A horrible plot combined with epic battle sequences

Rating: 6/10 (29 June 2011)

Okay, truthfully, no one who goes in to see a Transformers movie honestly cares about the story. They just come to watch giant robots beating each other up and blowing stuff up.
On that end, Dark of the Moon delivers tremendously. The visuals are stunning, the battles are intense, and the final climatic battle between Optimus Prime, Sentinel Prime, and Megatron was my absolute favorite part of the whole movie. The 3D in this is used well too. Shots of robots shattering apart in slow-motion or people swinging through the chaotic mayhem are breathtaking.
Now the plot. Okay, warning in advance that there are spoilers ahead in this next chunk and that the plot was garbage. So read on. So the whole premise is that there's a teleportation device from the Autobots on the moon. Like the last two movies, they have to race against the Decepticons to get it first and, unfortunately, like in the second movie, there is a long, complicated, and elaborate setup to make it work for the Decepticons that gives the Autobots just enough time to destroy an entire city and save it. There is a twist near the middle where a seemingly good robot goes bad and just had me thinking - what? Also, there is a second twist where you find out one of the supporting characters is a villain and is working for the Decepticons. However his motives are stupid, his lines are cheesy, and that whole subplot just felt dumb. Between the instances of robots killing each other, Michael Bay fills the dialogue with some humorous one-liners and situations but they eventually grow old and feel overdone - the Asian guy (Ken Jeong) from The Hangover was funny in this but it got old after the first minute or so.
The acting I guess was so-so considering there weren't a whole lot of instances where they really needed to try. Of course, everyone's wondering about Megan Fox's replacement - Rosie Huntington-Whiteley. She does good for most of the film though I did catch a few instances where I just sort of cringed - kind of like, "oops, she messed up." Shia LaBeouf is pretty funny and for once, while the parents are still in the film, their roles do not feel overdone.
Overall, Dark of the Moon's plot was a horrible, jumbled, inconsistent, plot-hole filled mess that some amazing battle sequences at the end manage to help you with in enjoying the movie.
Don't expect anything different from the others but be prepared for the best visuals this year!