Maybe I just don't like Michael Bay

Rating: 4/10 (6 May 2015)

One can always count on Michael Bay to make the most ridiculous, clichéd, over- the-top movies in any genre he dares tread. This goes over doubly so for his 1998 apocalyptic disaster movie, Armageddon. I am not entirely certain why I find this specific disaster so disaster movie so distasteful. I usually enjoy these types of disaster movies. There is so much fun in speculating on the supposed "big one", no matter the type of disaster it is. And there is nothing bigger than a world-destroying asteroid impact. All the pieces fit for a very fun movie, but the execution is done so poorly that it leaves a sour taste in my mouth. First though, let me discuss the things I do like.
The effects of the movie are beautiful, it's no wonder it was nominated for an Oscar in that respect. And model for the asteroid, while unrealistic, does go with what the film intended it to be. All the sharp spires and jagged rock and the ominous sounds of it really do a good job of transforming this big inanimate object into an antagonist. Unfortunately, that's all the good I can find in the film.
The storytelling itself is bad, the characters are not memorable, and the movie is rife with plot holes. How is it easier to train oil drillers to be astronauts, than astronauts to be oil drillers? What are the chances that every time a smaller asteroid struck, it hit a major city? Why was a romantic subplot shoehorned in, when they could have easily done a great bromance that would make the drillers more memorable?!? A day after re-watching the film and I had to go online to remember whom the drillers other than Bruce Willis were.
Also the science of the actual movie is just bad. If NASA did not know about the asteroid 18 days before it hit, they would not know about until it actually hit. Few, if any of the smaller asteroids would make it through the atmosphere without breaking up. And of coarse, an asteroid the size of Texas would do enormous damage to the biosphere, but it would not kill everything and make Earth a lifeless husk. Perhaps a few other scientists other than Billy Bob Thornton should have been consulted.
Honestly, I think the only reason I really do not like this movie is because it's a Michael Bay movie. No matter what genre he does, it will always be plenty of shock and awe and effects, and never any story and substance to go with it.