Escape to the Movies: Transformers Revenge

[Ancientgamer]

:| well... I supposed to go see it tomorrow with some friends. Hopefully it will at least serve as eye candy.

 

[MovieBob]

The robot designs are ugly? Oh, here's an argument for you: IT'S NOT G1!

I could care less about a little design-revision, but these creatures are simply BAD looking. So much attention has been paid to rendering all the little gears and bits moving around to the detriment of the broader design - they're too visually busy and the eye has no "line" to follow, so they all wind up looking like indistinguishable wads of crumpled tinfoil on those rare occasions when Bay opts to use a medium-shot.

Yeah, they made Devastator do nothing but dig a hole. What were you wanting him to do? Go on a destructive rampage? IN A DESERT?

Well, for one thing, this thing is named Devastator, not Hole-Digger or whatever. It wouldn't be noticeable but for all the badly-disjointed filmmaking and complete lack of storytelling ability involved: Devastator gets this MASSIVE introduction with all the big trucks rolling up and snapping together and "holy crap, look at the size of THIS one"... and he's there to be a SHOVEL? Megatron has a minion who is (judging his scale against The Great Pyramid) somewhere in the realm of 300-350 feet tall... and he's on hole-duty?

Oh yeah. I noticed the little dig at the flames. "Optimus Prime has flames! What are we going to do?!"

I know, I know. Old gripe. But there's still no better visual metaphor for all of Bay's douchebag tendencies than the use of automotive flame-decals on a robot. If I could've gotten away with just looping Clint Eastwood's rant about car decorations from the end of Gran Torino, I would've

And finally - The human characters. How do you relate to a plot about giant robots?

When the giant robots are humanoid, have faces, speak-english and emote? Easily. Hell, people (myself included) related to Wall-E just fine and Wall-E looked less human than ANY of the Transformers, didn't have a mouth and couldn't speak more than four or five words.

It's like trying to empathise with the bloody penguins from Happy Feet.

Happy Feet was awesome. Nobody gives that crazy-ass movie the credit it deserves.

 

[Aptspire]

I didn't see the 1st one and I won't see the 2nd one either

 

[hopeneverdies]

I'm sure this movie sucks after your review... but C'mon! worse than anything Uwe Boll has done? I think you need to watch his movies again.

I know, that seems harsh.

 

[maxrebo229]

First off I would like to say that being overly cynical is neither original nor entertaining. You simply cannot alienate half your audience by calling any one that disagrees with your overly bitter assessment a douche bag. To be honest I enjoyed the movie. While Movie Bob is entitled to his opinions, I must say that I like the deliverance of them less and less. Movie Bob isn't Yahtzee, nor should he be overly critical for the sake of entertainment. A fair and balanced review would be much more informative instead of 5 minutes of him spouting his bullshit while sounding like the intolerable douche bags he criticizes at the beginning of his review.

 

[HobbesMkii]

I wanted to comment about Michael Bay (one of my first threads here was an open letter to Michael, asking him to stop), but MovieBob took everything I could possibly say about it.

 

[teh_gunslinger]

I posted a review (or rant as they where very keen to point out) on here at 4am yesterday and most every one who commented said I was wrong and the movie was "Very good" and "Awesome".
at least Moviebob and Spoony where more sensible.

Ha! Yea, Spoony hated it even more I think. It was a pretty harsh reviev he did with his brother. Funny as hell though.

 

[milomalo]

bob, you are too late... i already seen that movie... and i lost my soul ...

but, nice review as always... i can only hope someone make u a regular in the escapist!! please!!!

 

[MovieBob]

I'm confused about the thing at the beginning. Are you trying to imply that the cartoon Transformers movie was, by some stretch of the imagination, good?

Judged against it's contemporaries and against it's purpose? Yes, it was. It's clunky and silly, but for something that was only ever designed as a narrative infomercial it occasionally managed to rise to the level of solid youth-targeted pulp-scifi (think Tom Swift or Silver Age Marvel comics.) The unforunate incident in Carbombya (google it) notwithstanding...

Judged against THIS piece of garbage? Oh, hell yes. Even the animated movie - Wheelie, Stan Bush and all, is freaking MIYAZAKI compared to this

 

[Xerosch]

HEEEEEELP MEEEE!!!

I'm being dragged in this shitty movie within the next 30 minutes!!!

 

[Snowy437]

Seriously. That's just immature. I liked this movie's Wheelie. He didn't rhyme like a douchebag. And as for Skids and Mudflap, I thought I'd hate them. I didn't. I liked them.

And what's this about it all being the humans? I can't think of one scene that wasn't interrupted by an obnoxious robot.

I'm sorry, did you even see this movie or just read a Transfan forum and look at some pictures? Yeah, they made Devastator do nothing but dig a hole. What were you wanting him to do? Go on a destructive rampage? IN A DESERT?

Sunset..? Where'd you get that idea from? Ok, so the entire first film was set in the sunset. The opening scene to this is at night. The college scenes and the desert are in broad daylight. Though, oddly Shanghai was in daylight before NEST got there.

And I thought the fight scenes were pretty damn clear. The one featuring Optimus Prime and the three Decepticons? That was clear. I saw everything. Bumblebee versus Rampage and Ravage - That was also clear.


And as for Soundwave, what did you expect a communications specialist to do? He did what his G1 job was. Even had the same voice actor. But nope, because he didn't stomp around all blue and cassette player-like, he's bad.

I had a feeling this was commin... At most parts i agree with you thyunda. I thought the movie was great. any one who doesnt like it.. well they're either lookin for somethin new in the world to cry about, or it just didnt live up to expectations everyone had for it. If you didnt like the first one. why would you see the second one, knowing your gonna hate it...reason? what i said earlyer.. just to whine about it.
Anyway on to stuff that was said: Skids and mudflap..turned into a big stupid issue..a really stupid one.. about race... its a movie. its about enjoyment. they were comic relief.. get over it and move on.

Soundwave was a spy. he did wat he always did. he didnt have a fight scene... yea im disapointed with that, but he was in space, and did wat his job always was. AND HE WAS IN SPACE. ... by the way. where the hell was rumble?!?

Now this was a great movie (20$? i paid 8.75........)
BUT i do agree with 2 things with MovieBob.

1. They need to get away from the humans. Michael Bay does have a fetish with armys and helicopters into the sunset and crap like that. But seriously.. they really need to develop some of the characters of the bots shown.. I'll use an example. Anyone tell me who Jolt was in the movie? I doubt it cuz he was in like 1 battle scene. and:

Spoiler

He merged jetfire's parts to prime with his ...well electric whips...i guess.

I really could care less about all human characters. but i can see where only A FEW should stay to develop the story..ie. Sam, the girl..maybe the one army guy that was in the last movie... if only cybertron was still there. they can get off earth and develop their characters storys a bit more.

2. Micheal Bay. Kind of needs to get his hands off this movie a bit more or else he will ruin it as GEORGE LUCAS + SPIELBERG RUINED INDIANA JONES.
also they killed jazz off...which im still not impressed with. Also not impressed with the wreckin "Balls".. had no...point.. to the story or weakness or anything.. that was just a dumb scene.

If Micheal Bay is gonna make another one

Spoiler

which by the ending of this movie there will be. (since megatron, starscream and soundwave are still out there)

they need to move it to space somewhere away from people.

People went into this movie with REALLY HIGH expectations, thats why people didn't like it. just enjoy it for the action movie it is. All movies have their faults...some movies, more than others. i really cant think of a perfect movie..
I know im gonna pay to see it again. movie was awesome.
...and 20 bucks? that is a pretty insane ammount to see a movie.

 

[dracoslayer16]

The first time I saw the trailer for this movie I thought 1 thing only:
#1. it is based solely on the human actors' "problems" in a "transformers" movie...

I am not a "fan" of transformers I just happened to like it on the side from time to time but what I noticed EVERY TIME that made the show different was the humans were always treated like dirt and worthless off-characters for comedic relief. Humans could not stand a single chance against the transformers so they needed help, A LOT. Now you are trying to turn the table and say humans are the prime characters and the transformers are the side-characters?

"NO Sam, you do not tell the giant f****n' robot what to do, he tells YOU what to do and you will sit back and listen"

After the first trailer my opinion about this movie has gotten nothing but worse and this review and forum replies have all but confirmed my own thoughts. Also I agree 100% with you that the look of the transformers is retardedly "busy" and unnecessary. I was ok with it in the first movie but now looking back it was annoying and I was just ignoring it. The only time it was cool was in that quick 4 second scene in the end of the first movie where we actually got to see prime with his face shield on.

Have not seen this movie and never plan to see it either.

 

[MovieBob]

I'm sure this movie sucks after your review... but C'mon! worse than anything Uwe Boll has done?

Uwe Boll's movies are usually shorter. And sometimes there are boobs. So, yes

 

[9NineBreaker9]

Thank you very, very much. I thought the first movie was a complete mess around the time they gave the robots personalities, and then killed them a few moments later... as if to say the rest of the movie was "good".

BUT, as I am told by my friends, it's all okay, because it has a hot chick with an Australian accent, which makes up for all of the shitty development, camera work, story, and action through some mystical form of woman magic.

 

[HardRockSamurai]

I think we can all agree that Michael Bay is a huge asshole, but I didn't really have to much ire for this film. Maybe it's because I'm not a fan of the series, or maybe it's because I'm not a film critic, but I can honestly say that I went to see Transformers 2 with some friends and that I left the theater feeling entertained.

There were some things I didn't like about the movie. First of all, it was obvious that Michael Bay didn't actually try and improve the first movie, he just took all suggestions from his douchebag fans and put them on the big screen; this resulted in a film with more explosions, more digital robots, and more scenes of Megan Fox running in slow motion.

Secondly is what I agree with MovieBob the most; the fucking action cinematography. I am sick and tired of directors using this "shaky-cam" technique to amplify action scenes; it simply doesn't work. It ruined every Bourne movie after the first and it ruins this movie too. The only instance where I think "shaky-cam" was actually appropriate was in Cloverfield; but Optimus Prime is not a giant monster. I can't wait until directors like Michael Bay finally realize that we would like to OBSERVE cool action sequences from a distance, rather than have our bobble-head faces stuffed in them.

Thirdly was the editing. Most people didn't notice it, but the movie was FILLED with sloppy jump cuts. It made the movie feel more like a rushed product rather than a carefully constructed piece of cinema. But since when has Micheal Bay constructed anything carefully? Hell, I bet the man sleeps on a bed made of C4.

Lastly, the ludicrously racist twins. Imagine if Jar-Jar Binks and Flavor Flav fucked and had a baby, and that baby fucked Gary Coleman and had another baby, and then that baby fucked Spongebob Squarepants and had another baby; that baby STILL wouldn't be as annoying as those two. What really boggles my mind is how no-one who made the movie was aware of it. Movies with big production values like this one are finished long before they are premiered to the public; my question is HOW, in that long stretch of time, did NOBODY NOTICE THE FUCKING RACIST ROBOTS?. I didn't think obliviousness like that existed!

However, disregard everything I just wrote above, because I ACTUALLY LIKED THE MOVIE. Does that make me a douchebag? No, it just makes me a person who DOESN'T set his standards all too high. So what if the story sucked? So what if it ruined a franchise. PEOPLE COMPLAIN ABOUT EVERYTHING, and if such trivial matters really prevent you from enjoying a movie, then I pity you.

MovieBob, calm the fuck down. Everyone else, come and get me

 

[ChromeAlchemist]

Transformers = avoid. gotcha.

also, is it just me or is Moviebob becomming more and more like Yahtzee with a red background? oh wells, it isn't a bad thing

Not particularly. I expected someone to say something. The difference is Yahtzee is being paid to be angry. This man actually is sincerely pissed off with this film. I also don't really see the similarities between them.

 

[Maet]

I have just one suggestion:

PLEASE cut back on the aside captions around the pictures, or at least allow them to linger a little longer. I ended up spending ten minutes watching the five minute video because I had to pause every other second to read the captions that just flew by.

Other than that, great review. I look forward to your next one.

 

[Uncompetative]

This is the only movie to tempt me back to the Cinema again after some horrible experiences I have had there. I'm not saying I'm going, but that it takes a lot to even tempt me, so they must be doing something right with this film.

 

[ChromeAlchemist]

I never understood the rage against human characters in transformers. I strangely like Shia I think he's a good actor. I couldn't make it though the review cause it seem hate for hates sake. My personal opinion was it was the most fun movie i've seen this summer. But i'm not a critic or cynic....

Do you want to know why people don't like the human characters in a TRANSFORMERS movie? Really you can't figure out why people don't like the fact that the TRANSFORMERS are only in part of their own TRANSFORMER movie, and the rest is filled with a stupid romantic comedy cliche bullshit. I seriously can't figure out why you can't figure out why people dislike people in the TRANSFORMER movie. Anyway...TRANSFORMER!!! Have a nice day.

People, calm down now, just enjoy the strip about the first one.

 

[SlickShot]

That was a beautiful rant. Thank you MovieBob