks like Bay may have actually thought something of the rumors, taking to his blog on Halloween and leaving this message....

I squashed a rumor that was on the internet last week. It was about Mark Walhberg. Mark was rumored to be staring in Transformers 4. We are working on another movie together, not T4. I had such a great time working with Mark on Pain and Gain, and he gave such a great performance – well let’s say that very internet chatter gave me some ideas. We are at the inception of our story process right now on T4. Let’s say some ideas are gaining traction with me and my writer – so I’m here to say thanks internet chatter.

So hardly official or anything, but if we combine this with those old rumors of Jason Statham being targeted it certainly sounds like the plan is to have a more physical leading man than Shia LaBeouf ever was. An actress is reportedly being sought for the female lead of a high school senior, along with a guy to play her race car driver boyfriend. It's possible Bay and writer Ehren Kruger could age up the characters so Wahlberg would be a more natural fit. Transformers 4 is set for release on June 27th 2014.