So..... Transformers....

[Trekker4747]

Anyone else go see this abomination this weekend? I did out of pure curiosity and wanting to "hate watch" it and I didn't leave disappointed. An absolute mess of a film with no meaningful story, arcs or even really point or thing to drive the characters. Even Mark Wahlberg doing a "The Happening"-like phoned n performance couldn't quite save this. Though he certainly helped.

Anthony Hopkins was good but, Anthony Hopkins. The problem is there shreds of a "good" movie here. The opening stuff in the Dark Ages was good stuff, hell, I'd love to see a movie all on that! There's a scene where we're told Transformers played a hand in pretty much every battle, Transformers in World War II fighting Nazis! Where's THAT movie?!

But, no, let's just throw some junk at the camera and call it a "movie." I actually came out of the previous Marky Mark one kind of liking it, though still saw it filled with flaws and Bay-isms.

It's time for these movies to go away for a while and be "rebooted" with a more competent director.

But, alas, the movies already planned don't quite give us hope there, though this movie is under-performing in the domestic BO.

 

[Ovation]

I found it rather "meh" (as I do all Transformers movies--not really the target audience). My 11 year old son loved it though--pretty much THE target audience.

 

[Gaith]

From the AV Club's commentariat:

 

[Lakenheath 72]

I saw the film. As it dragged, and as the end seemed near and yet so far away, I kept asking myself, when will this thing end? The King Arthur sequence, though nowhere historically authentic, was thoroughly enjoyable. Merlin was my favorite character.

 

[Tosk]

I haven't seen a Transformers movie in the cinema since the second one. In the words of Dubya Bush, "Fool me once, shame on ... shame on you. Fool me... You can't get fooled again!"

I had to laugh when I heard this one has an unironic "Save Martha!" scene in it.

 

[Starbreaker]

I've got no interest seeing this in the theaters, but that's the problem with these films. They're one good scene surrounded by just a bunch of horrible crap. Jetfire in 2, the opening moon sequence in 3, the Bud Light truck scene in 4 (kidding).

 

[M.A.C.O.]

I guess there is a ceiling to adapting 20 minute toy commercials (the original show), into a series of films. Stop at 4. Haha

 

[Trekker4747]

I saw the film. As it dragged, and as the end seemed near and yet so far away, I kept asking myself, when will this thing end? The King Arthur sequence, though nowhere historically authentic, was thoroughly enjoyable. Merlin was my favorite character.

Wait, you mean during the war with the Saxons King Arthur really didn't have Merlin the Magician go off to a crashed spaceship and beg for a powerful weapon?

Yeah, as I said, I probably could've watched a whole movie with the King Arthur/Dark Ages stuff. Now, I don't know what the Transformers would transform into, but it'd still be sort of interesting.

But, yeah, there were plenty of times in this movie I was thinking "when will this end?!"

I liked how whole characters were introduced and then disappear and either aren't in the rest of the movie or, like the girl, suddenly show up at the end just because.

I mean the movie spent several minutes with this "Suicide Squad" like sequence introducing all of these Decepticons only for them to be killed off in the next action sequence. I mean, why did we spend so much fucking time and energy introducing these guys if they weren't going to be a meaningful part of this movie. Chekov's Gun? Hello?!

And that's a large part of the problem, among other things, that these movies have is that they waste story time and the audience's time with sequences that don't matter. What did the little girl contribute? Nothing. Get rid of all of that. What did the prisoner-release sequence give us? Nothing. Right there you've cut more than half an hour out of the movie and pretty much changed nothing. All of the stuff with Turturro in Cuba, the cuts to Hopkins and butler "Totally NotC3PO" bot in the car and NotC3PO having road rage.

During the heavy exposition scenes with Hopkins the movie goes a bit too meta with the organ gag but, hey, it sort-of worked. Then they pull the exact, same, joke two minutes later. Really?!

And, I dunno, was the day really "saved." Seems to me we're still pretty much fucked with this giant thing attached to us with all of these pieces hanging down from it attached to the planet. Billions would die as the tides go crazy.

And I'm sick of Optimus Prime in these movies somehow getting pissed off at humans or losing faith in them only for him to monologue at the end: "Hey, our friends these humans, aren't so bad guys after all!"

 

[Taylirious]

Give Transformers back to Marvel! or anyone other than Paramount...not Sony.

 

[Bry_Sinclair]

I can happily say I've never seen any Transformers movie

 

[Reverend]

Saw the first one, thought it was OK, but flawed.
Saw the second one, thought it was tedious garbage.
Saw the second one under protest (it was a friend's turn to pick for movie night) thought it was miraculously even worse than the last one. Felt confident the series had hit it's nadir.
Apparently I was wrong, but I'm much happier relying on the opinions of others rather than find out for myself.

 

[Taylirious]

I like 2 better than the others. Might see Bumblebee. Please be true: http://movieweb.com/bumblebee-movie-vw-bug-transformers-spinoff/ :::SPOILERS!:::

 

[Relayer1]

It was not the worst Transformers movie though.

That in itself is remarkable...

 

[matthunter]

Get yourself the Transformers Prime series on DVD and you'll have way more fun.

 

[Mr. Adventure]

I am sometimes curious but I see that two-and-a-half-hour runtime which I know at some point from the previous ones will feel like it will never end. I'll wait til it hits the home market and I have some more control over the viewing situation and can watch in fits and starts or just quit altogether.

 

[doylem1]

The original and still the best. this movie has more characterization of the Transformers featured in it than all the Bay films put together.

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[Captain Craig]

I saw it, I've seen them all in theaters. Big TF fan from my youth. While the 80's toons are like most of its era, glorified commercials for toys, the longer they ran the more the writers actually created a loose mythology. In the case of TF, the '86 movie was a great capper to those first few years. Beast Wars in the 90's built on that fantastically and TF Prime is just phenomenal. The current comics from IDW the last few years show just how much great potential for varied story telling lies within this property.
Bay & Co have been empowered to creatively bankrupt it though. I give mad props to the first one but I fully believe in hindsight it's because Spielberg took his Executive Director role very hands on, hence why there are shades of E.T. in it and you actually care about characters cause enough solid material is written for them.

Grade: C-

Somewhere in this mess is a coherent story. Granted, one that still unnecessarily takes creative liberties with the mythology that need not be done. The action is great, again, but it's over bearing(still) and uses time better spent on making sure the plot is tended to and character depth created.

Anthony Hopkins actually does the best job with the material he's given and I believe it's likely he prepared the least to know anything about Transformers. The screenplay never gives us enough emotional moments to care about Vivian, Izabella or Jimmy. So, Vivian didn't have a great relationship with dad and Izabella has a real heart tugger for being alone but we never really spend time investing in them before it's on to the next 'splosion. Jimmy, he's just the new Lucas(TJ Miller) for this film but as a comedic sidekick made 1/2 as less annoying.

Cogsworth I kept expecting to be this McGuffin in plain sight that would do something really important but never did. Do we even know if he's a legit TF or just a complicated Terran robot created by the Witwicaan Society? What about those tiny little dinobots? They were just there to look cute I guess.
Why does Prime start of drifting in space? I don't recall a solid explanation. The gave lip service to why other 'Bots and 'Cons had been crashing down to Earth at least. Also to Barricade but odd that they would just leave him alone.

The final insult is that they really don't wrap things up. The middle credit sequence teases that event for TF:6 (which may never happen). At least Pirates 5 serves as a 97% wrap up if they never do another one.

 

[Ethros]

Nah the second one was bad enough. I did fall for Bay's comments on the third one though that he'd learnt his lesson and it would be a lot better. Fun fact- it wasn't. Then I saw the fourth one for free at least on a friends Netflix last year- same old guff.

 

[Spot261]

I can happily say I've never seen any Transformers movie

There is one worth the time and effort, Michael Bay had nothing to do with it:

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[Xerxes82]

Cogsworth I kept expecting to be this McGuffin in plain sight that would do something really important but never did. Do we even know if he's a legit TF or just a complicated Terran robot created by the Witwicaan Society?

I read somewhere that Bay intended for him to be a headmaster, and the car his larger robot body, but dropped it for whatever reason. Probably couldn't come up with any way to make it explode afterward.