Movie Reviews: Transformers (2007)

Title: Transformers (2007)

Cast:

Peter Cullen as Optimus Prime
Mark Ryan as Bumble Bee
Jess Harnell as Ironhide
Robert Foxworth as Ratchet
Darius McCrary as Jazz
Hugo Weaving as Megatron
Charlie Adler as Starscream
Frank Welker as Soundwave
Jess Harnell as Barricade
Reno Wilson as Frenzy
Shia LaBeouf as Sam Witwicky
Megan Fox as Mikaela Banes
Kevin Dunn as Ron Witwicky
Julie White as Judy Witwicky
Tyrese Gibson as Robert Epps
Rachael Taylor as Maggie Madsen
John Tuturro as Agent Seymour Simmons
Anthony Anderson as Glen Whitmann

Directed by: Michael Bay

Country: USA

Distributed by: Paramount Pictures

Genre: Sci-Fi, Action, Adventure

Year of Release: 2007

Synopsis: Optimus Prime, the leader of the Autobots, narrates the collapse of planet Cybertron. According to his narration, the planet was ravaged by a devastating civil war between the Autobots and Decepticons in the attempt to gain possession of an artifact called the "Allspark", which has the ability to bring inanimate machines to life in the form of transforming robots. The Autobots wanted the Allspark for the sake of good, while the Decepticons wanted it for their own personal gain in building an army to control the universe. As the war worsened, the Allspark was banished into deep space in hopes that nobody would find it. But Megatron located the Allspark, and his search led him to planet Earth, where he crash landed in the Arctic Circle and was frozen in the ice during the prehistoric age. Millions of years later, in 1897, Megatron is discovered by archeologist Archibald Witwicky, who accidentally activated Megatron's navigational system, and his glasses were imprinted with the coordinates of the Allspark's location. Fast forward to the present day, a military base in Qatar is attacked by a Decepticon called Blackout in an attempt to locate Megatron and the Allspark. He tries to hack into the military base's network for information, but is cut off. Meanwhile, in America, Archibald's descendant, Sam Witwicky, buys his first car, which turns out being an Autobot named Bumble Bee, who becomes his closest friend and protector. After his first encounter with the Decepticon Barricade, who Bumble Bee defeats, Sam soon learns about the ongoing war of the Transformers, and finds himself involved in the struggle.

Personal Comments: I know this may sound crazy, but ever since the 80s when I was a kid, I've always wondered what a live action Transformers film would be like. Most of the longtime fans know about the original animated movie from 1986. And to this day, many fans who grew up with it still regard it as a timeless classic. But I'm not so sure how many fans have ever pictured there existing a live action Transformers film at the time. And up until 2007, a live action Transformers film had never been done before. Well, much to the surprise of fans everywhere, that literally became a reality many years later with the release of the first live-action film by Michael Bay. And this movie came out 21 years after the original. Now, based on what I understand, there have been a lot of mixed reviews regarding this film and its sequels. Some people liked them, and some people hated them. Now to be honest, the first live-action Transformers film isn't all that bad. But I admit that there are a few things about it that do suck however. But before I review this, I want to start this off by saying that when I first saw the trailers for this movie, I had mixed reactions. Sure the trailers looked awesome and they definitely caught people's attention. But I wasn't so sure on whether to be excited or apprehensive since even big budget movies these days tend to fall short of audience's expectations. Needless to say that's been a reoccurring case all throughout the 2000s. And well, I wasn't all that surprised at how this movie turned out. Because as we all know, the movie has met with mixed reception from the general audience. Surprisingly, despite its mixed reception, it did pretty well at the box office, grossing millions of dollars worldwide. But let's go over it in vivid detail about the good, the bad, and the ugly. And be prepared, because I will also go over the two sequels that followed after this movie, and I'm going to be referencing the 1986 film on occasion.

The Good:
First of all, this movie has its fair share of ups and downs. But first I'm going to talk about what I liked about this movie. The first thing I want to address to is the fact that they got Peter Cullen to reprise his role as the voice of Optimus Prime. At first, this totally caught me off guard. But I mean that in the good way because that's one redeeming factor to this movie. As a long time Transformers fan, I have to say that I was actually quite surprised that Peter Cullen had returned to reprise his role after so many years since the G1 cartoon. And I have to say that after listening to his performance in this film, he's still the perfect voice for the character. Needless to say, he's even reprising his role as Optimus in the show called "Transformers: Prime" which I reviewed earlier this year. And because he still holds up, he has earned my utmost sense of respect. But in fact, I've always had a great sense of respect for Peter Cullen even during my childhood in the 80s. Again, having Cullen reprise his role as the number one Autobot leader after such a long time is a breath of fresh air, seeing as he's done mostly TV commercials for Toonami in back the 90s. On top of that, it was great to see Optimus Prime back in action again. Not that he hasn't had much time in the spotlight to begin with of course seeing as there were numerous TV shows that came before the first live-action movie came along. But I think every Transformers fan would agree with me on this that Peter Cullen was and still is the perfect voice for Optimus Prime. One thing I found to be a complete surprise was that they got Hugo Weaving to do the voice of Megatron rather than his original voice actor, Frank Welker. Based on what I've heard, Michael Bay wanted Megatron to have a more sinister and menacing voice, because he felt Frank Welker's original voice would be unfitting for the live action version of the character. And as we all know, Hugo Weaving is most credited for his role as Agent Smith from the highly acclaimed "Matrix" film series. I have to admit though that Hugo Weaving's performance as Megatron was definitely on par with Leonard Nimoy's take on Galvatron from the original animated movie. And I couldn't have been more impressed with Weaving's performance. He was just awesome. His sinister and menacing tone of voice was just badass, and it was totally fitting for the character. Speaking of Leonard Nimoy, he had just recently returned to the Transformers craze to do the voice of of Sentinel Prime for "Dark of the Moon", marking the first time in years since he voiced Galvatron in the 1986 movie.

The one thing I really I loved about this movie was its use of CGI animation for the robots and special effects. Since this movie was directed by Michael Bay, explosions here and there along with things being wrecked and blown to smithereens is what's to be expected in a Bay film. But anyway, in terms of practicality, I have to say that the computer generated robots and special effects are madly awesome. They just kick ass. In fact, this is similar to how I imagined a live action Transformers film when I was a kid. I can only imagine though that designing and animating the robots took a lot of time and effort on the animators' part. Because if there's one thing I know about animation, whether its hand drawn or computerized, is that its not an easy process, and it takes a lot of time, patience, and effort to pull off. In fact, I once heard in one of the documentaries from the DVD edition that each robot was designed and modeled piece by piece, and were composed of thousands upon thousands of individual parts put together to make one complete transformer. Not only that, but they also had to get the rights to some of the vehicles that were used for their alternate modes. And I can imagine that that must have been a pain in the ass to deal with seeing as copyrights can interfere with the development of a production. Anyway, as a whole, the robots and the special effects are just madly spectacular, and they really stand out among what most of modern day movies gives us these days seeing as there's little to no variety in most of today's films. Another surprise that caught me off guard was the use of Optimus's famous quote from the 1986 film "One shall stand, one shall fall." When I heard that, I was instantly reminded of the original movie.

Another thing that I liked about this movie were the changes they made to some of the robot characters. One thing I instantly noticed was that the robots have a completely different and distinct design in the live action films as opposed to their old-school cartoony designs in the G1 cartoon. In the movies they look more detailed and alien-like in appearance. Some of the robots who transform into smaller vehicles or household appliances were made in-scale with their alternate modes as opposed to being bigger and taller when in robot mode, which of course makes perfect sense. While Optimus Prime remains an 18-wheeler, and Ratchet remains an ambulance, Bumble Bee was changed from a Volkswagen Beetle to a modern day Chevrolet Camaro. Even his robot design was updated. Now at first I felt a bit nostalgic about Bumble Bee's original robot and vehicle designs from the G1 cartoon. But I quickly came to accept this change for I ultimately deemed it necessary, since the Volkswagen Beetle is outdated and out of style. It still has a special place in my heart being that I'm an old-schooler, but this is one of those cases where change is a necessity. They even changed Ironhide's robot and vehicle modes as well. Rather than being depicted as a red van like he was in the original cartoon, Ironhide was a modified black Chevrolet Kodiak truck. Again, I thought this was a unique take on the character. It's not what I'm used to, but its a unique twist nevertheless. Interestingly, in all three of the live action films, Ironhide was not voiced by Peter Cullen like he was in the G1 cartoon. But rather, he was voiced by Jess Harnell, who I remember most fondly as the voices of Wakko from Animaniacs, and Hunter from Road Rovers. And as for the Decepticons, some changes were made to them as well. For instance, Megatron has undergone some major changes in both his robot and vehicle designs. As I've outlined in my review of Transformers Prime, Megatron's alternate mode was changed from being a small handgun to an alien jet fighter. And to be honest, I thought was a significant and necessary update since today's audiences would laugh at the idea of a giant robot transforming into a gun that can fit into a person's hand. Wheras his robot mode looks monstrous and bestial, which I thought was appropriate for him since Megatron has a massive ego. In fact, the way his face was designed closely resembled that of a mechanical piranha, which I thought was downright creepy and demonic looking. Another thing I found interesting was how they involved the army into these movies as well, which made them seem like a cross between Transformers and GI Joe, which are both franchises of Hasbro. Not to mention the filler scenes had me thinking "WHAT DOES THIS HAVE TO DO WITH TRANSFORMERS?!"

In the sequel, "Revenge of the Fallen" Megatron could also change to an alien tank with bladed treadmills. But he still retained his jet mode. So he literally had three different modes. Though, I think that was a clever idea to have a tank as Megatron's alternate mode since that seems to fit him perfectly. Starscream was changed from being an F-15 Eagle to a modern day F-22 Raptor. Interestingly, he was voiced by Charlie Adler, who I remember as the voices of Snively and Reynard from Sonic SatAM, the red guy from Cow and Chicken, and T-Bone from Swat Kats. And lastly, Soundwave was changed from being a cassette player to a satellite that that hovers around Earth's orbit and ejects pods that change into the robots we know as Ravage and Laserbeak. Of course, Laserbeak didn't show up until the third movie "Dark of the Moon". Soundwave himself was once again voiced by his original voice actor Frank Welker, who is known around the world for being one of the most famous voice actors of all time. In fact, as I've mentioned elsewhere, Frank Welker is a legend in voice acting because he's participated in so many different TV shows in his career. But this time he voiced Soundwave in a similar tone of voice he used for Dr. Claw from Inspector Gadget. This didn't bother me too much because I figured they wanted to do something different. And I think it worked quite well. The rest of the Decepticons were just randomly introduced robots who could change into their own signature vehicle, and had their own variety of weapons and powers. But sadly, none of these characters were given much development other than being there just for the action. Most of them don't even have any dialogue. So basically they were just depicted as mindless killing machines with no personality. And well, Starscream is nothing like most of his past incarnations. In fact, we are only given brief glimpes of his personality in these movies, and he's not the backstabbing traitor that we remember him as. But rather, he is depicted being a mere coward. And that was a real downside on my part. As for the robots in general, it's to my understanding that some people complained about some of the changes that were made to them. But personally, I think some of these changes were necessary for the sake of updating things for a fresh new audience. I'll say that much.

The Bad:
Now for what I disliked about this movie and the two sequels that followed in its wake. When I went to go see the first movie in theaters, I was rather skeptical because I just knew that this movie and the two sequels that would soon follow weren't going to be anything like the original film that I grew up with as a kid. Now before anybody starts pointing fingers and starts calling me biased, ignorant, and old-fashioned, hear me out first. First of all, I admit that I'm biased and old-fashioned. I do not deny that. And I have accepted that this isn't the 1980s anymore. But what I mean by saying that I knew that the first live action movie wasn't going to be anything like the original is that it did not follow some of the essential rules that most fans would expect in a movie that's supposed to be about the Transformers. The one problem I have with all three of the films is that the robot characters are overshadowed by the human actors 90% of the time. What Michael Bay did was essentially push the robots into the background, choosing instead to focus more on the human characters who take up quite a bit of the focus. In fact, despite the title of the films, the movies are barely even about the Transformers. Half the time, the robot characters are absent and are not given much screen-time or development, and that is a serious issue that has plagued all three films. Because the title of the films is "Transformers". That would be like if they made the next TMNT movie that had little to do with the ninja turtles, or if they made the next X-Men movie that had little to do with the X-Men. Imagine how many people would be pissed off at that. You just don't do that because that is contradicts the title. In fact, the movies are more about Shia LaBeouf's character, Sam Witwicky, who is loosely based on Spike Witwicky from the original cartoon. But the problem with this character is that he comes off as downright annoying. Hell, Shia LaBeouf pretty much steals the show. But that isn't even the worst of it. The majority of these movies are plagued by a bunch of annoying human characters who have little to no importance to the plot, and are just there to act as fillers to prologue the length of the films. They don't serve any true purpose to the story, they're just there to annoy the audience. So why put them in there? Half the time I felt that I was watching a typical teen comedy film and not Transformers. If anything, the movies should have been titled "The Adventures of Sam Witwicky". That would have been a more accurate title since the robots were barely in the films to begin with. And that's the thing about these movies, they focus way too much on the human actors who fans care nothing about along with all the corny and gay jokes and fillers which were really unnecessary and have no purpose to the grand scheme of things whatsoever. For example, the scene in the first movie where Bumble Bee "urinates" on John Tuturro seemed completely random and out of place. Though, as I remember, everybody laughed in the theater for about 3 seconds before remaining silent. And that's the thing; its funny for about 3 seconds and then it loses its flavor. In the sequel, "Revenge of the Fallen", that same guy, John Tuturro, takes off his pants in one part for some reason. I mean what the hell was the point of that? Was that supposed to be funny or something? I mean could it have been more random and out of place? Because if that was seriously supposed to be funny, that was a major epic fail.

One thing I found interesting about the first two movies was Megan Fox, who played as Sam Witwicky's girlfriend Mikaela Banes. She was kind of like the movies' equivalent of Carly, Spike's wife from the G1 cartoon. But here's the question that a lot of fans have asked; what was her purpose in the movie other than just acting as eye-candy? I mean there's no doubt that a lot of male viewers have had erections just from looking at her. Cuz I mean what can I say about Megan Fox? She's hot! But again I have to ask; what was her purpose in the movie besides acting as eye-candy? I mean no offense to the actress, but she doesn't really have much purpose in this movie other than just being there to arouse male audiences. I mean she's as pointless as Kelly from RID! Okay, maybe she's not "that" pointless but still; characters have to have a reason for why they're in the story in the first place! Of course, as time went on, I grew used to Megan's presence. But sadly, she was replaced by Rosie Huntington Whitely in the third movie, who played the role of the character "Carly". This made the third movie seem a little more cannon to the G1 cartoon. I'm not entirely sure why they decided to replace Fox for Whitely. Maybe she lost interest in the films and decided to move on? Or maybe it was a decision made by Michael Bay and the producers? Who knows? The funny thing is that Megan Fox's character was never mentioned in the third film and nor is it ever explained what happened to her or how Sam ended up with Carly. For what its worth, I guess we can assume that they broke up with each other because Mikaela felt that Sam was whiny and annoying twat. If that was the case, then I can't say I blame her for dumping him, because Sam only became more irritating and less tolerable as time went on, which adds another one to the list of problems.

As I've stated earlier, most of the movies consisted of mostly pointless fillers in between the segments where the robots and the action were involved. In fact, that pretty much became a recurring theme of all three movies; pointless sex jokes everywhere, scenes that have nothing to do with the plot or story (not that there seemed like much to begin with), and annoying characters who practically take up most of the screen time and steal the show. So where were the transformers half the time? Weren't they the reason why fans paid so much money to see the movies in theaters in the first place? In the way I see it, the Transformers were merely background characters, much like Lupe and the Wolfpack from Sonic. In fact, they were practically just a sub-plot in the entire trilogy. And again, that is contradicting to the title "Transformers". And speaking of annoying characters, does anybody remember the twins Mudflap and Skidz? Because I heard that there were a lot of complaints about those two. In fact, I heard that some people were offended by their stereotypical African American accents and catch phrases, many of which audiences found to be extremely racist. And to top it off, they were the only robot characters besides Bumble Bee who had a decent level of focus and attention. Because of the complaints from audiences and critics alike regarding these two characters, Mudflap and Skidz have only appeared in the second movie, "Revenge of the Fallen" and did not return for "Dark of the Moon". Oh, and does anybody else besides myself find it weird that Bumble Bee somehow regained his ability to talk at the end of the first movie, but for some reason never talks again? I always wondered about that. Because if Bumble Bee could speak again, why would they have him remain mute throughout the entire series? For what its worth, I'm pretty sure it was an intentional decision on Michael Bay and the writers' part. One thing that shocked me in the bad way was the random deaths of characters Jazz, Ironhide, and the Arcee triplets. For those of you who may recall, Jazz was torn apart by Megatron in the first movie, the Arcee triplets were blown away in the second, and Ironhide was killed by the traitorous Sentinel Prime in the third. Again, the robots are barely even in the movies, so their deaths in these films were just pointless. But I have to admit that I wasn't expecting Jazz or Ironhide to die, because the lack of character development for those guys made their deaths seem very premature. Because I didn't really feel any emotional impact. Remember when Optimus Prime died in the original animated movie? Because that actually had some weight to it. Something which Michael Bay certainly couldn't replicate with his movies being mostly about the sex jokes and the half-assed attempts at humor. But at least Optimus Prime survived all three films. Yes, he sort of died in "Revenge of the Fallen", but he was brought back to life all too quickly by Sam using the Matrix, which of course is completely different from how I remember it from the original movie. Though, I felt that the Matrix was pointless in "Revenge of the Fallen" since they could have just used one of the pieces of the Allspark to revive him instead. And speaking of pointless deaths, the way Starscream goes out in the third film by the hands of Sam and Simmons was just downright ridiculous and embarrassing. And even Megatron dies in the third film all too quickly and anticlimactically. That's what I'd like to call bad writing and poor use of characters.

The Ugly:
After watching all three movies, I can now conclude that the movies barely have anything to do with Transformers. The first movie was okay. In fact, despite all the corny jokes, annoying characters, and pointless fillers, I forgave these problems for the first time around and ultimately decided that the first movie was fairly decent. It was pretty good for the most part. But the two sequels that came after it were inexcusably bad because they all suffered from the exact same problems that plagued the first one. And on top of that, the story never really went anywhere after the first movie as they just made up random shit as they went along. While the problems from the first movie can be excused, its another thing entirely to repeat the same mistakes over and over again. In fact, I had lost faith in the two sequels, and I practically fell asleep in the theater in my vain hopes that there would be anything worth while. Now, I can understand why they would neglect the robots for the first movie, but did they have to resort to doing the same thing three times in a row? What? Was the budget not good enough to allow the robots much screen-time or development? Or was that all based on the biased decisions of Michael Bay? In fact, now that I think of it, this makes me wonder if Michael Bay even knew anything about Transformers. Like the production team didn't have enough characters to work with? Did they ever read any of the comics or watch any of the TV shows, or the original movie for that matter? Because they could have gained a lot of ideas from any of those sources! Seriously, is it really so hard to make a film that is true to the spirit of the Transformers without neglecting who audiences would expect to be the center focus?

Now let me ask you something; what is the one thing that all the different Transformers TV shows have in common? Well, for one thing, despite their obvious differences, they actually focus on the Transformers. Even the 1986 movie obeyed this rule. Sure there were some human characters who audiences could relate to, but they were not the center focus. And also, the TV show and the original movie didn't rely too much on annoying human characters, corny jokes, and pointless fillers that served no purpose; they at least had a level of consistency and a plot-flow that had their audiences engaged. For real; is that too much to ask for to have a faithful film adaptation of an 80s TV show and toy-line that many people grew up with back then, who are now sharing "Transformers" with their own kids today? I mean I know I shouldn't compare these movies to the original since they're two different subjects. But I think I have a valid reason for my argument when it comes to the two sequels; if you're planning on making a theatrical film, TV show, or video game based on a particular franchise, its important to stay true to the source material and not to stray away from it too much. Otherwise, that just turns off the audience's attention. And from what I've heard, some people left the theater and wanted their money back after paying to see "Revenge of the Fallen" and "Dark of the Moon". Why's that you ask? One reason was because of the outrageous level of absurdity and the lack of focus and substance, and second reason was because the movies were not true to the source material. This is not the Transformers that we grew up with as kids.

But I think one question I should ask is; who was the target audience for these movies? Well I can certainly say that they weren't intended for viewers who were expecting a detailed and in-depth plot and story, and they certainly weren't intended for longtime fans of Transformers. Some people say that the movies were made simply to support a new line of Transformers action figures and to create a new generation of fans across the globe, which is a good contribution no doubt. However, some reviewers said that Michael Bay really doesn't give a shit about Transformers, and that he was just looking for a way to make money. Well, if that was the case, I can say without a doubt that he has succeeded because the movies no doubt had grossed millions of dollars at the box office. But money isn't everything. Because for the most part, the movies have met with mixed criticism from both hardcore fans, and casual movie goers alike. Based on what information I was able to obtain from various sources on the internet, it is said that Michael Bay will be doing a fourth Transformers film which is set for a theatrical release in June of 2014. As is the case with the last two films, the script will once again be written by Ehren Kruger. It's also been confirmed that Shia LaBeouf will not be returning as Sam Witwicky this time. And also, it has even been stated that after this movie has seen the light of day, Michael Bay will leave the door open for someone else to take over. Hopefully it will be someone who has more respect for the franchise's history. I can only hope for the best. But I have low expectations for the fourth film now.

Overall: Like I said, the first film was good, but the last two movies really killed it for me. I don't totally hate these movies, but they are seriously lacking in quality. But to be fair, I have to give Michael Bay some credit for actually making an effort to make a trilogy of movies that were based on the Transformers. Even though the movies hardly had anything to do with Transformers in the first place, at least he contributed to the franchise in his own way. Because I seriously doubt that any other film directors would ever make an effort to do anything based on Transformers. Especially since most of today's films offer nothing new, and most of mainstream society doesn't give a shit about what was popular back then. But even with that being said, "Revenge of the Fallen" and "Dark of the Moon" fell short of audience's expectations. I mean the flaws were excusable the first time around with the first movie, but it was inexcusable to repeat the same mistakes for the second and third time around. Bad writing, bad acting, corny jokes, and the piss lack of loyalty to the source material ultimately ruined the experience for me. For me, the highlight of all three movies were the action scenes that involved the robot characters. Especially the final battle scenes where we saw Optimus Prime fight Megatron, the Fallen, and Sentinel Prime. However short their screen-time was, I have to say that those scenes are the only parts I really care about in these movies. Now I know that there are those who outright defend Michael Bay's decisions by making a number of excuses for his choices, but you can't make excuses for actions that have been repeated over and over again. Sometimes the audiences know what they're talking about. Especially if they are more familiar with the source material than the director or the production team is. The most popular excuse you'll get in these films' defense is "What were you expecting? They're movies about toy robots! Just stop thinking and enjoy the explosions!" I don't care what the films are based on! That's no excuse for them to be this sloppy and inconsistent! A bad movie is a bad movie no matter what excuses you make for it. All I have to say is, if you want to go for these movies, you'd have to be a die-hard special effects fan, or a fan of the actors who participated in these movies. But if you're a die-hard Transformers fan and are expecting not just good action scenes, but adequate character development and a consistent plot flow, then you won't find any of that stuff here. My suggestion is watch the original 1986 movie if you still have it. Or if you want to get into something more up to date, watch the TV series Transformers Prime. Both those choices are much better than any of these movies put together. The point is if you're going to make movies based on the Transformers franchise, then they should be about the Transformers. That's how its supposed to be. That's all I gotta say.

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