THE GENERAL IDEA

THE GOOD

The bots are all great. Even the annoying Wheelie and whatever his new buddy is named. They are brief, but effective. A little campy to make the kiddies smile, but they actually serve a purpose. The Autobots are great and there is enough exposure to these characters to actually care who they are. A point is clearly made to reintroduce them so you know who is who. I didn’t really care for Q (Wheeljack)’s very humanized Einstien-esque head (with hair), but they all serve their purpose and each get a moment to shine. The parents are in this but very minor. And I count this as a very good thing.

This brings me to the real purpose of this film. The action and visuals. I saw this in 3D and I found it rather effective, again without obvious “in-your-face” thrusting images. It was an effective use of the technique, but not “required” to enjoy this movie.

The visuals worked really well. Normally I am not a fan of slow-mo action shots, but with the overly complicated bot-forms in tight combat, there was just enough of it to punctuate the action and impacting moments. The action was impressive and a lot of fun.

The biggest part that outweighs all other things in this movie is that they REALLY made this a more serious film for the most part. The final battle is very impressive and I cannot stress this more…. PEOPLE DIE. Characters die. I wont say who or how, but characters you know bite it and its hard to see it happen. There are scenes during the Decepticon invasion where they are gunning down fleeing fleshlings, bystanders get slaughtered. Its not graphic, but very obvious. They are not pretending this city is empty when the fight goes down, and the Autobots don’t save them all.

And the Autobots share. When human military forces attempt to take on these bots, they can stand their own (and for the most part still fail) because they have advanced tech. This makes sense.

Lastly, I know people are waiting to see how Rosie Huntington-Whiteley fares. They replaced a hot girl who isn’t an actress with a hot girl who isn’t an actress. No loss there. They don’t spend much time at all introducing how and why Carly is with Sam, and its done very well. They are already in the relationship at the very first frame of the movie. No time wasted on a pointless romance but still deals with Sam’s feelings for her in a way that works with the movie. Yes, Rosie is insanely hot, and a better female side character than Fox ever was. Sam is more mature now, and she is a much better counterpart to him in the film. (That and in the G1 animated series he ends up with Carly anyways)

THE BAD

There is a number of supporting cast in this film that I just had NO USE for. John Malkovich is typically a home run in everything he is in, but in this he plays an incoherantly overstated attempt at comic relief that just doesn’t work. Disappointing. Another crappy supporting character Ken Jeong -who is the same exaggerated awkward type he always is – is brief but ineffective. And lastly, Agent Simmons is back and really doesn’t need to be. AT ALL. His character delievers a plot point that could easily have been covered by any other character at all. Pointless.

I just wish at one point in this franchise they would give a definitive set of rules about their alternative modes. What they are able to transform into should have been defined. Some bots seem to be able to change into anything, and those things seem pointess when you see their bot forms. Most of the bots look like they are made up of parts of the vehicle they change into, but others don’t look like anything. The tranformations are so convoluted that I just can’t be fascinated.

Little nitpicks… I did like that Soundwave was not just a satellite in space, and not that I wanted him to be a Sony Walkman, but I wasn’t really impressed with what he does transform into. And Laserbeak looked awesome, but I was disappointed that he speaks.

Michael Bay still manages to get in his trademark explosions, which goes with the genre of the film, but he also gets a chance to insert his waving Us flag. I guess it wouldn’t be a Bay film without one.

OVERALL

The movie is a big shift in gears (pun intended) to a more serious combat film with a real world threat level. This is my favourite of the three films for this reason alone. Less hokey stuff (but its still there a bit) and a LOT more heart.

The film does run a little long, but its pretty clear that this is the end. Bay has hinted that he will not return to these films and I believe it.

If so, this is an effective finale.

I give Transformers Dark of the Moon a 7 out of 10

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