I saw Transformers at a sneak preview last sunday.

Well, as for all Michael Bay movies it's action galore! The CGI is great - no doubt about it but the story is pretty weak as is the characters (with the exeption of Shia LaBeouf's character, he's actually pretty funny).

I'm not a fan of the cartoon, haven't really watched any, so when Optimus Prime revealed himself and all the people in the front rows started cheering, I was like "The hell's wrong with you ? He's a truck...a red truck".

All in all fairly entertaining, yet fairly forgettable.


Cheers
Rob

This movie delivers and then some. But maybe too much. If that makes any sense.

I had to sit down and take a breather after leaving the theater. Bay throws so much at the viewers; you kind of get lost and confused. You’re not sure what part of the screen to watch, because so much is going on at once. But the images that do manage to smash their way inside your brain are simply amazing-- scratch that-- just fucking insane.

So there were some groundbreaking visuals and the action was awesome but what about everything else? Shia LaBeouf did an awesome job portraying Sam Witwicky; but he was the only worthwhile human character.

And the plot was nearly nonexistent. Something about a cube and then-- Giant Fucking Robots! This film’s greatest strength was also its greatest weakness. The action overwhelmed everything else. This film never fucking slowed down.  

But is that a bad thing? Probably not, this film was everything a summer blockbuster should be and more.

My head hurts.

So has any fans of the original series or original toy line on here seen the film yet? When I heard about the film originally, I was just excited because I played with those toys as a kid and even made a customizable card game with them back in the 90's. It was awesome, but trapped on an ancient PC.

I grew up watching the original series and I had a ton of the toys.  I was a fan of the animated movie.  And I was excited to hear the Transformers were going to hit the big screen, but I thought the movie was horrible.

The jokes were dumb.  Sex jokes and gags, and Sam's mother just wouldn't stop making the masturbation jokes.  It was embarrassing.  That whole sequence when Sam was in his room looking for the glasses went on way too long.

Michael Bay couldn't make the characters any more bland.  Too many characters and no depth and there was potential here.  Megan Fox's character had a decent backstory.  It deserved more than a couple of lines.  The soldiers were easily forgettable.  The agent for the secret government agency will go down in history as one of the worst characters of its kind.  He deserves to be on a sitcom, getting picked on by his young son and bumbling around while trying to find the perfect vacation for his wife, not being a high ranking agent for a high level government agency.

The special effects were the worst I've seen in a long time.  The action was impossible to follow.  The battle scenes couldn't have been pieced together any worse than it was.

On a scale of 0 to 5, I give Transformers a 1.  The only redeeming value of it was the moment we see Bumblebee next to the VW bug.  That was it.  That made me smile.  The rest of the film made me cringe.

I thought the action was very easy to follow. There were almost no "speed blurs" at all. I guess it was the projector at your theater or something because I could follow everything perfectly (except for the fact that some of the Decepticons looked very similar to one another when they were Robots. I confused them sometimes).

The jokes and sex gags had to be there for the teenagers and there was only ONE masturbation joke (although it was pretty damn long). I also thought the winks to the older animated movie were a pretty good easter egg ("One shall stand, one shall fall", and the like)

I, too, thought the characters had potential, but there were too many of them...and the fact that new characters kept popping up even after the last half-hour of the film didn't help. The movie had way too many characters for its own sake, without even counting the Transformers.

Another beef I had with this was the extremely short chase scene between Bumblebee and Barricade (?). I felt it had potential to be much longer and more exciting. Also, my favorite Transformer's death was VERY anti-climatic. I'm not gonna say who it was.

The CGI in this was perfect and the film was very well-paced. Action, Comedy, and amazing SFX make for the best summer popcorn flick I've seen in a while.  

--Julio

Ok so I know I'm odd. I went to see this one today as the first movie in a doubleheader. The second one was Die Hard.

I had to go see this one alone! Yes, I was the only "older" female in the crowded theater without any youngsters attached to them. I offered, even pleaded with my own kids to come along, but they were not interested. They did meet up with me for Die Hard however. My son might have come along if he had known there were so many "silly" close-ups and lingering on hot young girls. No eye candy for my demographic group hower...

Anyway, I actually thought this movie was worth the cost of the ticket. I myself enjoyed the cars, the awesome transformations and I was impressed with the special effects. Never did it start looking like cgi which to me ruins a movie and reminds me I'm just watching a film that's far from real.

This movie did have some problems however and most of it was the comedy bits which in my opinion misfired a lot. Compared to Die Hard where most of them were spot on.

Some minor things that bothered me was that the ground troops in Quatar were US Air Force troops. I'm no military expert, but except for Delta Force USAF guys don't like to get "dirty". They don't do much fighting on the ground, so that bugged me a little. They should have been army or something like that instead.

Another minor thing was that the "good" autobots all had blue eyes and the Megatron had "evil" red eyes.  That  bugged me too along with that the nice autobots had friendly looking mouths if you can call it that, while the evil Megatron reminded me of "Predator" with his facial features. He even had teeth! How stupid is that? Was he a flesh eating robot?

I also thought it was stupid when they tried to make us feel sympathy and be sorry for the Yellow one (already forgot his name). Then it got a little preachy about war and peace stuff and that humans really are a good species, but we still have lots to learn. I guess to ten year olds that part might work. I openly admit I'm old, jaded and cynical.

The ending action scenes went on way too long. It wasn't bad or anything, just went on way to long.

All in all I did enjoy it...

"I also thought it was stupid when they tried to make us feel sympathy and be sorry for the Yellow one (already forgot his name). Then it got a little preachy about war and peace stuff and that humans really are a good species, but we still have lots to learn. I guess to ten year olds that part might work. I openly admit I'm old, jaded and cynical."

I do know with age you might become more "jaded" to this kind of stuff, but with all due respect,  those were all elements taken straight from the cartoon. Prime was always preachy and he always had cheesy dialogue (remember you're watching a film based on a CHILDREN'S show, no, not even that, a TOYLINE), but he is still considered "the coolest of the cool" even by adults. That's just how the character rolls.

As for Bumblebee (the yellow one): He was always an underdog and it showed on the film . A "younger" Transformer, if you will. I did feel bad for him when they were capturing him, because although TF's are robots, they do have feelings, emotions and personalities. Their technology is supposedly light-ears away from what we could ever hope to accomplish. They're not merely machines, they're alive. I don't think the "sympathy" scenes for Bumblebee detracted from the movie at all.


The film did have a lot of faults but I thoroughly enjoyed it. Then again, I'm sixteen years old so that could've influenced a bit

--Julio

I had mixed feelings myself. I actually obtained the script from here shortly before it was taken down a couple of months ago. I read the first half and hated it, so I stopped reading. It was filled with bad dialog and full of cliches. Then I saw the trailer, and I was like the CGI looks good so I might just finish the script and see it. Man, I should have stayed home and waited for it on DVD.

The lack of character development on part of the Transformers was mostly likely due to cost. However, as in the script and on screen, the human characters were terrible, sometime even worse in he movie itself. There was too many unecessary characters and too many subplots. They should have kept it simple, and shaved a half hour off of the runtime. Most of the comedy misfired as well.

What really bothered me was scenes such as the transormers hiding at Sam's house (was stupid and could have been cut out. Also, logically it was stupid). The scenes with Sector 7 were just plain silly. They should have taken the movie more seriously. Frenzy acting like Jar Jar Binks wasn't helping either. The hacker subplot was just as silly, but I was a little entertained by it. Also, the Defense Dapartment seemed clueless. As far as the quick cuts could have been an attempt to save money but ended up being frustrating because you couldn't see anything.

I guess the worst part about it was that you have have had all those subplots woven in nicely if they would have taken the material more seriously and not ham it up or try to be silly all the time  I know that Transformer series is corny, but this was not good.

I didn't mind it being a 2 and a half hour advertisement. That's what the cartoon was anyway. I actually like some of the soilder scenes. At least they tried to be serious with the execption of the phone call part (which was unrealistic and just plain stupid). The transformations were awesome, and Optimus Prime being voiced by Peter Cullen helped me not completely hate the movie.

I almost wished James Cameron directed this. Spielberg should be ashamed for executively producing this

NOTE: I haven't read any of the reviews of this before hand, so if I copy or say something someone else has said...sorry.

I absolutely loved this movie. I hope no one was ever expecting anything deep, and I'm glad it wasn't. I'm tired of having to think so hard when I go see a movie. I was definitely looking forward to seeing a movie that is exactly what cinema has been and should be--fun.

Now I'm not saying that movies that make you cry are bad. Heck, I'd say it's wonderful if a movie is so good it can affect your emotions in that way. But I like to have fun in a theater for the most part. And in that respect, Transformers delivers and then some.

I've never seen the original series...never collected any action figures or toys or anything like that...so I went into this with no expectations. And I think it was good enough that, even if I had high expectations, they would still have been met.

But your high expectations can't be for a deep story or anything like that. You need to expect a good time with a lot of explosions, insane battles and action scenes, a lot of funny moments, etc.

I think the only negative comment I have is...Mr. Bay...please scoot the camera back during the action so we don't feel like we just gave our eyeballs a work out after seeing an action scene! =)

Other than that, I completely enjoyed myself during this movie and can't wait to go see it again. This is definitely not a "get it on DVD or rent it" movie. This is something that HAS GOT to be seen on the big screen.

*****/*****

-Chris

eh, I can see why someone would like this movie.  Big explosions. Jokes. Pretty girls.  It was fine - and if you like action you probably do want to see this on the big screen.  A really big screen.

But it isn't perfect.  It has a lot of "WTF?" goofs.  For instance, Sam gets his pants torn off and they reappear on him the next scene (in a fight that starts in the morning and ends at night).  It was like they were so focused on getting the robots right that they just didn't pay attention to the script. Then again, read an interview with Bay saying he kind of took it upon himself to make the script "edgier".  Which explains why it feels like someone else wrote the last hour.

The fight scenes were confusing and made no sense... robots that die reappear later then disappear. Then there are robots that entirely disappear before the end fight.  Sam, with land lock autobot help, runs toward a roof (I don't care if there is a helicopter waiting - he is fighting a freaking jet & helicopter bot). Most of the time I couldn't tell who was fighting who.

And I'm still wondering what city that final battle was suppose to be. They make the 35 mile drive to Vegas? That didn't look like vegas.

There were other things I found weird.  Did the glasses lead to Hoover Dam or not (or phrased differently, was the cube always at Hoover dam?)?  Why hack airforce one? What purpose did the hackers (especially the black guy) serve?  And did e-bay pay by the Ladiesman712 joke?

The last half was the cartoon.  Which was booth good and bad.  Good because the lame jokes stopped.  Bad because the cartoon was never that good. Long speeches by Optimus Prime explaining why they don't hurt humans.  Big battles in cities.  And an odd scene where Optimus gives a eulogy for Jazz while holding his carcas like it was a football.

Well...

The action was great.  GREAT.  Giant robots, what's not to like?  But everything else was garbage.  The script was idiotic, there was zero character development, the love story was moronic, the logic holes were the size of small moons, the acting was terrible, the inclusion of American troops in Qatar was pointless, the "emotional" moments were forced and ineffective, the production was gluttonous, the pacing was poor, the supporting characters were uniformly uninteresting (except of course the divine Mr. Turturro) in all four or five or six or whatever number of plot lines, and that damn little Decepticon sounded like a gremlin the whole time.

But hey, summer release, right?  And the action was great.  Ultimately, enjoyable but forgettable, which is more than I can say for...ah well, something.

Decepticons they come-a and-a they blow down me door
One him come through through my window
So they put me in a Camaro that's a giant robot
From that point on I'm hangin' with Autobots
Well I need to take a cube that's-a creatin' tension
Put it in Megatron's chest and fry his bottom...

...sorry.

The CGI was awesome (It was the only thing that kept me through the whole movie). The rest was terrible. The story and characters were just cliche and dull. It was like a clone of a better movie. Michael Bay shouldn't be a director, he should be a garbage man.

"Big battles in cities.  And an odd scene where Optimus gives a eulogy for Jazz while holding his carcas like it was a football."

Oh my god that was so funny.

I thought this movie was okay. The robots where incredible cgi wise. But we didn't get to see Megatron until the last twenty minutes of the movie. To many humans and not enough transformers.

After seeing the movie and doing a wiki search on trasnformers, I soon learned the movie was a wasted oppurtunity because Transformer universe and characters have enough back story to fill five movies. and it was all ignored by Bay.

The original cartoon was about the Autobot and Decpticons converting earth resources into energon cubes, (can't remember why)

How cool would it be if with the current energy crisis we have on Earth and possibility that we are running out of fossil fuel, imagine if the movie focus on transformers where the decepticons stomp all over humans and steal the last remaining oil wells and convert to energon cubes and the Autobots have to stop the theft before human economy collapse and civilization implodes into new dark age. The story foucs on robot and their character personalities and motives while the human race scurry about like ants.

Plus what is everyone going on about that as already established in movie when a transformer is born it is a mindless, viscious killing machine and Optimus is a preecher robot who convert robots into conscious compassionate robots. I missed that one when watching movie but it would make a cool  story for sequel.  

I'm not even going to stand here and write some long review as if my opinion is important, but this movie was terrible.  The only reason I went to see it was to see the 2009 Camaro in action.  

I'm assuming you have to just be a freaking nerd to find this stuff entertaining because it was so stupid.  But I just have a few questions.  

Just for starters, after the robots were discovered why did they insist on returning to car mode in the city during the final battle?  I mean is a 18 wheeler cab going to pick up more ground compared to the bot in "transformed" mode where its strides are probably hundreds of feet long?

And at the end why were there still people driving in the city when there are 100 ft bots smashing it all to hell?  I mean I understand they wanted the Paris Hilton spoiled brat archetype to get her face mauled by a robot, but 30 mins into the battle, people are still cruising the streets, while the city is under attack?

What happened to the female attendent on Air Force One that went to get the President's Ding Dong?

What happened to the female and male hacker that were in the bunker making the morse code message?  

And if you finally got the girl you really liked into your car and you get captured by a federal agent and you find out she has a criminal record would you really really really CARE?!  Oh wow, I stalked you for four years in high school just to sniff your perfume, but oh no you worked on stolen cars, now I'm going to grow a pair and get mad at you because its just wrong to like a girl with a record.

But it's silly to even think of these questions because in the end does it really matter?  Maybe to the virgin fanboys it does.

Go GM!  The new Camaro looks awesome.