Director: Michael Bay
Starring: Shia LaBeouf, Megan Fox, Josh Duhamel, John Turturro, Tyrese Gibson
Running Time: 150 minutes
Score: 6.5 / 10
This review by Jinja. Spoilers ahead....
What's it about?
IMDB blurb: "Decepticon forces return to Earth on a mission to take Sam Witwicky prisoner, after the young hero learns the truth about the ancient origins of the Transformers. Joining the mission to protect humankind is Optimus Prime, who forms an alliance with international armies for a second epic battle."
Was it good / bad?
I probably didn't do myself any favours by watching the first one the night before seeing the sequel. But I did have my expectations very low due to a couple of friends mentioning their disappointment.
+ The CG again was phenomenal - but, I said this first time round, the transformations were overly complex.
+ The eye-candy in this movie was spectacular.
+ Giant transforming robots fighting!
- Unfortunately I think the CG is also what totally overpowered the flick.
- The story was overly ambitious and complex - not for the younger audience.
- There was unnecessary language, that again I wouldn't be overly comfortable with my 10 year old nephew hearing.
- Some gratuitous shots of Megan Fox and Isabel Lucas - now don't get me wrong I enjoy the sight of an attractive woman, but the bit with Megan Fox painting the bike at the beginning was ludicrous!
- Slow-mo overload!
- A robot that transforms into a human!?
- Way way to long.
Just another thought what happened to the characters played by Anthony Anderson and Rachael Taylor?
Coolest / worst scene?
Coolest scenes were Optimus going berserk (on a few occasions) on decepticons and BumbleBee kicking ass.
Worst, the ridiculous geography that goes on at the end. One minute they are at the pyramids in Cairo, then the adventure takes them to Petra in Jordan. Then from Petra they see the military parachute out and land near the pyramids...and within minutes they are driving to meet up with them (I know I've seriously paraphrased that). Now Cairo and Petra are around 251.1 miles (give or take) apart. Sorry no, that last part of the film all took place within the same 'evening' - I know this is a film about alien life-forms that transform from giant robots into vehicles but come on. There wasn't even a mention of the fact Israel even existed between Egypt and Jordan.
The Robots - What about the robots?
The twins were initially annoying, the half way through they were annoying and by the end you had enough of them as they were annoying and you hope the devastator kills them! A pair of street jive idiot punks, mildly ammusing but generally annoying - did I say that already?
The return of Megatron - acceptable, was expecting the whole cargo ship to transform rather than just the five overly suspiscious vehicles on-board. Unfortunately too many bad guys leaders, Megatron, StarScream and the Fallen, wanting screen time.
Soundwave - good idea as the satellite, but where was the voice!?
The Devastator - the biggest overly complex transform of the lot. Was just too big.
The Fallen - a lazy bugger who'd been hanging out on one of Jupiters moons for the past 17,000 years.
Did you laugh / cry / cover your eyes / walk out?
Laugh - yes, some very funny bits especially John Turturros paranoia and still some of the 'aliens out of place on earth' moments.
Cry - not even with laughter.
Cover my eyes - followed by a shaking head of disapproval at some of the continuity errors and pretty much the whole last half hour.
Walk-out - I didn't walk out of Vertical Limit (my current leader of absolute chod movies) so wouldn't walk out on this - worth staying for the visuals.
Anything we should watch out for?
You may miss it near the beginning, but the bit of an argument in China between the army and couple of Transformers. The governments manage to cover up the whole thing as a little earthquake or something...its complete and total destruction of downtown Shanghai!!! (BTW yes sarcasm set to very much high on that comment)
Why should we see / avoid it?
Big robots, lots of fighting, CG overload - your choice.
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