Not worth your time.

Rating: 5/10 (27 June 2009)

This movie is the sequel to the 2007 adaptation of the Transformers toys and cartoon series. The plot is exceptionally awful. Basically Sam Witwicky is going off to college. At the same time the Decepticons are planning an attack on the Autobots and a whole war is starting up. Sam finds that he still has a piece of the Allspark cube that was destroyed in the first movie and when he looks at it the symbols get imprinted into brain, which the Decepticons are after. Also, another unrelated part of the story involves a robot named The Fallen who wants to destroy the sun with a machine hidden in the pyramids. I didn't fully understand the plot, therefore I won't be able to explain the entire plot. These elements in the script are really not related and you can tell one story being completely dropped and forgotten about.
The acting in this movie is never a requirement but I'm still going to comment on it. I thought that Shia LaBeouf actually gave a great performance in this movie and he's definitely overqualified for Transformers. If he were to be in a drama, he would be great.
Now, Megan Fox is only in the movie because she's hot and that may be true, however she's a terrible actress.
John Turturro who actually has a much larger part in this movie than he has in the first film. He's clearly in the movie as a comic relief and the jokes involving his character are sometimes very absurd.
Getting off the topic of performances, I would like to mention that the action in this movie is bigger and better than the first film. There's so much more robots fighting if that's what you're into. The CGI is also incredible with the very detailed robots. There are many parts to them, but this could be a disadvantage because a lot of them look like a bunch of metal pieces stuck together with faces. However, you could tell that the budget was very large on this movie because there's practically a new thing exploding in every scene. By now this is Michael Bay's trademark and it can really get old quickly.
There were some improvements in this movie that really bothered me in the first movie. The major improvement was that Michael Bay actually managed to keep the camera still for a lot of the movie, so I can actually tell exactly what was going on in a robot fight. In the first movie, he would constantly be moving the camera and you wouldn't be able to tell what was going on. However, there was one scene where Shia LaBeouf's character is saying goodbye to his girlfriend played by Megan Fox before he goes to college and the camera constantly circles very fast and it really wasn't necessary.
The difference is that the plot was a pretty good in the first movie around all the action sequences. In the sequel, the story is much worse as I have mentioned before. One part that bothered me is when Shia LaBeouf left college suddenly and never came back after only being there for a few minutes. We never saw that again and it was never explained if he ever even went back.
When I was reading the reviews before I saw the movie, everyone was mentioning The Twins who were extremely racist stereotypes. A lot of the things they said were too offensive and crude but they didn't offend me that much. I didn't like the addition of the gold teeth and the fact they couldn't read, but other than that they made me laugh. They just didn't need as much screen time as they were given.
The biggest problem with Transformers 2, is that it is way too long. It's about 2 & ½ hours and just six minutes longer than in 2007. This movie could have easily trimmed out a half hour just from the useless comedy scenes and maybe it would have been bearable. I started looking at my watch about an hour and a ½ in. I would even stop paying attention to the action sequences because I had become so bored near the end that I just wanted it to be over.
I would also like to talk about the IMAX. I honestly can't say that it's a good idea to watch it in IMAX. You assume that it's a bigger screen and more enjoyable but for most of the movie it's only using the middle of the screen with some specific scenes that are shot with an IMAX camera. I'll have to admit that the IMAX shots were incredible and really made me feel like I was actually there with them in the desert. When it's being used, it's even more impressive than 3D, it's just that it's not used enough to pay five dollars extra for a ticket.
Overall, I can't honestly say that I enjoyed the movie more than the first one, so I guess that means I believe the first movie was better. I'm fine with that, it's just that I still didn't like the first one because it was boring and had similar flaws this movie had. Overall, this is just a bad franchise and I actually wouldn't mind if I never see a third one. Even if they improve it, there's no more stories left to even keep it interesting.
So, that's my review of the film. I give it a 5/10, and I personally don't recommend it. However, if you're a big fan of explosions than this is the movie for you. What should you see instead if you don't like explosions? Probably The Hangover again.