Transformers Fanboy-Free Breakdown
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008Zulu said:
Bay isn't pro-war. He heavily criticized Bush for Iraq and said it was useless. Just because he doesnt depict America as the enemy and actually depicts soldiers as efficient and following orders, doesn't mean he's some balls to wall jingoistic neo-con
The second movie was so bad I was looking around my room for suicide weapons. Fortunately it also drained my will to live to the point where I couldn't move to carry out the deed. Somehow after seeing it, I lost a week. Revenge of the fallen forced my sentience to turn off as a protection feature like an on overheating CPU. I think my brain shut down to re-route its circuits like the Terminator.
He is probably told to say all those anti-war speeches.Gunnyboy said:
Here is a brief examination to consider;
He was making movies like Bad Boys and The Rock. As a tangent, The Rock was anti American as per the disgruntled general taking San Fransisco "hostage" to ensure reparations for servicemen who died for their country but were denied. When Army recruitment started to take a dive, he started making movies like Pearl Harbor and the Transformers trilogy, which have been obviously pro army.
An interesting "coincidence". Lets see if any of his future projects are just as pro American army.
This. I had such high hopes for the first film. I grew up with the Transformers. I cried when Optimus died in the original movie from the 80's. My mother once told me Optimus's death devastated me and it took a long time for me to get over it. I was dragged, seriously dragged to the second film because my friends called me a snob. As we walked out, my friends apologized, and I made them promise to listen to me next time. They are going to see it Sunday. I will not be joining them. Here's hoping someone like Zach Snyder gets a hold of the franchise and lends his brand of awesome to it.Falseprophet said:
Yes The military would fight the robots. But during a big fight scene we should see a big robot mash up. While focusing on the decepticons fighting soldiers in Iraq was cool i think some of the focus should have been put into the robots. When Jazz died in the original and prime in the second i felt uninvested because they gave them no focus. They focused way to much on the military(no disrespect to to anyone in the military) or Shia labuaf running away from things.Ian S said:
So he was told to make posts on his forums about it? And he did so before the first Transformers, so that wasn't going to help the movie at all. It's nothing to consider; Bay isn't anti-soldier, and because he makes a patriotic film doesn't mean he blindly follows the government. Armageddon was also about highlighting the common man and NASA. I guess he was being jingoistic there too right?008Zulu said:
See, I could have given them this. Accepting the military having a roll in the movie would make sense and I could even buy the first major battle with a transformer being between it and the military to establish how powerful the Decepticons were. I could even tolerate the human characters having a plot. All of that could have worked.B Goy said:
What I really can't tolerate in these films is that the human characters are not interesting, nor is their story clever, fun to watch, or in any way worth the time the movies spend on it. And the way that the military is presented in it is so fucking stupid that it just hurts. The soldiers are presented as a bunch of supermen with no flaws and no real personality, while all the government agents are sniveling weasels with no personality beyond "you dumb, we shut you down, dur hur hur . . . *drool*"
I'm a child of the nineties, so I actually missed the transformers. Having seen the original stuff recently just so I could see what all the fanboys were going on about, I have to say I think the original stuff was pretty "meh" (except for Unicron, he was awesome whenever he was on screen; Orson Welles for the WIN!!!). So, just looking at the films with a cold, analytical eye, these films are dreadful all around.
Making popular comments about a war that has been unpopular from the very beginning would only help the ticket sales of his movies.Gunnyboy said:
Interesting that you would label Transformers patriotic. Considering that the franchise is about robots fighting and selling toys of said robots, the humans and their respective armies have always been shown to be less than ineffective against them.
Possibly with Armageddon, couldn't help but notice that with a global threat the initial crews are exclusively American. I suppose the European and Asian space agencies had decided to sleep in that day or figured it wasn't worth contributing to.
There's nothing wrong with thinking your country is better than most, it's entirely another to portray yours as the best while showing how inept (through stereotypical typecasting) others are.
Totally agreed. So, yeah, uh, Bob? The Decepticons have ALWAYS proven to be impossible to negotiate with even before Bayformers. That's part of their charm--if they're talking peace treaties with you, it is always a ruse and they will always betray you because that is just plain what they do. You're an inferior life form to them anyway. Appeasement never works against an aggressor in real-life, either, because they'll always want more, so how is this a bad message?maninahat said:
The real problem is how they sloppily added twists to the plot. I thought Megatron came to Earth for the Allspark and didn't tell anyone where he was going because he wanted it for himself? And now we've got this new plot thread about a collaborator butting in and acting like it was here the whole time? Whatever.
{quote="maninahat" post="6.297592.11803466"]What is wrong with having a neo-con message? Ignoring all the shit in the rest of this movie, I am straining to get over that one point raised.
Just having a conservative message does not necessarily work to the detriment of the film. In a movie that borrows Pentagon equipment and features battling army and robots, the movie is not likely to be promoting a message of diplomacy or "appeasement" (conservative for "surrender"). In the context of the story, it also makes sense that warrior robots and jarheads aren't likely to be keen on the idea of cutting deals with an enemy. Especially an enemy called the DECEPTICONS.
[/quote]
Well-presented conservative viewpoints are one thing. But when Bay make the "appeasers" weak, weasily or myopic (not just once, but twice) and Bay times the attitude change in the movie's White House to the real-life changing of the Guard (Bush to Obama), I can't help but agree with Bob about the underlying message.
It is common in action movies to paint the talk-it-out crowd as either dumb, naive, insane, or all of the above. It's not just inaccurate (think Cuban Missle Crisis, for starters), it's a cliche.
Just having a conservative message does not necessarily work to the detriment of the film. In a movie that borrows Pentagon equipment and features battling army and robots, the movie is not likely to be promoting a message of diplomacy or "appeasement" (conservative for "surrender"). In the context of the story, it also makes sense that warrior robots and jarheads aren't likely to be keen on the idea of cutting deals with an enemy. Especially an enemy called the DECEPTICONS.
[/quote]
Well-presented conservative viewpoints are one thing. But when Bay make the "appeasers" weak, weasily or myopic (not just once, but twice) and Bay times the attitude change in the movie's White House to the real-life changing of the Guard (Bush to Obama), I can't help but agree with Bob about the underlying message.
It is common in action movies to paint the talk-it-out crowd as either dumb, naive, insane, or all of the above. It's not just inaccurate (think Cuban Missle Crisis, for starters), it's a cliche.
You had me up until you started spouting your political philosophy the way you always like to do. Seriously, I watch your videos/read your articles because you actually seem to know a thing or two about MOVIES (and, to a lesser extent, comic books) not because I want to hear your opinions on world events.
This was supposed to be a article describing why this was a bad FILM, and how the plot is so full of holes you could drive a (inexplicably painted with flame) mac truck through it. The fact that you, personally, disagree with its message does NOT make it a bad film. It may very well have been a bad film, but your opinions on the validity of its message are NOT one of the reasons why.
Note: In case you're confused, complaining about how much time is devoted to nameless military characters we know nothing about in a movie that's supposed to be about giant robots IS an example of bad film-making. The fact that the movie is espousing a philosophy you do not agree with is not, and if anything it sounds like it actually did a fairly GOOD job of incorporating that message seamlessly into the storyline, making it one of the very few examples of actual good film-making in this movie. That complaint has no place in a supposedly bias-free review, which is what you're claiming this is.
In short, get off your soapbox and start reviewing movies.
This was supposed to be a article describing why this was a bad FILM, and how the plot is so full of holes you could drive a (inexplicably painted with flame) mac truck through it. The fact that you, personally, disagree with its message does NOT make it a bad film. It may very well have been a bad film, but your opinions on the validity of its message are NOT one of the reasons why.
Note: In case you're confused, complaining about how much time is devoted to nameless military characters we know nothing about in a movie that's supposed to be about giant robots IS an example of bad film-making. The fact that the movie is espousing a philosophy you do not agree with is not, and if anything it sounds like it actually did a fairly GOOD job of incorporating that message seamlessly into the storyline, making it one of the very few examples of actual good film-making in this movie. That complaint has no place in a supposedly bias-free review, which is what you're claiming this is.
In short, get off your soapbox and start reviewing movies.
The thing I have about the whole "Robots in disguise" thing is; was that ever the idea after film 1?
Disregarding the tv series that had the actual opening music proclaim "Transformers: Robots in disguise", the Transformers' vehicle forms normally let them travel faster than their legs and arms form. But even if they didn't, that's the whole idea of Transformers. That they can turn into vehicles.
If they couldn't then they would just be "shouty drama students with cereal boxes on their heads".
Disregarding the tv series that had the actual opening music proclaim "Transformers: Robots in disguise", the Transformers' vehicle forms normally let them travel faster than their legs and arms form. But even if they didn't, that's the whole idea of Transformers. That they can turn into vehicles.
If they couldn't then they would just be "shouty drama students with cereal boxes on their heads".
Agreed, the railgun from Transformers 2 showed us that much by taking out the biggest Decepticon it could target!Akalabeth said:
While much of the Escapist seem just love hate these films and echo bob's lame remarks(no matter how baseless they are.) I refuse to. Especially since he's in my arena today hehe. For having a show called the big picture he seems to rarely see it. He should really rename it Bob's tunnel vision.
So here goes....
* What Do the Decepticons Want, Again?
Same thing we do every night pinky...try to take over the world! Oh wait wrong show.
* So when did they change the goal of the Decepticons..oh wait they didn't. As for what the Allspark can do, it was basically described as a cosmic cube of sorts. it's made of pure energy, and creates life for transformers and can recreate planets. It's description never changed as everythnig it did was covered under that.May be you lack the imagination and needed the movie to hold your hand more(So much for overthinking haha.) it be no different than Electro using his powers to create magnet despite electricity being his power. It's just another application of the same prinpical in another way. (which being pure energy it's not destroyed, it merely transformed.)
So basically the Decepticons and Autobots both wanted the cube for the entire film as all subplots lead up to that. While some of the threads were a bit pointless or convoluted (whole glasses was just a vehicle to get Sam involved but they ultimately don't do much as Sam,and bumble bee recover the Cube without them. So they'd been better off just doing what Jazz said and followed Bumble bee when he got captured.)
They needed the Allspark still as that thread continued with Sam absorbing it. (which was passed into the Matrix when Sam had his near death experience.) Sam had all knowledge inside him they needed to get the star harvester working as explained by Jetfire.
While wasn't explained well, merely shown vaguely.(the comics go further with this.) The Fallen had psychic powers is why only Prime could defeat him. Megatron was controlled by him , as he was his own bot when he wasn't near him, but becomes so subservant once he went near him. Prime's are immune to the Fallen's powers, as we see when Optimus battles him. If Optimus wasn't the Fallen would just tossed him around like a ragdoll as he did the US miltary just moments earlier. Optimus mauls him because of that. It's like seeing Magneto fight hulk with out his powers. It doesn't go well.
While we're tossing movies under the bus, we get more info about the Fallen than we ever got in the 1986 film to Why the Matrix of leadership (which was a massive Retcon, since Optimus never had it before it. We see a Xray of him in Prime Problem.) kills Unicron or where either of them came from. But hey one story glossing over major details all together is ok if there's enough nostaliga covering it.
No it wasn't. Sentinel prime and Megatron forged a pact, but Sentinel was shot down before the war ended(none of the Decepticons knew about the betrayal till it happened in the film. Starscream was completely unaware of it and is surprised when megatron explains it.) and never heard from again till they found his ship in the 60s. This plan fell thru, and megatron went with other schemes between now and then. When Optimus gained the matrix, he then had means to revisit his earlier scheme. It was a dead end till then. He likely was trying figure out a way go around Sentinel being on verge of dead till then. The movie never once says Megatron's only plan was to work with Sentinel. Besides when has Megatron ever had only one scheme? he's the Doctor Doom of the Transformers universe.
Given how much got lifted from the original series in this film I'd have say someone was paying attention to the source material.
- The plot of Ultimate Doom , where the Decepticons used a space bridge to move cybertron to earth to enslave us and gather resources is lifted wholesale.
- Megatron using Abe lincoln's momument as a throne. This was done in the episode Atlantis Arises. (and the ending of the first movie game as the Decepticons.)
- Dark Awakening, Optimus prime was brought back to life as a trap for the autobots before killing him again.(Way to pour salt in the wounds Hasbro.) In the episode Rodimus imediately tries hand over leadership back to Optimus Prime the same way Prime does to Sentinel in the film. Only difference is Sentinel rejects the matrix of leadership, while Rodimus has beat it back out of prime later.
- Megatron's master plan, The autobots are forced the earth by the humans to leave due to an act of deception. Of course it turns out to be a trick, and the autobots return in time to save the planet.
- Ironhide gets wasted simliar to how gets taken out in the 86 film. Only we see it this time. (which was a real downer for me. I love Ironhide especially his movie verse incarnation.)
I'd say there's a lot more stuff but there's alot of attention to details to the source material. Far more than the credit given. Even Revenge of the fallen, was simliar plot to change gears with the solar needle. Jetfire maintained his role of being a turncoat, the taxi service of the team, and merged with Optimus Prime as he did in the Unicron trilogy.
Ultimately you have watch these with the same level of suspession of disbelief as you did with the original series. If you overanalyze it all it just doesn't work as Why in world would Megatron held back that many troops on the moon till now. 200 some Decepticons landed in DC....why did they just chill on the moon till now?.(thats really the biggest beef I had with it all. I'd liked it better if theye explained them being space bridged from some really remote part of space as to why their lack of involvement till now.) If Soundwave and Lazerbeak have been on the Earth since the 60s...why didn't they help find the Allspark sooner? Same could be said for ROTF...why didnt Jetfire, or any of the seekers looking for the Matrix of Leadership recover the Allspark since it wasn't concealed till the hoover dam was built if they'd been here for centuries? You just have look at the stories from a self contained episode outlook as there's parts that just don't work if you don't. It still has far less continuity errors than all xmen films do heh. Continuity is a pain sometimes lol.
*Do We Know the Transformers Are Here or Not?
- Do you pay attention or not? is the better question. In the first film there was a global communication blackout for an undisclosed amount of time thanks to Frenzy. It was likely dismissed as a terrorist act along with the attack the Decepticons lead in quatar at the start of the film. Having an entire group of soldiers in a city with no means of communicating to rest of the world what happened is probably pretty easy to cover up. Money or bullets, your choice.
Not to mention people likely weren't sure what the heck they saw anyways. The transformers weren't in robot mode the entire time, and people usually start running when there's army vehicles firing on the street. With no proof, most people would dismiss what the peopel would say as crazy. People claim there's aliens all time in the real world, and no one believes them. It's not that much of a stretch to guess that would happen here.
In second movie we see the pbulic starting become aware of this situation. Mid way thru the film the Fallen reveals that there's transformers on earth to the world.They openly show themselves and people are quite aware of their prescence by the third film. It doesn't help Simmons has wrote a book about it even.(though the government has painted him as nutjob, as shown in the O reilly scene.)
As for why Sam can't talk about it. He was still sworn to to keep a lid on it. That's why they paid for his school. The government probably wants keep as much of it all under wraps as possible. It's also for Sam's own safety.
*Why Are the Robots Still "In Disguise"?
*Why Is Optimus Prime Basically Useless?
- No more so than G1. Prime gotten beaten down effortlessly on a few occasions. He got fragged in showdown with Megatron in the 86 film. In plenty of episodes we see humans saving his butt. Whcih is larely the point, the autobots never could won the war without our help. They re not war machines, and the Decepticons are. They kicked the autobots butts up and down the block before landing on Earth. Prime is merely the toughest of the guys who aren't soldiers.
Why are the autobots shown less over series than humans? Again obvious answer...MONEY. For same reason Ironman spends majority of the film not in his armor and the whole fight with ironmonger was a whopping 7 mins. Why scenes on Oa in green lantern were brief and not the majority of the film. Why Thor spent so much time being human and less time beign Thor. You make these assessments as if budgets are unlimited or something.
This also goes back to your batman comparsion. Having Batman in his costume is not a special effect. Movies will show things that don't consume tons of cash for every second they re on screen. They dont need army take over for batman to keep the budget down since there's far less special effects involved in his films. Every other super hero tends spend a far less amont of time in costume or being super as a direct result of budget. Transformers are no exception.
*What's the Point of All This?
*To sell stuff and tell a story. As I joked transformer is the greatest 2 hour long commerical ever. You don't think so, really because Hasbro making more money with their toylines than they ever have on top of all product placement they do. Big picture Bobby..and you're missing it.
- No you're just reading more into it than it is. The Decepticons curb stomped the armed force for the bulk of the beginning of the film. A single Decepticon trashed an entire base. Scorponok shrugged off gunfire that turns tanks into swiss cheese. (Do you have any idea how stupidly resilent he was taking A-10 rounds like that? As a member of the air force I do.)The Decepticons crippled our entire communication grid, and almost caused us to go into world war 3 prior to their attack. I think was a rather balanced take on our might as a stand alone, as it always comes down to both humans and the autobots needing each other.
Humans have always been a major part of the Transformers universe. Even the original series has plenty of human heavy episodes. They play such a major role that Megatron went back in time to kill us off before we became a threat in beast wars. it gives the autobots the homefield advantage at every turn, and we vastly outnumber the Decepticons. The only series to have no human involvement on screen was Beast wars and War for cybertron.
This isn't a direct translation of transformers, rather a what if transformers were in the real world. Honestly the human element in previous series got ignored a bit too much at certain points. Such as the battle for autobot city in the 86 film, the decepticons attack for over a day and no human involvement is shown outside of Daniel despite being on Earth and distress calls going out. An alien civil war is happening on our front lawn, of course we'd get involved. May be it swung too much in the other direction, but it's refreshing to see how it effects the world as they come into it.
It also grounds the movie a bit for typical movie goer, as prior to these films I don't think you'd gotten a major turn out of box office on a super bot heavy film, if the bomb in 86 is an indicator of anything. Plus it being live action , that means humans are involved in it by default. If you really wanted a bot heavy film you,d be better off making an animated one where costs the same to make anything appear on screen. Simliar to the TMNT reboot that was all CGI. As long as it's live action humans are going be the forefront.
And don't say well they're the title characters. Gremlins, Critters, and even ET took the back seat to humans. That's just live action films for you.
Ok I think that's enough out of me for now. I'll check back later.
If the Fallen was willing make compromises and be reasonable there never would been a war in the first place. Long as two parties are willing listen they can work through anything.
So here goes....
* What Do the Decepticons Want, Again?
Same thing we do every night pinky...try to take over the world! Oh wait wrong show.
Um no this is absolutely false. See below.
* So when did they change the goal of the Decepticons..oh wait they didn't. As for what the Allspark can do, it was basically described as a cosmic cube of sorts. it's made of pure energy, and creates life for transformers and can recreate planets. It's description never changed as everythnig it did was covered under that.May be you lack the imagination and needed the movie to hold your hand more(So much for overthinking haha.) it be no different than Electro using his powers to create magnet despite electricity being his power. It's just another application of the same prinpical in another way. (which being pure energy it's not destroyed, it merely transformed.)
So basically the Decepticons and Autobots both wanted the cube for the entire film as all subplots lead up to that. While some of the threads were a bit pointless or convoluted (whole glasses was just a vehicle to get Sam involved but they ultimately don't do much as Sam,and bumble bee recover the Cube without them. So they'd been better off just doing what Jazz said and followed Bumble bee when he got captured.)
* Which turns out the first movie's plot was bigger scope than originally thought as the events of the two films were connected.(since when it is a crime for movies to do that.) Why Optimus believed Megatron wanted the Allspark, wasn't the full scope of what was going on, nor was he aware of the Fallen. (something the Primes weren't too proud of and tried not to talk about hence why his original name was stripped.) Megatron himself never once explained his plans in the first film to verify Optimus' claim to make it a contradiction.
They needed the Allspark still as that thread continued with Sam absorbing it. (which was passed into the Matrix when Sam had his near death experience.) Sam had all knowledge inside him they needed to get the star harvester working as explained by Jetfire.
While wasn't explained well, merely shown vaguely.(the comics go further with this.) The Fallen had psychic powers is why only Prime could defeat him. Megatron was controlled by him , as he was his own bot when he wasn't near him, but becomes so subservant once he went near him. Prime's are immune to the Fallen's powers, as we see when Optimus battles him. If Optimus wasn't the Fallen would just tossed him around like a ragdoll as he did the US miltary just moments earlier. Optimus mauls him because of that. It's like seeing Magneto fight hulk with out his powers. It doesn't go well.
While we're tossing movies under the bus, we get more info about the Fallen than we ever got in the 1986 film to Why the Matrix of leadership (which was a massive Retcon, since Optimus never had it before it. We see a Xray of him in Prime Problem.) kills Unicron or where either of them came from. But hey one story glossing over major details all together is ok if there's enough nostaliga covering it.
No it wasn't. Sentinel prime and Megatron forged a pact, but Sentinel was shot down before the war ended(none of the Decepticons knew about the betrayal till it happened in the film. Starscream was completely unaware of it and is surprised when megatron explains it.) and never heard from again till they found his ship in the 60s. This plan fell thru, and megatron went with other schemes between now and then. When Optimus gained the matrix, he then had means to revisit his earlier scheme. It was a dead end till then. He likely was trying figure out a way go around Sentinel being on verge of dead till then. The movie never once says Megatron's only plan was to work with Sentinel. Besides when has Megatron ever had only one scheme? he's the Doctor Doom of the Transformers universe.
Given how much got lifted from the original series in this film I'd have say someone was paying attention to the source material.
- The plot of Ultimate Doom , where the Decepticons used a space bridge to move cybertron to earth to enslave us and gather resources is lifted wholesale.
- Megatron using Abe lincoln's momument as a throne. This was done in the episode Atlantis Arises. (and the ending of the first movie game as the Decepticons.)
- Dark Awakening, Optimus prime was brought back to life as a trap for the autobots before killing him again.(Way to pour salt in the wounds Hasbro.) In the episode Rodimus imediately tries hand over leadership back to Optimus Prime the same way Prime does to Sentinel in the film. Only difference is Sentinel rejects the matrix of leadership, while Rodimus has beat it back out of prime later.
- Megatron's master plan, The autobots are forced the earth by the humans to leave due to an act of deception. Of course it turns out to be a trick, and the autobots return in time to save the planet.
- Ironhide gets wasted simliar to how gets taken out in the 86 film. Only we see it this time. (which was a real downer for me. I love Ironhide especially his movie verse incarnation.)
I'd say there's a lot more stuff but there's alot of attention to details to the source material. Far more than the credit given. Even Revenge of the fallen, was simliar plot to change gears with the solar needle. Jetfire maintained his role of being a turncoat, the taxi service of the team, and merged with Optimus Prime as he did in the Unicron trilogy.
Ultimately you have watch these with the same level of suspession of disbelief as you did with the original series. If you overanalyze it all it just doesn't work as Why in world would Megatron held back that many troops on the moon till now. 200 some Decepticons landed in DC....why did they just chill on the moon till now?.(thats really the biggest beef I had with it all. I'd liked it better if theye explained them being space bridged from some really remote part of space as to why their lack of involvement till now.) If Soundwave and Lazerbeak have been on the Earth since the 60s...why didn't they help find the Allspark sooner? Same could be said for ROTF...why didnt Jetfire, or any of the seekers looking for the Matrix of Leadership recover the Allspark since it wasn't concealed till the hoover dam was built if they'd been here for centuries? You just have look at the stories from a self contained episode outlook as there's parts that just don't work if you don't. It still has far less continuity errors than all xmen films do heh. Continuity is a pain sometimes lol.
*Do We Know the Transformers Are Here or Not?
- Do you pay attention or not? is the better question. In the first film there was a global communication blackout for an undisclosed amount of time thanks to Frenzy. It was likely dismissed as a terrorist act along with the attack the Decepticons lead in quatar at the start of the film. Having an entire group of soldiers in a city with no means of communicating to rest of the world what happened is probably pretty easy to cover up. Money or bullets, your choice.
Not to mention people likely weren't sure what the heck they saw anyways. The transformers weren't in robot mode the entire time, and people usually start running when there's army vehicles firing on the street. With no proof, most people would dismiss what the peopel would say as crazy. People claim there's aliens all time in the real world, and no one believes them. It's not that much of a stretch to guess that would happen here.
In second movie we see the pbulic starting become aware of this situation. Mid way thru the film the Fallen reveals that there's transformers on earth to the world.They openly show themselves and people are quite aware of their prescence by the third film. It doesn't help Simmons has wrote a book about it even.(though the government has painted him as nutjob, as shown in the O reilly scene.)
As for why Sam can't talk about it. He was still sworn to to keep a lid on it. That's why they paid for his school. The government probably wants keep as much of it all under wraps as possible. It's also for Sam's own safety.
*Why Are the Robots Still "In Disguise"?
- Because it's alot cheaper show cars than robots for the entire film. Obvious answer really. Plus they are product placement in the film then. So it's a budget issue all around.
- Laserbeak was shown to be a special case. He was able to articulate himself far better than other transformers are. Given he flies his insides might be hollowed out a bit like a real bird's structure is. It's possible he's an orgami transformer simliar how they explained Broadside being an aircraft carrier as an alt mode. Plates, which overlap in his other modes, extend out to cover the mass. As a result, his armor is terribly thin in this mode. This series has always had issues with Scale. http://tfwiki.net/wiki/Scale
-Pretenders are concept that existed since the 80s. Yes they are special breed of transformers. http://tfwiki.net/wiki/Pretenders
*Why Is Optimus Prime Basically Useless?
- No more so than G1. Prime gotten beaten down effortlessly on a few occasions. He got fragged in showdown with Megatron in the 86 film. In plenty of episodes we see humans saving his butt. Whcih is larely the point, the autobots never could won the war without our help. They re not war machines, and the Decepticons are. They kicked the autobots butts up and down the block before landing on Earth. Prime is merely the toughest of the guys who aren't soldiers.
Why are the autobots shown less over series than humans? Again obvious answer...MONEY. For same reason Ironman spends majority of the film not in his armor and the whole fight with ironmonger was a whopping 7 mins. Why scenes on Oa in green lantern were brief and not the majority of the film. Why Thor spent so much time being human and less time beign Thor. You make these assessments as if budgets are unlimited or something.
This also goes back to your batman comparsion. Having Batman in his costume is not a special effect. Movies will show things that don't consume tons of cash for every second they re on screen. They dont need army take over for batman to keep the budget down since there's far less special effects involved in his films. Every other super hero tends spend a far less amont of time in costume or being super as a direct result of budget. Transformers are no exception.
*What's the Point of All This?
*To sell stuff and tell a story. As I joked transformer is the greatest 2 hour long commerical ever. You don't think so, really because Hasbro making more money with their toylines than they ever have on top of all product placement they do. Big picture Bobby..and you're missing it.
- No you're just reading more into it than it is. The Decepticons curb stomped the armed force for the bulk of the beginning of the film. A single Decepticon trashed an entire base. Scorponok shrugged off gunfire that turns tanks into swiss cheese. (Do you have any idea how stupidly resilent he was taking A-10 rounds like that? As a member of the air force I do.)The Decepticons crippled our entire communication grid, and almost caused us to go into world war 3 prior to their attack. I think was a rather balanced take on our might as a stand alone, as it always comes down to both humans and the autobots needing each other.
Humans have always been a major part of the Transformers universe. Even the original series has plenty of human heavy episodes. They play such a major role that Megatron went back in time to kill us off before we became a threat in beast wars. it gives the autobots the homefield advantage at every turn, and we vastly outnumber the Decepticons. The only series to have no human involvement on screen was Beast wars and War for cybertron.
This isn't a direct translation of transformers, rather a what if transformers were in the real world. Honestly the human element in previous series got ignored a bit too much at certain points. Such as the battle for autobot city in the 86 film, the decepticons attack for over a day and no human involvement is shown outside of Daniel despite being on Earth and distress calls going out. An alien civil war is happening on our front lawn, of course we'd get involved. May be it swung too much in the other direction, but it's refreshing to see how it effects the world as they come into it.
It also grounds the movie a bit for typical movie goer, as prior to these films I don't think you'd gotten a major turn out of box office on a super bot heavy film, if the bomb in 86 is an indicator of anything. Plus it being live action , that means humans are involved in it by default. If you really wanted a bot heavy film you,d be better off making an animated one where costs the same to make anything appear on screen. Simliar to the TMNT reboot that was all CGI. As long as it's live action humans are going be the forefront.
And don't say well they're the title characters. Gremlins, Critters, and even ET took the back seat to humans. That's just live action films for you.
Ok I think that's enough out of me for now. I'll check back later.
You must have missed the following scene when the Fallen trashes our forces like toys. That is why we needed the autobots to help. or all other times the Decepticons completely tore the humans a new one. (such as the fight in Chicago didn't go so hot till autobots showed up.)
The Fallen was unreasonable and refuses to compromise. That's really whole downfall of the Decepticons as a whole as they try drive that point home with the scene when they revive Megatron and Kill the little ones despite there being options to fixing their boss besides that.(like the parts of all dead Decepticons near by that got dumped from the first film.) They will accomplish their goals at any costs and don't care who they want on to do it. The Fallen got tired of playing ball with the other Primes and decided they were only slowing him down. He just tried to take control of the matrix of leadership and the star harvester to remove any further speed bumps later.
If the Fallen was willing make compromises and be reasonable there never would been a war in the first place. Long as two parties are willing listen they can work through anything.
That's pretty much the point tho.Akalabeth said:
Either M16 rifles (or other anti-personel weapons) can do something to a Decepticon, or it can't and you need anti-vehicle/ordinance.
If anti-personal weaponry can destroy them, than the Decepticon are simply not numerous enough to be any kind of realistic threat to humanity. The army of pretty much any nation could crush the amount of Decepticon we've seen... hell, a bunch of cops or redneck with shotguns could do it, no need to even get the army involved. This makes the movies' plots even more flimsy than they currently are.
If they cannot do much to them with anti-personal weaponry (which the films certainly seem to support), than the desert fight scene in TF2 makes no sense - you cannot 'hold your ground' when you aren't even denting the opponent. The big robots could just walk up to the US soldiers and step on them if they wanted too, as M16 bullets just bounced off them.
So which one is it? It can't be both, and either way there's non-sensical stuff in there.
Well I didn't...
But like I said - why does the Fallen wait so long to join the fight? As far as we know, he's just chilling with a brewsky on the moon while his men are being slaughtered... and he only lands once Prime is ressurected and he now has a chance to be defeated.
How freaking idiotic is he? Had he helped out the Decepticon from the get go, it would have been no contest, Prime would have never been raised and the sun would be destroyed. Than again, I suppose him being an idiot is well established with the whole 'Must eat Star with a planet that has life on it orbiting it and trigger a civil war instead of eating one of the multiple billion stars with no life on it.' thing.
Just more non-sensical stuff >_<.
And yes, I know the cartoons were full of non-sensical stuff... but they were cartoons for hyped up on sugar kids, I'm pretty sure if I watched the cartoon today, I'd find them equally stupid. That is not much of an excuse however - just because the source material is riddled with holes, doesn't mean you have to make a 200 millions dollars movies that's also filled with them.