Clumsy and cheesy with hints of brilliance

Rating: 6/10 (15 July 2009)

I found the first Transformers movie to be a very good action flick. It found the right balance between the human and Autobot stories. Yet here, we get treated to a teen movie with the Transformers taking a support role. It's really grating and the first part of the movie is just terrible.
Mid-movie, it starts to come together yet we still get dragged into this stupid love story. It really starts to come together when John Turturro makes an appearance. He's a wonderful actor and is a funny counterpart to Shia LaBeouf - who is pretty woeful up until that point. Megan Fox feels lifeless through-out and is there purely for male fantasy purposes - no surprises there. While both LaBeouf and Fox have little to work with, they don't ever try to excel in their roles either.
Going into the last act, we finally get treated to what we all wanted to see. It's pretty wonderful to watch it all unfold and will satisfy the true fans to some degree, but it by no means saves an average action flick.
I'm not sure if the kids will like it. It's a weird one. It has violence and swearing that I would not expose a child to. Yet the theatre was full of them...it really doesn't seem to know if it's doing the whole adult thing or if it's aimed at the kids. It really is detrimental.
I was expecting more from this sequel. The music is nice, the graphics are awesome and some of the shots we are treated to are delightful. Yet poor editing rears its ugly head at times, both in terms of errors and the tempo at which it moves; it often feels disjointed.
Nevertheless, it's okay. This isn't must-see stuff and I don't think young kids should be exposed to the language and violence nor should it be aimed at them in the way that it is done.
Transformers fans won't get much out of this either. But the final act made all the terrible build-up worthwhile. 6/10