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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Jeysie" data-source="post: 3635004" data-attributes="member: 51817">See, IMHO, that's exactly what the first movie needed to be. Not because I wouldn't love more Transformers-only time myself, but because that's what makes it an actual story instead of 2.5 hours of high-budget fanservice. This *is* a 21st century reboot, where you need exposition and setup instead of just jumping straight into things, and I feel it's handled well. (Remember complaints of X-Men 1 being too talky, and similar comments with other recent franchise reboots?)***Some specific thoughts:The military:[sblock]If I was an alien being trying to research a crash-landed leader and artifact, didn't find much public information, and  stumbled onto the world wide web (where conspiracy theories tend to breed like rabbits), I'd probably finally resort to hacking a military network, too. They're not versed enough in Earth culture to realize the conspirists are nutjobs (or are they nutjobs? <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)"  data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" /> ).So, it's not a surprise that the military gets involved. One could argue more subtlety on the Decepticons' part... but the fact that Blackout disguised as an Army aircraft suggests they were trying to be. Sneak in, drop Frenzy off and let him do his thing, pull out. Too bad the humans are too blasted suspicious. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)"  data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" /> [/sblock]Sector 7:[sblock]Isn't a secret government agency de rigueur where aliens are involved? And here, instead of being all-knowing and all-powerful, they (IMHO more realistically) get burned because they don't realize exactly what they're playing with.[/sblock]Sam & Family:Sam is a teenager. One who's histrionic and self-absorbed at that (traits which appear to be genetic...) So his main concern, at least at first, is getting (and keeping) his car and girl, and not getting killed by his parents. Following from that...The backyard scene:[sblock]You have the giant robots. Who - instead of placidly waiting around for The Great Bedroom Search - are impatient, running recon like soldiers, trying to remain inconspicious in the middle of suburbia, and grumbling about how it'd be much easier if they just shot the parents. In other words, behaving fairly realistically (for giant robots).On the other hand, you have Sam, whose personality I already summarized above. "How do I deal with giant robots in my yard and find my granddad's glasses in my bedroom without my potential girlfriend finding out about my pervy hobbies or my parents grounding me for life?"On the left foot, you have Sam's parents, who are worried about their son's closed door and voices, mysterious lights, ground shakes, and a trashed yard.And on the right foot, the neighbors. Truth be told, if I hear loud noises in the middle of the night, I usually roll over, pull my pillow over my head, and hope it goes away so I can get some sleep for work tomorrow.Anyone who did get up and saw the giant robots would probably figure that one, they had too much "sauce" that night, two, they're dreaming, or three, the neighbors got some blasted new toy that Junior's probably going to want for Christmas.And even if you didn't conclude one of those things, the cops probably would. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)"  data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" /> Douglas Adams didn't invent the "Somebody Else's Problem field" out of thin air.[/sblock]While it did go on a little too long in places, and had its dialogue a bit over-the-top for comedic purposes (both of which could be grumbled at), I don't think the actual existence of the scene is out-of-place.***As I commented to my friend after we saw the movie, it was nice to see the whole idea of robots walking around treated somewhat realistically for a change, as opposed to more like a robotic Godzilla vs. Mothra (you know, the aliens duke it out while the humans just run around, scream, and get crushed the entire movie).Now that [spoiler]the military thinks the Decepticons are all dead[/spoiler] and [spoiler]Sector 7 is no more[/spoiler], that leaves plenty of space to focus on the Transformers in a sequel. And by getting all the setup out of the way first, that makes this a fresh (and hopefully successful) movie franchise as opposed to a big-screen TV episode.I *would* have liked more character development and robot-on-robot-smashing, but I feel that having Earth be more than an alien playground is better story-telling, and we still got a good amount of those things. I have some grumbles with some of the details thereof, but not with the basic elements that were included.Just my own $2.00.Peace & Luv, Liz</blockquote>

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