Less Than Meets the Eye

Rating: 5/10 (23 June 2009)

Let me start by saying I was a childhood Transformers fan – the target audience of this film. Let me follow-up by saying I was once again, overall disappointed with the film adaption of the popular cartoon series. Let me conclude by listing WHY:
1) The script was once again, appalling:
As a fan of a small handful of Michael Bay/Jerry Bruckheimer films, you know what to expect when walking into one. A good script is not one of them, but Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen seemed particularly awful. While the general direction of the film was an improvement over the original film, the dialogue itself was frequently worse. Expect to cringe, groan, and perhaps contemplate why you're watching it.
2) The action scenes are flawed:
Admittedly, the action scenes are impressive, which is what you'd expect from a Michael Bay film. But as the camera often cropped-in too close to the robot, it would have been nice to occasionally "see" what was happening. Besides that, there's so many bits of metal being blurred radically across the screen, it's difficult to make out who's successfully hitting who. This could have easily been avoided if we didn't have to watch an Autobot transform while the camera is zoomed-in on it's nipple.
3) The romance was just wrong:
Sam Witwicky (Shia LaBeouf), leaves his now-girlfriend, Mikaela Banes (Megan Fox) to go to college (and we should point out that if they didn't call it "college" in the film, we'd have presumed it was a world cheerleader convention, as average-looking women are apparently banned from the lecture rooms). In the moments Sam and Mikaela are together, they try to make the other say "I love you" first. Call me jealous, but it was difficult to believe that someone like Megan Fox – who looked as stunning as ever in the film – would have any trouble making her boyfriend say "I love you" every ten seconds of the day. But by the end of the film, she concedes. Of course she does.
4) The humor is very, very unfunny:
Transformers is clearly not meant to be a comedy, but oh how they tried! Every scene attempted one or two laughs - from humping dogs to a trash-talking mom. In most cases the cringe-worthy jokes would test your patience. In other cases, it just felt like a test of your IQ.
5) There are two Autobots:
One of the best things about the Transformers franchise is that everyone has their favorite Transformer. My personal favorites are Jazz and Sideswipe, major characters in the series but non-existent in this movie. So unless your favorite is Optimus Prime or Bumblebee, you will be disappointed. Ironhide (meant to be a red minivan) and Acree (female motorcycle) have one line each, so I guess they got lucky.
6) Thank god for the Americans:
When the evil Decepticons overwhelm the Autobots/US Marines-tandem in Egypt, the Jordanian Army comes to the rescue. Maybe it was too good to be true, but their army – consisting of two helicopters – get shot down within 10 seconds of appearing. Thank god more American reinforcements were suddenly nearby Egypt to balance the fight...(!)
7) Soundwave doesn't have "the voice":
Those who know Transformers would remember Soundwave – the Decepticon who's voice sounded like James Earl Jones after swallowing a light-saber, and transformed into an 80's tape cassette deck. The film version of Soundwave sounded like every other Transformer, and humped a Satellite the whole time. Lame! Where's the personality?
8) By the end, some journalists applauded:
I fear that when it is all said and done, some journalists are going say this was a good film. It is not. Fun? Yes. Entertaining? Yes. Good? No. The best way to work it out is this: If you take out the multi-million-dollar special effects (aka; the wrapping paper which makes it look pretty), you get the raw essentials. If you grade this film on it's raw essentials – you'd see it for what it is.
At least Megan Fox was hot.