Transformers - Dark of the Moon

[Dark Silver]

So I went see it with a lady friend yesterday (her decision).

In short, it's better than the garbled mess of Transformers 2: Revenge of the Fallen. I preferred it the first time I saw though...back in the 80's. when it was called "The ultimate Doom" and was a 1.5 hour three parter.


The run-time for the movie was over done, it should not have been 2.5 hours ong. We focused to much on Young Sam and his trials and tribulations and about how much he wasn't appreciated, and how hard he had things after he saved the world. Twice. and got a Presidential Hero's medal.

Optimus' character has gone from being th wise and powerful Leader of the Autobots, to being a blood thirsty mechanoid who killed out and out.


But seriously, this movie's plot was cribbed from "The Ultimate Doom" three parter from 1985 - only it was adapted to fit the movie verse, then watered down.

Meh...it's still better than Revenge of the Fallen....and it's apparently the last of Bay's Transformers movies. Which for one, I'm glad for.

Maybe Hasbro and Paramount will find someone better capable for it with a better love of the franchise than Micheal "military wank" bay and attempt a reboot in a couple of years.

[frigidmagi]

It's not the military wank that bothers me. When two factions of giant robots show up on the planet and start duking it out, the military should be involved.

That said when Bay bragged that he fixed everything that had been wrong in two I violently disagreed. Because Bay is what's wrong with transformers. Everything fucked in the series comes from one source and one source alone... Micheal Bay.

Honestly if it had been me? Shia Lebouf's character would have been hacked out of the movies (AND STAY OUT OF MY INDY MOVIES ASSHOLE!), along with his parents (and the peasants rejoiced) and Megan Fox (hard times blah blah blah, sacrifices blah blah blah) and the time spent on them would have gone to the Cybertronians as is proper. That would have left us the military squad and the Aussie hacker chick (there I give you eye candy, happy?). There is no saving II.

[B4UTRUST]

Basically that's whats pretty much wrong with the entire trilogy. Too much time is spent on the humans and not nearly enough time on the giant robots. That and Michael Bay spending 449 minutes playing catcher in a circle jerk starring the U.S. Military.

Edit: Yes, TF3 isn't as bad as TF2. But that's like saying herpes isn't as bad as AIDS.

[Lys]

Transformers has always had human side kicks, with only a few exceptions. The shows have always been better for it, especially when the main setting is on Earth. The issue is that apparently Bay didn't notice that the humans were always secondary characters, and that the focus of the shows was on the giant robots. The humans are just there to be audience stand-ins, and also to give the Autobots something immediate to protect. They are not and have never been the main characters.

Personally I have no problem with Shia LeBouf. Yeah sure, he always plays the same character, but there's not necessarily anything wrong with that. Some character types are versatile, and so long as he's not pretending to be anything other than "everyman the loser" it works. I think LeBouf's character is pretty much spot on for the role of the Autobot's squishy sidekick. The problem is that Michael Bay then went and not only made the story revolve around him, but also tried to make him the hero. The result wasn't a Transformers movie, but rather an abortive and poorly executed coming of age story with giant robots.

Also, watching Michael Bay's work always reminds me of an old piece of advice given by an editor of science fiction back in the 1950s. "Always start as late into the story as you can." It often occurs to me that a movie would be much improved by just skipping some of the exposition at the beginning and starting closer to the action. Star Wars is one of the best examples of doing this right.

[Stofsk]

It's not the military wank that bothers me. When two factions of giant robots show up on the planet and start duking it out, the military should be involved.

That said when Bay bragged that he fixed everything that had been wrong in two I violently disagreed. Because Bay is what's wrong with transformers. Everything fucked in the series comes from one source and one source alone... Micheal Bay.

Honestly if it had been me? Shia Lebouf's character would have been hacked out of the movies (AND STAY OUT OF MY INDY MOVIES ASSHOLE!), along with his parents (and the peasants rejoiced) and Megan Fox (hard times blah blah blah, sacrifices blah blah blah) and the time spent on them would have gone to the Cybertronians as is proper. That would have left us the military squad and the Aussie hacker chick (there I give you eye candy, happy?). There is no saving II.

I pretty much agree with everything you said 100%. For me, I cannot stand the human characters in the Transformers movies. The first one was ok in that regard, and a lot of things from the plot made sense. In Dark of the Moon, there is a real sense that the guys in charge are... well, idiots. I mean they exiled the autobots because of something something and then the decepticons started murdering people left right and centre. You'd think someone in charge would have went 'gee whiz maybe we should trust the autobots we've known and loved rather than this new guy who claims to be the leader of them'.

Plus Shia is really bringing these films down. In the first film he had a role, and it was decent enough - he was the bridge between the autobots and the audience. But in this film we spent too much time on his problems and I couldn't. Give. A Shit. There's also the problem that he needed to somehow re-enter the plot and it's just become stupid at this stage. I can't even remember Revenge of the Fallen - like literally, beyond a few scenes and so on, I cannot even remember what the plot was. I cannot even remember what Sam's role in it was, and here he just sort of stumbled into it as well.

At this stage I want a transformers movie where there are few if any human cast members. Let it just be the autobots and the decepticons.

[Soontir948]

I accept the humans grudgingly. Yes, it would be awesome if the Autobots and Decepticons took the main roles but that wasn't going to happened. Though I thought I heard they were planning on making another movie with humans as secondary in which I'll be extremely happy about that.

Anyway, I thought the movie still flowed quite well even with them in it. The combat scenes alone were worth watching on IMAX 3D. I liked how the blurred action was slowed down and gave it a better visual appeal than the crap thrown in the previous movies.

TL;DR, Nimoy's in it!

[Stofsk]

I admit, I squee'd when I heard Nimoy's voice. On the other hand, I hate how the film used at least one Spock quote. It felt really overdone and self-referential.

[frigidmagi]

Apparently due to the fact that it was filmed in 3D, Bay had to film the action from a further back stance then usual. So he went slow mo instead of shakey cam. Thank heaven for small favors.

[B4UTRUST]

Apparently due to the fact that it was filmed in 3D, Bay had to film the action from a further back stance then usual. So he went slow mo instead of shakey cam. Thank heaven for small favors.

Yes, it's one of the reasons the film's fight scenes were watchable. Kind of sad that one of the big reasons the movie was better than the 2nd wasn't that the director did it better or learned from his mistakes, it's that the limitations of the technology wouldn't let him go fucktarded with it and fuck it up again.