I saw this last night and was disappointed like many. Don't get me wrong, I'm not some random Bay hater; I liked the first one in a "turn off your brain kind of way", but the first film's problems are here again and even worse. But let's start off with the good.
The film's effects are excellent and re easily some of the best I've ever seen in my life, from the slow-motion shots--which are used a lot, but I didn't mind that at all--to awesome POV shots(the one with the dog Transformer shooting at the base). Also, when robots aren't pounding the **** out of each other, and humans are on screen this film looks great. those two were the saving grace I also didn't hate the acting. For the most part, it should be blamed on the writers and Bay. Shia didn't bug me, Josh Holloway and Tyrese Gibson did were fine, and one girl who unintentionally did a great job at playing a lifeless robot. Also, a few transformers, Optimus, Soundwave, Megatron, and Starscream got a lot more screentime then expected.
Now onto the bad...this film's story, for the most part, just sucked. I didn't mind the first one, which was very simple, but enjoyable. Here, it's all over the place with so much stuff that's just so over the top and in the end unbelievable- even if it exsist's in a world with giant robots. Also, some parts were just too hard to follow. It's extremely fast pace would force so much at you in one moment then it would move on to the next and I'd be sitting there "Um...what?" and there's next to no development for every human and transformer.
. Sometimes I had a main problem with what was going onscreen. I didn't have this problem in TF1 but here, sometimes I could only tell if, for example, Optimus was winning would be because and red and blue blur or streak was beating up a gray blur or streak. I was a wee bit tired so that could've been the reason. I don't know whether it was the film's budget or Bay was just trying to make it feel more intense.
. Megan Fox. While she's very hot, she can't act for ****.
. The film's editing was Awful. Some scenes were way too fast paced where you'd get about 5 shots every second, a character would suddenly appear out of the blue, etc.
. Some of the comic relief. While Sam's parents had their moments, most of the time I would roll my eyes or cringe, though the actors did a fine job for the most part, especially the dad. Don't get me started on the twins. Trying to add pop culture references as pretty much two characters were about as bad as it gets. Almost down to Jar Jar Binks level. How they got more screentime than any other transformer other than Prime is beyond me.
. Runtime. This film was waaaaaaay too long and by the end I just really didn't care anymore. The last action scene which I'm pretty sure was longer than Ghandi got boring fast and couldn't live up to any other action scene. Hell, even when when everybody think it's about to pick up with an awesome climax Between Prime, Megatron, and The Fallen it ends abruptly and can't even live up to the first one.
. Characters. There were just too many and next to none of them developed and a hell of a lot of them were written poorly. This film focuses only on the Transformers I mentioned before and the rest are absolutes, they're just there. Also, some Decepticons didn't live up to what I was hoping for. Megatron and Starscream are pretty much Abbot and Costello. The Fallen didn't really do anything, the lazy bastard. We heard him ***** and moan, until Prime was killed then he shows up again for about 5 seconds and then he's killed. He came nowhere close to how badass and intimidating Megatron was in the first one.
Overall, this film proves that bigger, sometimes, isn't better. If they "simplified" the film and cut out which wasn't needed(unfunny jokes, some scenes cut, the climax cut in half, etc.)and focused more on the characters then this would've been a much better. Still, in the end, I went into the theater with my brain turned off and was entertained. 6/10
I just think this is a summer critics will bash movies and rightfully so as this summer hasn't been great across the board.
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