Very, very flawed, and yet not a total disaster

Rating: 4/10 (14 September 2010)

What are the problems with Transformers 2? Really, it's difficult to sum them up, because it is flawed in so many different ways. In-between the action scenes that most of us are watching the movie for, we get a lot of stuff that isn't much fun. Sometimes these scenes are dull and meaningless (at one point, the characters have a long, whispered conversation about something-or-other right when a Decepticon is approaching them, ruining the pacing of the scene). And sometimes they are just stupid: apparently Michael Bay believes that those who enjoy watching giant robots smash things up will also enjoy watching a middle-aged woman get high, or dogs humping each other, or listening to dialogue like "I am directly below the enemy scrotum." Being someone who did watch this movie in order to see giant robots smash things up, I can testify that this is not necessarily the case.
There are definitely problems with the characters: most of them aren't terrible, but there are some particular ones (the infamous Autobot twins, and Sam's new college room-mate) which are incredibly annoying and serve no useful purpose at all, and yet get more than their fair share of screen-time. And while it's nice to have some new Autobots and Decepticons, most of them get very little to do and are pretty much wasted.
I also didn't like the climactic action scene: it goes on for too long, there are times when you can't tell what's happening, and a lot of screen time that could be spent showing us Transformers is instead spent showing us exactly how the human military are contributing to the whole thing.
And yet, there are some positives about this movie. Most of the action, like the opening scene in Shanghai, and the scene where Optimus Prime takes on three Decepticons at once, is definitely worth watching. The story itself is reasonably interesting if not executed very well; and any scene featuring the Transformers rather than the human characters is good enough to hold your attention.
In this reviewer's opinion at least, Transformers 2 is not the worst movie of 2009 (it would take something really horrific to beat Bride Wars) or even the worst action movie of 2009 (it's more entertaining than Terminator Salvation) - but it certainly can't be called a good movie.