Transformers

[Arnwyn]

Just saw it last week.

I didn't enjoy it all that much, but it didn't suck. A 6/10 - slightly above average for a "summer blockbuster". Spent a few moments bored (who knew that someone could make giant robots boring? But looks like the (director? screenwriter?) managed to) and it was about 40 minutes too long. Hunting for glasses and that lame "Section 7" nonsense didn't do much for me.

I might have enjoyed it more if I were 10 years younger - basically it was some teenage masturbation movie, which has long since been lost on me. Way too many snot-nosed teenagers getting in the way of giant robots.

And the poor, poor Autobots. What terrible luck it was for them to have happened to each land on Earth in front of a GM dealership. No wonder the Autobots needed the meatbags' help to win - the Decepticons get cool forms, while the Autobots get stuck with the iest cars on earth. Nice going, losers. (And no wonder

Spoiler

Jazz died - a Pontiac Solstice? That car has universally reviewed badly. You got what you deserved, Jazz

.)

What dipstick thought it would be a good idea to bring the cube straight to a major population center? Oh yeah - the moron that thought there would (read: might) be a good fight sequence there. Whatever. (And no - I don't buy the excuses given in this thread, sorry. In any case, I expect movies to show clearly why such questionable decisions are made, and this movie failed on that, regardless.)

Finally - shakey cams suck. They've always sucked, and they still suck today. Hard.

Megatron and his pure Cybertronian form rocked. And, while I didn't get much out of some of the Transformers, the normal/mundane military hardware - namely the desert sequence with A-10s and gunships - was awesome.

 

[Orius]

*resurrect*

Not a bad movie. I remember watching the Transformers cartoons when I was a kid, but I have to be honest here. I haven't seen them in like 20 years, and I left the Transformers behind when I hit puberty. Honestly, I sometimes am surprised the toys are still popular. The only ones I remembered were Optimus Prime and Megatron, I pretty much forgot all the rest of the stuff.

So I'm almost coming to this movie from the angle of the uninitiated (though I knew damn well when that rig rolled by the crashed Autobot that that would be Prime (and when did Prime get those flames, wasn't he solid red and blue?)). And to be honest, I think it turned out to be a pretty good movie that was born out of an '80's toy line and the cartoon that was pretty much a marketing device for those toys. It could have been way cheesier. The story wasn't too bad, and there were some decent action sequences. Shaky camera doesn't bother me that much, but I'd have to say it's a bad cinematic technique. Sometimes realistic DOESN'T work in a movie, for whatever reason.

I do agree that there wasn't enough screen time of the Autobots and too many humans. The Sector 7 crap and the hip-hop hacker in particular felt extraneous. But the scenes with the army guys fighting the Decepticons was pretty good.

Did Hasbro think they weren't getting enough of a plug out of an entire movie based on one of thier toy lines? There was that girl with a big stuffed My Little Pony when the one Autobot crashed into the family pool, and the big fight scene in the city had a truck with a Furby on it.

The DVD was kind of disappoiting. No special features, cut scenes, theatrical trailers or anything like that. Am I the only one who's getting disappointed by the seemingly increasing lack of material on DVDs these days (are they saving all the stuff for freakin' Blu-Ray?)

 

[John Crichton]

The DVD was kind of disappoiting. No special features, cut scenes, theatrical trailers or anything like that. Am I the only one who's getting disappointed by the seemingly increasing lack of material on DVDs these days (are they saving all the stuff for freakin' Blu-Ray?)

You must have the non-Special Edition.

http://www.amazon.com/Transformers-..._bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1206783409&sr=8-1

This is the one you want for the special features:

http://www.amazon.com/Transformers-..._bbs_sr_2?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1206783409&sr=8-2

I believe it has a little more, in extras, than the HD-DVD version (that I own).

 

[Asmor]

I think the Target exclusive had the best special feature...

...the DVD case transforms into Optimus Prime.

It's not very complicated, arms and legs just swing out or tuck back in, but it's still freaking cool. Stands as tall as my Unicron figure, too.

 

[Orius]

You must have the non-Special Edition.

No big deal, it was just Blockbuster.