Bay blows shit up and assumes that audiences are just as ADHD as he is.
By RITOS
SPOILER ALERT.
I'm serious about that. If you haven't seen Transformers 2 and kind of give a shit, don't read this. ...Wait, no. DO read this. Save two and a half hours of your life by spending five minutes reading this review.
Michael Bay. Those two words should be painted on the fucking poster in giant red stenciled letters like a contamination warning. Fair enough, the guy knows how to blow shit up with the most schizophrenic camera work of any other director on earth. Seriously, with the bright explosions and quick jumps between action scenes I know that there's an epileptic having a seizure in a theater somewhere. However, to Michael Bay, the scenes between the explosions and the action are like math problems to a monkey: if you can actually get the monkey to comprehend the general concept of math (or in this case, "character development" or 'story structure'), it wouldn't give a shit and would instead go off and bang two rocks together because they make noise. And that is what Transformers 2: Revenge of the Fallen is. Bay does what he does best: Blow shit up, and doesn't care about what else actually makes a movie, and assumes that audiences are just as ADHD as he is.
With Transformers 2 banking $400 Million box office (domestic), apparently Bay's assumption is right.
I love movies with tons of special effects and explosions, and Transformers 2 has tons of action scenes and mind-blowing CGI. However, Transformers 2 is completely DEVOID of anything resembling a good movie. B-movies are fun to watch because of absurd plots, characters and interactions; however, when story elements take a back seat to special effects, I feel cheated. In my honest opinion, the characters in Transformers 2 serve only to move one special effects action scene to another, and apparently they don't need to make sense.
The plot of the movie changes at the drop of a hat in order to lead to the next action sequence, all thanks to characters teleporting all over the fucking globe.
Bay: "Let's have robots fighting all over the world, like in China and at the Pyramids!"
Writer: "So do we write scenes between Sam and Mikaela traveling on boats or airplanes? What happens then could further develop their characters, their relationship, and the story as a whole?"
Bay: "Fuck story development. They can just teleport. 'BAMF!' And they're there!"
Hell, even in normal shots, characters will appear and disappear from the same scene depending on their usefulness. Characters will be standing with one another one minute, and then a split-second later, characters are either conveniently absent or added in order to set up an action sequence, all without any explanation or setup. The entire movie feels like it was written on-the-fly, and edited for time by cutting out "boring ol" plot development and story" for the sake of keeping the multi-million dollar action sequences intact.
When I first saw Transformers 1 in theaters, I was bored as all hell. I sat in the theater for the first hour and a half thinking to myself, "Why the hell did I pay $10 to watch retarded kids climbing trees, dogs with bling, parents that are more annoying and anal than my own, and a teen drama between a skinny geek and a hot girl who can't act?" The stupidity of the Transformers playing fucking hide-and-seek with Sam's parents was the moment my childhood shattered and fell to the sticky theater floor. There was nothing that would redeem that steaming piece of shit... Until badass fight towards the end between the Decepticons and the Autobots (as brief and completely out of focus as they were). Others commented that "If the movie had more fighting and less teen drama crap it would be better."
Careful what you wish for because Transformers 2 is the opposite extreme: All fighting sprinkled with the stupid comedy-relief characters and annoying jokes that I hated from the first movie.
The only thing more pathetic than Bayformers 2 is the rabid fans who are defending this horrible piece of shit. "You are over-analyzing the movie" and "People can't just enjoy a movie anymore."
BULLSHIT. I enjoy all kinds of movies. I can enjoy an action movie like Dark Knight and Iron Man. I enjoy old slasher flicks like Nightmare on Elm Street and John Carpenter's The Thing. Fucking crap, I even enjoy shitty B-Movies for the fact that you can at least riff on it ala Mystery Science Theater 3000. I can NOT enjoy Transformers 2.
All of the Bayformers defenders think that everybody should turn off their brains while they watch Transformers 2, but I'm telling them all to turn their fucking brains ON once in a while. When the hell did "turning off your brains" become the acceptable practice for summer movies? Putting any ounce of thought into this movie you will realize that what you are watching is really fucking stupid. Transformers is not just stupid, it's TOO stupid for me to enjoy.
I can't enjoy any of the action scenes because none of the rest of the movie makes any kind of sense. I couldn't sit back and enjoy the stupidity, but maybe other people don't wonder things like why the Autobots, who were with Optimus Prime like five minutes ago, suddenly disappeared long enough to fight three Decepticons on his own. Or why they suddenly showed up the instant he died? (Because Michael Bay thought it would be cooler, so fuck the previous scenes.) Why can only a Prime kill the Fallen? (I have no fucking clue.) If the piece of the Allspark can bring a Transformer back to life why doesn't Sam use it on Optimus instead of Jetfire, who he hopes will tell him how to find another doohickey that might bring Optimus back to life? (ADHD posterchild Michael Bay adds another explosion on the screen to keep your mind distracted from all these little "details".)
And then there's the return of the fucking shitty humor from the cast of comic-relief characters, both human and robots. Why the fuck would an action flick about giant robots blowing shit up in an epic battle for the earth and/or universe be so saturated with robots that piss, fart, act stupid, talk in "ebonic', or hump Megan Fox's leg. Does Bay actually think that this kind of low-brow, juvenile humor is funny? Was all of this done for a younger audience? If so, then why in the hell was there all the f-bombs, the killing, and a slutty Megan Fox bent over a motorcycle? I was surprised I didn't see an ad on TV that had Optimus Prime saying: "Fuck feel-good family flicks like E.T. or Wall-e, take the little mother-fuckers to Transformers 2." I'm officially convinced that Bay's brain was pickled and preserved the moment he hit puberty, never to age from hence forth. That would explain horrible mix of the pre-teen humor, action, violence, language and sex in Transformers 2. I'm also convinced that if you approached Michael Bay and said the words "plot development" and "no special effects" the expression on his face would look like my mother trying to open a jar of pickles.
The best way to sum up this movie: Devastator's balls. If you think Devastator having two wrecking ball testicles is funny (and I know some people do, because a few people in the theater wouldn't stop laughing) then you think the fake scrotums people put on the backs of trucks are funny. I'm boggled why Bay would try to cram so much "comedy" into his summer action spectacular.
Oh, the twins? They are disgustingly fucking racist. I will rabidly disagree with anyone who says otherwise on this because, besides the voices, besides the gold teeth, and besides them yelling they "I'm gon' pop a cap in yo' ass", they look like robot versions of the censored 1920's black cartoon characters: Big lips, big ears, small heads; all of them drawn like monkeys. It's really, really awful. Shit with this trend I'm honestly expecting the following four robots in the inevitable Transformers 3:
A beatup old truck with a confederate flag that is covered in rust and speaks with a southern accent. Kinda like "Mater" from Pixar's Cars except it wears a white hood and has a noose instead of a tow hook.
A low rider voiced by Cheech Marin that does more sleeping and pot smoking than fighting, runs on tequila, and attacks with a bladed sombrero like he's Kung Lao from Mortal Kombat.
A yellow "ricer" that mixes up the "L"s and "R"s in its speech, is good at math, and its optical sensors are narrow and slanted.
A male, neon pink scooter that slurs his speech, decorates the Autobots's base, and 'connects' to other robots in ways that are deeply pornographic.
Did I miss any blatant stereotypes? Maybe a female robot that shoots nipple-missiles from her Double-D's and transforms into a vacuum cleaner or a dishwasher?
But the aforementioned 'Raceformers' might not actually be a bad idea; adding some color and uniqueness to the Transformer designs would help me figure out who the fuck is winning and losing during the action scenes. But it's not like it matters anyways; the plot was so infinitesimal that the only fights that ever matter were between Optimus Prime, Megatron, and The Fallen. Every other fight was either a mesh of metal parts crashing into each other like mid-air traffic accidents, or it was Optimus and the other Transformers jumping into the air, twisting and contorting like 12-year-old circus acrobat ballerina ninjas, lithe and light as a feather, instead of being enormous hunks of metal. Again, it's what Bay thinks is cool, and his refusing to let any sense of reality interfere with his genius.
Transformers 2: Revenge of the Fallen did not amuse me, nor did it entertain me because apparently I made the mistake of "leaving my brain on" against the wishes of the Bayformers fans. The action sequences were grand and flashy, but it was the way they were set up that kept me from enjoying them. Instead I spent the entire fight sequence wondering where in the hell Character A appeared from, or where Character B disappeared to. But again, apparently I'm thinking more about plot and story structure than Bay or the Bayformers fanboys want me to. No, I was supposed to laugh at every fart and fuck joke that flashed on the screen; I was supposed to "ooh" and "aah" at the poorly filmed cluster-fuck fight scenes that looked like close up footage of a tool chest rolling down a cliff; and I was supposed to cry when Sam dies and goes to Robot Heaven (I won't even get into that, it makes just as little sense as the rest of the movie).
But a lot of you guys loved that movie. I have no clue how. Maybe you guys can turn off your brains, but I don't want to because I'm too scared I'll never be able to turn it back on again.
Yeah thanks for insulting everyone who actually enjoyed the movie asshole.
'Bayformers'? Cmon. There was a lot in the movie that was awesome but
everybody picks it apart like its a frog on a dissection table. Robot
balls, this. Humping Megan Fox, that. I'm tired of it. Why can't people
just sit back and enjoy a movie. Seriously the movie is based on TOYS so
what do you expect? I'd like to see you make a better movie. I daer you to
throw out a better movie concept.
RITOS
17 Aug 2009, 00:29
Speaking of the fanboys...
Sorry you feel like that, man, but you'll have to excuse me if I've come
to expect more out of Hollywood than a string of fart jokes in a movie with
a budget of $200-million.
Last year we had action movies that were surprisingly deep (Dark Knight and
Iron Man) and everyone was thinking: "This is the power and magic of
movies." It was like witnessing evolution or even the birth of a new
species: The intelligent action blockbuster, and everybody loved it. It
kept people excited and also made people think about what they had
witnessed long after the movie was over.
Then along comes Michael Bay, the 50-year-old fratboy, dragging us back
into the Dark Ages of the stupid popcorn flicks with Transformers 2. I'm
insulted as a movie-goer that for $200-million they couldn't have pulled
off either something slightly thought-provoking, or even just a cool movie
about robots punching eachother. But no, we needed the juvinile humor that,
according to the backlash against Revenge of the Fallen, people "love".
You want to know what I would do for a GOOD Transformers movie? Very
simple: Sam gets a car that is actually a Transformer. From that moment on,
the only purpose for Sam is to convey the world of the Transformers to the
audience. Optimus Prime and the others explain their war to him, their
technologies, and any other plot points. In telling Sam, the audience is
properly informed about situations, characters, and so on. NO COLLEGE
BULLSHIT, NO FOCUS ON RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN A NERD AND A FOX, NO GODDAMN
ANNOYING PARENTS. PERIOD.
Another optional (or possibly added) perspective would be a soldier
witnessing the war between the Transformers first-hand (kinda like how the
first movie started out).
That's it. The rest is developing the characters of the individual
Transformers, NOT the comedy relief characters. Have some wicked skirmish
battles that lead to an epic fight, then end it with at LEAST 7 minutes of
Megatron and Prime fighting head-to-head with all sorts of cool weaponry
(and keep Sam THE FUCK OUT OF THE FIGHT!) Optimus wins, Decepticons retreat
with a smashed up Megatron to set up a sequel. Roll credits. Summer
blockbuster and everyone is happy.
zimes
17 Aug 2009, 02:43
Being that I have never seen this movie and more than likely my friends on
this site will make fun of me for going to this. Also being a collector
and fan of the original transformers ( I have both original Optimus and
Megatron), I never remember anything about being a Sam toy.
The fact that two ass hat transformers gets more play time than old school
transformers is pathetic and insulting to all transformer fans. Jazz,
Sideswipe, Sunstreaker (Sideswipes twin), Prowl, Wheel Jack, Ironhide,
Ratchett, Grimlock, Smokescreen, Infurno, Hoist, Brawl, Cliffjumper, Hound,
Mirage, Blaster, Ultra Magnus, Blur, Springer, Hot rod, Bumble bee. only a
very few of the original transformers autobots are even in the movie and
two ass hats get more play time than any of the above. (I do realize that
skids is an original TF but, he has no twin, nor did he act like a
jack-ass).
Really, I am prepared to turn off my brain to enjoy the movie. But,
Afterword I will probably join up in Ritos's words about how Bay raped the
memory of transformers.
AesopsLegend
17 Aug 2009, 18:17
This review was a riot. I visit this site because of the way you all write
your reviews as brutally honest. Don't throw punches and keep them
coming!!!
azrael723
18 Aug 2009, 16:16
Everybodys always hatin on Bay and Transformers 2. The movie wasnt perfect
but no movie really is. There was stupid scenes like when the mom ate the
hash brownie and was trippin and the robots were racist as fuck. Funny pic
about the racist robots tho ROFL.
Still the movie had the BEST DAMN ACTION SEQUENCES ALL YEAR. Iron Man and
Batman didn't have shit in comparison. Peace!
RITOS
19 Aug 2009, 10:20
Zimes: we won't make fun of you but we will chastise you if you pay money
for this movie.
Aesop: thanks
Azrael: yes the movie had action and that's what Bay specializes in, but
you cant have explosion after explosion and call it a movie. My opinion,
anyways.
ONOE
22 Aug 2009, 10:07
Funny review! You had me laughing out loud but also personally analyzing
the movie as well. Usually I go to a movie and don't really think that
deeply about what I'm watching, so maybe Bay and his BayFormers got what
they wanted from me. I try not to be overly critical when I watch a movie,
but after reading this review I realized how much some of the smaller
things really did bug me.
Read my latest review: Devil May Cry the Anime.
http://www.cheshirecatstudios.com/reviews/devil-may-cry-anime/
Rasser
31 Aug 2009, 10:13
Everybody gets it. Transformers sucks. Move on people.
Kenny Farino
12 Sep 2009, 11:06
This was seriously on par with the terrible ripoff movie Transmorphers. It
was disappointing, and I would have cursed "WHAT THE $%^$ ARE YOU
DOING?!" had I not been a camp counselor taking the kids to the movies at
that time. Seriously, Bay.
RITOS
13 Sep 2009, 16:42
The Horror Corner guy is a camp counselor? At least you know what NOT to do
and stay alive, right?
Kenny Farino
17 Sep 2009, 06:55
Yeah, my ideal summer doesn't include getting a machete stuck in my noggin
:P.
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Transformers 2: Revenge of the Fallen
