Immediately after watching this one, I realised I probably should have re-watched the first two before seeing this one. It was a nice, back to basics kind of movie but it was filled with little throwbacks and references to things I can't remember. Were those little 'Formers in the second movie? What's with the rabbit's foot again? Who am I and what am I doing here?!
I have nothing against Transformers but I never watched the show as a kid and if not for the current movies I probably never would have watched them at all. I'm more of an Evangelion mind-funk kind of gal. So anyway, obviously Transformers is about giant robots that transform into other things like cars, trucks, planes and so on to disguise themselves on Earth.
Still with me? Good. I really do like Sam in this series though, for being so human. Previously it was all 'Holy crap, my car's been stolen and now it's walking and talking!' then 'Like, zoinks! Get off the new pavement before my dad finds out!' All very human concerns in the face of impending doom. He still screams in an endearing kind of way.
In this movie, we seem him struggling to cope with unemployment even though he's just graduated from a good college and you know, saved the world and whatever. I like that. Sam is the everyman we can all understand even though he's in this world that's so different to ours. So he's worried about his future, or that his parents will find out he's a bum, that some McSleazy is going to steal his girlfriend and he's being jock blocked by government agents because while he did save the world..
Well that was then, this is now, he's really just a kid and this is a job for
Hurray! It's a woman!! ....It's a ...ball bustingly rude woman. So the four woman who get more than one scene in this movie? The angry woman, the sexpot damsel, the inappropriate mom and the timid mouse who carries the bags for the aforementioned angry woman. I'm feeling empowered already. It wouldn't be so bad if movies like this could just slip some unnamed women into group shots of soldiers or upper management.
I'm not just saying this is a Transformer's 'my bad' - it would be nice if we could just have more women characters DOING things that all the men are doing. Even better if the movie didn't make a huge deal out of it. Just let them be there. We all know they can do the job. It's okay. They don't have to prove themselves to the audience.
Example: Fast and Furious 5
Outdated pervert: Nice legs! What time do they open??
Female Driver with About Five Lines: I have a gun.
Outdated Pervert: I respect you now, hot lady! You have certainly proved my sexism is no match for your violence! From now on I will only cat call women who don't pack heat!
Whoops, I got off topic. So, the mangled history of the moon landing and the bits at Chernobyl were fascinating and worked well. The parts with Carly and Sam's relationship dragged it down. I wasn't fond of Mikaela, and I'm never going to be a Megan Fox fan but Carly just seemed to be there for the eye candy.
Sam seems to be aware of the fact that he's just a boy toy she enjoys bonking. She doesn't care about how he feels regarding her boss. They have a fight and Carly goes to walk out... of HER OWN HOUSE. Then by the end of the film he's ready to move heaven and Earth to save her.. but they weren't ready to say the L word before that. Whaaaaat?
It's not that she had a bad character, it's just that she was so bland. She was supposed to be sexy but I didn't feel that at all. She just had this rich girl persona that jarred with Sam's every day person one. Sam goes to work, she thinks it's 'cute' and just swans around his workplace like she owns the building. What happened to her job?? Shouldn't she be at work?
Yeah, the job she's soooo good at. Well, we hear that, how she organised it all and made it work.. but you don't see her do anything apart from wear designer clothes to work and sit around a showroom, or occasionally a work party. She tags along to all of Sam's Transformer outings.. even though she has no relevance whatsoever to the program and lacks clearance of any kind.
Half the time she's laughing off Sam's hero status saying 'sure baby, I believe you' and the other half she's defending it to people she doesn't even know. Then she turns into the damsel and just has to get kidnapped, then rescued. Saving the world is not enough, you must have a girlfriend to prove to the world that you're manly, damn it! So what if she's got a job, a car, a house, she has no security without you!
Sure, she redeems herself with one great speech to Megatron but anyone could have done that. I was still hoping he was going to squish her with a fist but nooo her name's in the billing, she can't die. Curse you and your sentimentality, Megatron.
They pretty much just stole the Chinese dude's character from the Hangover. As always, his straight faced, erratic performances were hilarious but I couldn't help thinking that if he'd just talked to Sam normally we could have skipped several confusing (but funny) scenes and he probably could have lived.
Not to brag, but I totally called the Sentinel Prime's evil twist. Sam's parents weren't as funny as they usually are, again they just seemed kind of inserted in a random way. Graphically, it's a visual feast.
Things I Didn't Understand
How nobody worried about how Cybertron being in Earth's atmosphere could affect tides and the like, similar to the moon? Granted, I'm sure destructive robots hellbent on killing you could put a little thing like that out of your mind temporarily but still.
Why did they have to make a love connection with ball buster and conspiracy guy? As soon as I heard him say he survived heartbreak I just knew what was coming. It seemed like it was only thrown in the movie last minute so they could make a joke in the credits. Strange.
Sam wasn't allowed to be informed of the secret ops or see Bumblebee much but he was allowed to keep two small Transformers? In view of civilian room mates and dogs?
The Decepticons wanted to use the human race as slaves and take over their planet. So, what was the idea behind destroying most of it and killing half of them?
Why does a transform sometimes take ten seconds, and then at other times it takes a lot of panning shots, re-used footage and making love to the camera for about five minutes?
Stupid Sidekick Quotes
*sliding down a slanty building*
'Saaaaam, I can't stop!!!' <-- NO. SHIT.
Things That Annoyed Me To No End
Always putting the damsel in distress in white clothes during a phase of destruction. Why? Contrast to the dark clothed army dude perhaps? Still, WHY WON'T YOU GET DIRTY?! Damn it, all that 3D and you still can't be real!!
The evil watch decepticon lived happily on McSleazy's wrist for ages, after it gets the one piece of info it needs from Sam, then it withers up to die? Alrighty then.
The fact that if you're a man, a Decepticon will just beat the shit out of you. If you're a woman, you get trapped in a car while tentacles play with your hair and hang around your mouth in a phallic kind of way. I'm sorry, I wasn't aware I paid to watch freakin' Hentai!!
Jeans? To a job interview with a tie and jacket? Are you stupid or something? Your interviewers should punch you in the face.
The 3D looked great. Obviously most of this movie is computer generated which is fine but.. when you look at city shots it all looked to clean and perfect. Like no one lives there. Like someone told them the Transformers movie was going to be shot here so they all pitched in and cleaned the town from top to bottom. This isn't a big concern but it's hard to lose yourself in the movie when it looks fake.
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