Well everyone, the time has come to follow up my pre-review of Transformers with my actual one, having seen it two days ago.
Please be warned that I will be speaking freely of my criticisms and the following review contains major spoilers.
I have never been so disappointed in seeing a film in my entire life. Everyone I know really loved it, and thought I of all people should go see it. Being the huge Transformers fan that I am, I had to see it, despite my reservations. So I did. And I hated it. Really, I was on the verge of tears. Everything was wrong, it was so far removed from what made them popular, it was a crime.
My number one complaint about this film is the same thing that sandbagged most of the G1 episodes, TOO MANY HUMANS. Anyone that knows me, knows that the humans ruined every episode that they were in. They got in the way, had to be protected, and basically crippled the Autobots from being able to fight properly. Truly, the best fight sequences in the cartoons had no humans in them at all.
So it was in this movie. I don't understand why the military would think it was a good idea to locate the final confrontation in the middle of the city, but I know it was a stupid one. The Autobots spent so much time trying not to step on the humans that they looked like ballerinas, and spent much of their battle time losing their balance. In fact, ten minutes into the final battle sequence, I'm wondering why the fuck anyone is still out in the middle of the street? Did it not occur to anyone to get the hell out of the way of the giant killer robots?
A consequence of the transformers low screen time was the fact that they had no lines, and thus no personality. The Decepticons suffered much more from this than the Autobots. While Optimus hogged the lion's share of the lines while he waxed poetic, the balance of the lines were simply trash talking during the fight sequence. Megatron came in second but he couldn't put three words together without adding in a growl. In fact, only two of the Decepticons actually say anything at all (Frenzy doesn't count as he only sounded like a gremlin, and wasn't speaking English at all).
Personality-wise, the Autobots were identical to their G1 cartoon counterparts. At least in theory. Without any real dialogue, they were just big bots. I would have liked Ironhide to at least have a southern accent.
Really, the Decepticons were always the more popular group in the 80's, even though they wanted all humans dead. Why? The absence of moral hinderance frees the character to develop very memorable personality traits such as Starscream's desire for leadership, Soundwave's teamwork amongst his cassettes, and the Insecticons' constant treachery. The Autobots were always going on and on about "blah blah blah honour, blah blah blah protect the humans, blah blah blah ..." Boooooooring!
The only thing that was done right in this film was getting Peter Cullen back to voice Optimus Prime. For the ten lines of dialogue that Megatron had, there was no reason to replace Frank Welker with Hugo Weaving. The original G1 voice would have easily fit with Megatron's new form. I've heard clips of Megatron from the video game (voiced by Welker) and they sound fine.
While we're on the subject of talking, Prime's mouth looked horrible. He looked like a talking ape. All the promotional footage showed Prime with his faceplate, but there was not a single frame of footage in the film with Optimus using his faceplate. He really looked bad.
Also, would it have hurt anyone to actually have the Autobots kill a Decepticon? Isn't that what they're there for? After Prime decapitates Bonecrusher (who is in the movie, literally, less than 60 seconds before he dies) all the other Decepticons are killed by humans. I thought THEY were supposed to be defending US! Shit if it weren't for the humans, Megatron would have shredded all of those pussy Autobots, single handedly! Why did the Autobots even bother showing up? We seemed to have the situation under control.
Overall, this film was a failure despite its financial success. I place all of the blame on Michael Bay as he is a failure as a director and as a human being. It was sloppy.
If my hands weren't tied by the unalterable fetters of the law, then I would invoke the tradition of our illustrious forebears, reach back to a purer, sterner justice, and have you BURNED AT THE STAKE! Michael Bay, you fucking suck!
Let's begin with the fact that the tank calls himself Devestator (as do the credits) while the toy is called Brawl. It seems that Bay lost control of the film and forgot the names of his characters. The character's real name is Brawl, Devestator was only a working name. What self respecting director does that? And what kind of director lets that error into the theatres?
Then the action. Things don't start to heat up until there are 30 minutes left in the movie. Then Decepticons start appearing from everywhere. Hell do I know what was happening. There wasn't a single wide shot anywhere to be found in that entire sequence. Nor did it occur to actually keep the camera still, or even move it in the same direction as the action. So everything is whipping all over the place and millions of dollars of supposedly fantastic CGI effects are flushed down the toilet as you can't make out what the fuck is going on. Robots are dying, but since the Decepticons are all the same colour (black) you can't make out who anyone is.
Also, Bay was so focused on keeping mass and volume constant, that certain popular characters were left out, and the ones left in look like they were assembled on Junkyard Wars. Meanwhile at the climax of the film, Bay has a 30 metre tall, metal cube condense into a smaller cube the size of a basketball, and just as light. Where the mass went to, I don't know, but Sam was able to run all over the city and up forty flights of stairs with it. Michael Bay, you are a total hypocrite.
Finally, Optimus Prime fights like a total PUSSY! He gets totally manhandled by Megatron. Remember his fight scene in the 1986 movie? Well forget it. If it wasn't for the humans' airstrike, Megatron would have ripped apart Prime like he did Jazz (interestingly enough, however, Jazz, the only Autobot to actually die in the movie, was the one voiced by an African American actor) and eventually every other Autobot in the movie.
Finally, I have one piece of advice to Mr. Bay. When making a movie, you only use a joke once and that's it. Transformers has two urination jokes (both times calling it "lubricating"), and twice uses the phrase "more than meets the eye" the old catchphrase of the original G1 series. The jokes were stupid to begin with, the second time around they aren't even worth hearing. Go back to director's school.
From what I understand, two sequels are greenlit, the next one will feature Soundwave, the Constructicons, and the Dinobots. I shudder to think how shitty they'll look. Apparently they wanted to save Soundwave for the sequel when they had more money, so they could "do Soundwave right". After seeing this movie, that doesn't hold any meaning to me anymore.
I hate you Michael Bay, I wish I could hate you to death.
Until next time, keep on having fun!
"bah weep graaagnah wheep ni ni bong"
Monday, August 6, 2007
Truly a disappointment to behold
Tuesday, April 10, 2007
When Directors Shit on Our Childhood Dreams
SOUNDWAVE's NOTE (2007-08-06) : Read my full review for the film here.
When George Lucas keeps revising Star Wars to continually keep up with his ever changing Original VisionTM, fans complained that he was ruining a film they enjoyed from childhood. They should count themselves lucky that they had almost 20 good years before he decided to make Greedo shoot first.
Countless childhood television shows and video games wound up in the crapper when making the transition to the big screen. Remember the He-man movie? Sadly, I do.
Unfortunately this travesty is going to be repeated with the most sacred of institutions, Transformers. The perpetrator? Michael Bay (and to a lesser extent, Steven Spielberg).
To be honest, no one that I knew was more in love with the idea of a CGI/live action movie of the Transformers than myself. Unfortunately, the more I read about this project, the more I became concerned that another wonderful idea was going in the wrong direction.
First off, here is a quote from Wikipedia regarding Michael Bay's involvement:
Michael Bay was negotiated with to direct, but turned it down as a "stupid toy movie". Realising he had been wrong as a teenager at Lucasfilm regarding Raiders of the Lost Ark' box office potential, he was put through "Transformers school", and in April 2005 he confirmed he was directing the film.
What the FUCK! Any director who has to be educated about the Transformers should not be a choice to direct! Look at Superman Returns, Spider-man, and X-men (1 and 2). These directors were HUGE fans of the original series and characters. Their movies are highly faithful to the original concepts and were well received (Spidey's organic web shooters caused issues, but I really blame Stan Lee for coming up with a stupid idea to begin with). Ghostrider's star Nicolas Cage is himself a big fan of the character and even helped write the film. This is what we need.
How about this one for Mr. Spielberg:
Spielberg himself had come to know the franchise via the toys and cartoons that his children loved.
Everyone, go call your dad and ask him who the leader of the Autobots was. Enough said.
Above all here is a fan-fucking-tastic (emphasis on fan-fucking, because that's all they're doing with this movie) expanation why the Arc was removed from the film (the Autobots space shuttle that crashed into the volcano):
In another design development Roberto Orci cut the Autobot's Ark spaceship which John Rogers originally included, saying "Why would aliens who moonlight as vehicles need other vehicles to travel inside?"
Orci, you dumb fuck, the Arc is a space vehicle, not an airplane. Everyone understands that for travel around earth, they move under their own power. How the hell is a robot the size of a car supposed to travel between solar systems?!?!?!?!? My brain is beginning to hurt.
Now lets really bring on the hurt. No one looks anything like their '80's counterpart. Prime, Bumblebee, Jazz, Ironhide, and Ratchet are all new vehicles (marketing tie-ins) and their robot states look like... well I think you need to see the horror for yourself. Get a tissue, or a box.
The Decepticons are even worse, Megatron looks like crap, so does Starscream. Soundwave is nowhere to be found, and the other Decepticons are all but made up.
As an additional kick in the balls regarding Megatron, Peter Cullen is reprising his role as Prime, but Frank Welker was turned down to reprise his role as Megatron in favour of Hugo Weaving. For those who don't know, Frank Welker is a voice acting god, having played thousands of cartoon voices. It would have been awesome to have the original voices AT LEAST. Monkeys at the controls I tell you, monkeys at the controls.
What is Bay's response to this criticism? 1) He wanted to make it realistic, 2) It's a reboot of the series. He looooooves to hide behind those stupid excuses.
Michael's addiction to realism is why characters like Soundwave are not in the movie and Prime's vehicle mode has changed, because he is trying to be mass constant. Great. I'm glad he's trying to be realistic about sentient, shape-shifting robots from a fictional planet. Mr. Bay, please watch Mario Bros. That is a lesson on making things "realistic". (Nintendo really should have stepped in on the scriptwriting on that one)
Secondly, reboots refer to existing franchises like James Bond and Batman that seem to be going downhill. Transformers had one cartoon movie, 20 years ago. That is not a franchise, it doesn't get REBOOTED.
There are glaring other changes, such as the whole point of the trek to earth is not for energy to fuel their war, but for the ALLSPARK? What the hell is that?
Mr. Bay please let me inform you of something, regardless of what Steven tells you, these characters exist and do not need to be created or "updated". As if he knows what the fuck he's doing nowadays anyhow. Haley Joel Osment as Harry Potter? Give me a break. At least Harry Potter has JK Rowling to defend it. Transformers has no one. Only millions of fans screaming in disgust, but no one is listening.
Michael Bay, please take your seat next to Joel Schumacher in the line of "Directors whos should be banned from filming". Psst! Hollywood... I think Michael Bay is a communist! Pass it on!
Despite this harsh criticism, I am at odds as to whether or not I will see this film in theatres. One side says to protest, but the other is dying of curiosity. Its like a train wreck, you don't want to look, but you can't turn away.
I'm hoping that I didn't bring you all down too much. To make it up to you and to cheer you up, here's a gallery of Lil' Formers, really funny single-frame Transformers comics, as kids!
Actually here's the homepage for Lil' Formers: Lilformers.com
Also, check out this one:
Look closely at Wreck-Gar's gift. First one to explain the joke as a comment to this article gets a shout out on the next blog entry!
Well that's all for now. If I do watch the movie, I'll post a review. Until next time, keep having fun.
"bah weep graaagnah wheep ni ni bong"
