The
Autobots explore the Ark,
finding Sentinel Prime and some artifacts called the pillars. Well,
that was fun! Let's see as Sam and Carly eat dinner- wha? No, we're
in Africa instead. We see a giant rugged truck transform into a
robot... wearing a desert cloak. Do you know how BIG that thing would
have to be? Where did he get that? Did he knit it?
Whoa, that's
Megatron! We see he's living in a little shanty town with the rest of
his cohorts. WHY is Megatron still staying on Earth when he has that
massive Deception base back on Saturn where they were growing the
Fetus Farms? Did it just magically blow up when the Fallen was
killed? Where did Megatron get a cloak that big?!?
Soundwave
stops by to be awesome, and they're still going with Frank Welker's
Dr. Claw voice instead of the animated Soundwave one. Not complaining
though, just pointing it out. Soundwave and Laserbeak report their
scheme was a success, the Autobots took the bait and have returned to
Earth with the cargo from the Ark.
Megatron is pleased, ordering Laserbeak to kill the rest of their
human collaborators.
We then get a WTF
transition of a bunch of crime scene photos and newspaper clippings
of dead people that were in on the Decepticons scheme, which is SO
out of place in a movie like this it makes my head spin. Bay
IMMEDIATELY tops this in the next scene, where Laserbeak goes to a
house out in the suburbs and changes into his robot form.
He finds a little
girl playing in her yard, asking if her daddy's home in the most
demonic voice possible as the movie shifts HARD into creepy as fuck
territory. The screen cuts to black. The scene comes back on with the
girl reading a book to Laserbeak as her mom walks in. Laserbeak
shifts into his bird form. The screen cuts to black. The scene comes
back with Laserbeak chasing the mom through the house as she screams.
The screen cuts to black. The scene comes back with the father
sitting in the couch, demanding to know why Laserbeak is there. The
Deception replies “Just visiting” as the screen cuts to black
AGAIN.
The scene comes
back for the last time as we see the mantle of the house, containing
a picture of the father and several other men standing in front of
the Accuretta building. One of the men is noticeably Ken Jeong, the
renowned actor who will say yes to starring in anything. I nearly forgot:
WHAT THE FUCK WAS WITH THAT SCENE WE JUST SAW?! This movie has gone
on WAY too long without Sam, so we watch as he goes about a day at
work in the mail room. Carly comes to see him, and FOR ONCE Bay's
idiotic “upwards shot of a character getting out of a car or a
plane” makes sense because it gives him a chance to shove his
camera between Rosie Huntington-Whiteley's legs. I'm not even sure
she was wearing underwear in this scene.
I can safely say I
owe Megan Fox the biggest apology ever- no wait, I don't. She was
horrible. But Rosie Huntington-Whiteley is HORRIBLER. We are talking
“You know, after watching this I realized Sofia Copolla in the
Godfather 3 wasn't REALLY that bad!” HORRIBLER here. Hell, Sam and
Carly are the new Sam's parents, which is literally the WORST thing I
can say about any characters ever.
She leaves, but not
before Bruce and everyone in the office can take the time to stare at
her ass. This is embarrassing to watch John, I truly hope that
paycheck you got was epic. Ken Jeong, who has been stalking Sam the
entire time, finally confronts him in an elevator and says he knows
all about Sam and the Transformers. And yes, Jeong is being total
“wacky wild Kool-Aid style!” in case you were wondering, but I
have no idea why you'd question that. What? No, he doesn't completely
destroy any serious tone the movie ever had going for it with his
goofy antics, why would you even assume that?
Ken grabs Sam
jacket and takes off, Sam cornering him in a bathroom stall. Ken
tells him his name is... do I REALLY have to say it? Hey, real quick
I want to share with you fine folks an interview Bay did about this
movie:
“What we did with
this movie is I think we have a much better script, and we got back
to basics. I think there’s some really cool action on this movie,
there’s some very cool conspiracy, there’s great robot stuff in
this that people were missing in the second one, you’ve got great
robot conflict. So I’m excited about this movie. It’s
more serious. I got rid of the dorky comedy, I mean we’ve got two
little characters, that’s it, but the dorkiness is not there.
Dork-free Transformers. It’s much more serious. It’s
still entertaining, it’s big looking.”
Just
keep that all in mind for this scene, and the rest of the movie. Ken
reveals his name is DEEP WANG, a hi-lar-ious parody of the fabled
“Deep Throat”. Deep Wang. That's his name. He starts ranting
about the moon and... why? WHY?! WHY?!? Wang pulls down his pants,
where he takes some papers out of a holster wrapped around his leg.
He gives them to Sam, telling him the Decepticons are killing
everyone who knows about the moon and the Autobots are next.
Bruce
enters the bathroom, and you know EXACTLY where this is going. Sam
and Wang exit the stall after a scuffle, Wang's pants still around
his ankles. More serious. No more dorky comedy. Dork-free
Transformers. Michael Bay is a man people throw billions of dollars
at. Sam
goes back to his desk to look over the papers, realizing Wang is onto
something. However, he never gets a chance to talk to Wang because
Laserbeak throws the nutjob out a window to his death. Sam is next on
the hitlist as I realize Laserbeak is now officially more badass than
Optimus Prime based off his kill count.
Laserbeak
starts shooting up the office indiscriminately, killing anyone in his
way because if he kills another fifty people he'll get enough
experience points to upgrade his ammo capability. Sam escapes,
picking up Carly, Wheelie, and Brains and heading to the NEST
undercover base. The guards won't let him in, denying they know
anything about the Transformers. Optimus or Bumblebee never even gave
Sam a way to CONTACT them, just in case of something like this? I
know Sam is annoying as all fuck, but seriously, at least give him a
magic cell phone just in case. Or what about Wheelie or Brains, they
don't even have a way to contact their fellow Autobots?
Sam
manages to wrestle a walkie away from one of the guards, screaming
for Bumblebee who immediately shows up to rescue him from a beatdown.
But, just like the last movie, Sam starts YELLING AT HIM for saving
the day. Sam rips into him for never hanging out with him and forcing
him to drive his piece of shit Datsun, and this is our HERO? I can't
believe I actually felt a bit sorry for him before. He's a selfish
and whiny asshole that I now hope gets stepped on by Shockwave. The
next five minutes are basically Sam just WHINING because he should be
treated like God for saving the world twice.
Charlotte
tells an assembly of officials they've locked the five pillars sound
with Sentinel into a giant vault until they know exactly what they're
dealing with, because Optimus apparently never bothered to tell them.
That's a REALLY good idea to keep them all in one place, because that
NEVER backfires in these kind of movies. She cuts
her presentation short when she sees Sam and Carly enter,
establishing herself as the “no-nonsense bitch you don't want to
mess with” as she asserts SHE'S the one in charge and not the
Autobots. Frances McDormand is SO FAR out of the league of every
other actor in the movie that it is just STUNNING. Her character is
the most cliché, one note moron I've ever seen, but she's playing
her like it's actually a serious script. That is what we call
professionalism, ladies and gentlemen.
Enough
of all that though, because it's FINALLY time to get some
Transformers in this thing. We see Optimus using the Matrix of
Leadership on Sentinel, which brings him back to life. Sentinel is
voiced by the... I can't even think of a word awesome enough to
describe him, so I'll just say Leonard Nimoy. Nimoy, as you should
know, is actually a veteran of the franchise as he voiced the
GREATEST Deception in all of history: Galvatron.
Just
like Tony Todd in the last movie, I'm glad to see such well respected
actor of mine get a huge payday over someone like Malkovich who
regularly gets cast in large movies. But enough of that, the Matrix
isn't just a key anymore, huh? I like how all Autobot artifacts can
ALSO transform into other things. Sentinel
asks about the pillars, learning the Autobots only found five, one of
which is the “control pillar”. He is upset about this because he
left with hundreds, which prompts Charlotte to ask what kind of
technology they are talking about. We get this:
“It
is the ability to reshape the universe. Together the pillars form a
space bridge. I designed, and I alone, can control it. It defies your
laws of physics to transport matter through time and space.”
“You're
talking about a teleportation device, aren't you?”
“Yes,
for resources, for refugees.”
Teleportation
was the technology that was going to win the Autobots the war? They
were going to take the pillars to somewhere else and transport all
the other Autobots off Cybertron to what I can only assume was
regroup and relaunch a counter-offensive? Nevermind all of the time
they were off the planet, that would give the Decepticons plenty of
time to prepare their own defenses. Not to mention Transformers can
ALREADY FREAKING TELEPORT, as we saw in the last movie.
This is
the shit that baffles me about action movies, it REALLY shouldn't be
that hard to write this stuff so it actually makes sense. What's
wrong with “the pillars can destroy only Decepticons, but now the
Decepticons have learned to reprogram them to kill Autobots”? WHY
does everything in these movies have to be so goddamned convoluted
and confusing as possible? It's not like the target audience of these
movies are known for their deductive reasoning skills.
Charlotte
starts doing her “blah blah blah I'm a stupid government official
and you can't have the pillars” routine, as I have NO idea how
McDormand was able to say her idiotic lines without bursting into
laughter. She sends Sam and Carly home under Bumblebee's protection,
but Sam isn't letting his chance to be the hero for a third time go.
He says they need to figure out why the Decepticons are killing
humans, and the only way to do that is to “go to the expert”.
We
cut to Simmons on The O'Reilly Factor
talk show, because this movie DESPERATELY needed to go from merely
stupid to huffing paint stupid. Simmons is saying humans need to side
with the Autobots while Bill O'Reilly says they need to leave Earth
because they're not white American males who believe in God. At least
I think that's what he said, I really stopped paying attention the
second this scene started. Sam calls Simmons and the team-up is on!
The Team Up ABSOLUTELY NO ONE
DEMANDED!
Bruce
shows up at Sam's place with Wang's file, agreeing to help on the
condition he gets to see Bumblebee. He describes the Autobot to be
“fucking awesome”, which makes the second use of the fuck in the
movie which means this should be rated R. I'm not even going to
bother ranting about a movie for kids having such language, this is
NOT a kid's movie and if you let your young children watch this you
are a TERRIBLE parent.
We learn
Wang designed a sate little for NASA to map the moon in 2009, but
sabotaged it so it wouldn't detect the Ark. 2009, the same
year the Decepticons tried to pull off their goofy Sun Harvester
scheme. At some point I can only assume is AFTER the movie, the
Decepticons started contacting humans and making deals to set up this
massive conspiracy to hide the Ark's existence from the rest
of the world. How did they do this with no one noticing? Did they
force the humans to help them? Or did the humans go along with it? If
so, what did they promise the humans in exchange for their help?
These are things that might have been nice to see, instead of thirty
scenes of Sam whining that the human race doesn't kiss his ass.
Bruce tries to... fist fight Bumblebee, who then knocks him on his
back and starts tickling him. MARY MOTHER OF GOD THERE IS STILL
NINTETY MINUTES LEFT! You know the absolute WORST part about this,
and I mean besides I'll never be able to take John Malkovich
seriously ever again? Is this entire scene had to be carefully
written and designed since it contained a massive CGI Bayformer. They
probably spent HUNDREDS of hours animating this scene, and all for
something that is wretchedly stupid.
Brains
tries to actually get the fucking movie rolling by announcing he's
found the location of two Russian cosmonauts that might be involved
in this whole thing, but Carly shows up to put the kibosh on any of
that “story” nonsense. See, she's pissed because Sam is with
Simmons trying to save the world instead of getting ready to go with
her to the dinner party of the guy trying to bang her. MEN!
AMIRITE,
ladies?! They
also try to throw in some kind of subplot how she hates the military
because her brother was a soldier who died in the line of duty but HA
HA HA, swing and a miss Dark
Of The Moon!
Rosie
Huntington-Whiteley makes JANUARY
JONES look like a stellar actress. She is so laughably bad I'm
somewhat in awe by all of this, especially when she tries to make Sam
choose between saving the world or her. She drives off and boy, can I
not wait for the scene where Sam fights to get her back. I really
hope it comes at the very end of the movie, so it feels like an epic
love reunion. I also hope they kiss in slow motion with majestic
music playing.
Sam,
Simmons, and Simmons's bodyguard Dutch... I was really hoping I'd be
able to go the entire review without acknowledging Dutch but he's
getting too much screen time now to make that dream a reality. The
joke about Dutch is he's a flamboyantly gay stereotype and before you
get on me for assuming he's gay by the cliché way he talks, Simmons
was very sure to reference his homosexuality earlier. Michael Bay,
what an auteur!
The
three track the Russians to an underground bar where they are shown
pictures Russian probes took of the dark side of the moon in 1963.
They are of hundreds of the pillars, Sam figuring out the Decepticons
must have left Sentinel behind so the Autobots could revive him. HOW
THE FUCK WOULD THE DECEPTICONS KNOW THE AUTOBOTS WOULD EVER REVIVE
HIM? They didn't even know the Autobots would EVER find the moon, let
along the freaking Milky Way galaxy. But let's just say the
Decepticons assumed the Autobots WOULD track them to Earth someday,
how were they planning on the Autobots reviving their ally?
Duh
Ghoul, are you a fucking moron? The Matrix of Leadership obviously!
Oh wait, HOW THE FUCK WERE THE AUTOBOTS SUPPOSED TO FIND THE
MATRIX?!? Remember the whole plot of the last movie where the Matrix
was super hidden and no one could find it, not to mention the
Autobots didn't even KNOW it was ON EARTH?!
Do you
see? When you actually write this shit down how none of it makes a
lick of sense whatsoever? Who was coordinating this whole pillars
plan anyway? Megatron was frozen on Earth since at least the late
1800s, so that means the Fallen would have been running the show.
BUT, as the last movie kept telling us, the Fallen can ONLY be killed
by a Prime so why would he want to revive another Prime? I could keep
going, I really could, but this is the ULTIMATE example of how no one
gave the slightest sliver of a fuck about the storyline and
continuity of this trilogy.
Sam
calls Charlotte to warn her for some stupid reason, but to my
surprise she listens instead of hanging up on him. Three Decepticons
called the Dreads, who DON'T
have horribly stereotypical Jamaican accents to my absolute shock,
attack Sam and the Autobots
as we get an EXTREMELY well done chase scene. Everything's clear and
easy to follow, especially an amazing shot where we witness a first
person view of Bumblebee transforming into his car form around Sam.
Ironhide aaaaand... maybe Sideswipe? I
can't tell because with Bumblebee gone EVERYONE is identical
monochrome now- stay behind
to deal with the Dreads. The Transformers end up in a standoff, with
every aiming at someone else and- hmm. You know what this scene
reminds me of?
You
remember the 2007 cinematic classic Hitman, don't you? Oh you don't because you
forget it the moment you saw it? Not that Hitman
invented that scene because gun standoffs are as old as time itself,
I just had a flashback to that. One of the Autobots says to the
Dreads “Weapons down, and we'll let you escape with your dignity.”.
Uhh... just- just like what Agent 47 said in Hitman.
Sure
enough, EXACT-FUCKING-LY LIKE HITMAN, everyone drops their guns and
break out blades they had concealed in their backs. At least here it
makes sense, unlike Hitman where they just produced blades
from their magic Weapons Inventory. Ironhide and his ally take out
the Decepticons in a battle that I could safely say would have been
AWESOME had I been able to tell who was who, but even so this was
probably one of the most visually solid Bayformers fights yet.
I am
QUITE mystified by what we just saw. Near as I can tell, Michael Bay
just ripped off Hitman, a movie that didn't even make $100
million dollars. Hitman is barely even remembered by anyone
besides cynical pricks like myself, WHY of all things to rip off why
would he choose this one? Unless Hitman itself stole that
scene from a more famous movie I'm not familiar with, if this is the
case PLEASE let me know so I can sleep at night. Sam
and Bumblebee make it outside the base, where Sentinel and Lennox are
waiting for them. Sentinel takes this moment to reveal he's in
cahoots with Megatron as he MURDERS IRONHIDE! Oh no, that actually
might have meant something if we'd gotten even remotely close to
knowing Ironhide the past three movies.
Sentinel
proceeds to blast the base apart, takes the pillars, and splits.
Optimus arrives too late, taking in the scene of destruction and
displaying more emotion than any single human in the entire movie.
Man, that was so dark and violent. I sure hope Bay doesn't follow
this up with- GODDAMNIT!
I hate you so much Bay.
More
Sam's parents, and they're as funny as ever! Sam goes to check with
them if they've seen Carly, which leads Sam's mom to start lecturing
him on his love life. She says he can't keep going through beautiful
women and he'll NEVER get a third girlfriend that beautiful unless he
has a big dick. Hold on hold on, it gets better. She THEN goes on to
say he's probably lousy in bed so pulls out the book She
Comes First: The Thinking Man's Guide To Pleasuring A Woman
by Ian Kerner. Seriously. Fuck
all of this. Sentinel starts setting up the pillars around Washington
while Megatron and Starscream meet in the Lincoln Memorial. I'm just
going to transcribe this because... well, you'll see.
“My
master! Such a brilliant scheme! So when Sentinel left Cybertron, it
was to defect?”
“He
was meant to rendezvous with me here on Earth before fate waylaid us
both. The only way to revive him, we needed Prime and his Matrix.”
Stop
talking! Just stop talking, for the love of God. SHUT UP! It makes it
borderline impossible to review this movie when every single fucking
line of dialogue sends me into another rant. Cybertron World War I
was 19,000 years ago. At this point the All Spark was STILL on
Cybertron, so WHY would Megatron and Sentinel make plans to meet on
Earth? They wouldn't have even KNOWN Earth EXISTED at this point, let
alone that's where the All Spark would somehow end up! And again with
the Matrix, they had NO WAY OF KNOWING Prime would ever get the
Matrix! This is just balls-to-the wall insanity right here.
Megatron
then blows up the Lincoln Memorial because... uh... explosions?
Optimus arrives, oddly without with Trailer of Badassery, but he's
too late. Sentinel activates the Space Bridge, which starts drawing
Decepticons to the Earth. Sentinel beats the crap out of Optimus as
we learn his motivation was to save the Transformers by allying with
Megatron, but whatever, he's just a one note “I NEED MORE POWER!”
cliché now. The humans should treat them as gods and serve them, or
all be killed. You've seen this one before.
Sentinel
doesn't kill Optimus though, because who will kill him at the end of
the movie? Bumblebee? I DON'T THINK SO. Sentinel then just walks away
and Optimus just casually watches him leave, because he knows there's
still an hour to kill in this thing. BRING ON THE FILLER! Hey
Dylan's party, that's perfect! Sam shows up to talk to Carly, but
before he can Dylan reveals he's ALSO in cahoots with Megatron. Good
God, is there anyone in this movie who ISN'T in league with Megatron
at this point?
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