The Energon Pub

[william-james88]

I geeked out at the Shockwave voice. I didn't know that was in Jon3.0's repertoire. Well done

He's quite the talented guy. While many know him for his epic voice, he is a voice actor first and foremost and has a pretty wide repertoire. I am super glad he was given a chance to show thst to the world in the biggest platform imaginable and its super cool to know that it also happens to be through a dream project.

[Deadput]

you mean more about humanity? cause that's what's been missing from the past films.

i want to see transformers movie with little to none human intervention

Wouldn't be a Transformers movie if it didn't take place on Earth, there is absolutely zero point to the franchise if it takes place off world because what justifies them Transforming in the first place since their not in disguise?

Transformers are only impressive when they have humans to compare themselves to.

Same. I thought the humans in this movie were way more annoying than in any of Bay's movies.

Yeah no

There is no reality or perceptive where this is true, there is no way anyone in that film was more annoying then say Leo or any of the awful stereotypes in the past Bay films.

[SlyTF1]

Same. I thought the humans in this movie were way more annoying than in any of Bay's movies.

Yeah no

There is no reality or perceptive where this is true, there is no way anyone in that film was more annoying then say Leo or any of the awful stereotypes in the past Bay films.

I thought Leo was funny. In this movie, the human scenes just felt like a barrier that would pop up to keep the movie from getting on with the action.

[Deadput]

I thought Leo was funny. In this movie, the human scenes just felt like a barrier that would pop up to keep the movie from getting on with the action.

Because screw establishing your characters so people can actually get emotionally invested to just get to the mindless action.

More action doesn't equal a better movie.

[dragons]

I some times see him on regal rewards video before movie plays and Mitsubishi commercial

[SlyTF1]

I thought Leo was funny. In this movie, the human scenes just felt like a barrier that would pop up to keep the movie from getting on with the action.

Because screw establishing your characters so people can actually get emotionally invested to just get to the mindless action.

More action doesn't equal a better movie.

If their aim was to get me emotionally invested in those characters, they failed. I wanted them to hurry up and get out of the way so I could see giant robots rip each other to pieces.

Also what's the point of spending so much time establishing characters like the family if there are never any stakes involved with any of them? There was one scene where they were in danger, but it was played for laughs. No tension whatsoever.

[Deadput]

If their aim was to get me emotionally invested in those characters, they failed. I wanted them to hurry up and get out of the way so I could see giant robots rip each other to pieces.

Also what's the point of spending so much time establishing characters like the family if there are never any stakes involved with any of them? There was one scene where they were in danger, but it was played for laughs. No tension whatsoever.

Because people have families and it would be weird if they weren't around at all? They exist for the main character's life and her character arc, a family doesn't have to be in danger to be worth existing.

[SlyTF1]

If their aim was to get me emotionally invested in those characters, they failed. I wanted them to hurry up and get out of the way so I could see giant robots rip each other to pieces.

Also what's the point of spending so much time establishing characters like the family if there are never any stakes involved with any of them? There was one scene where they were in danger, but it was played for laughs. No tension whatsoever.

Because people have families and it would be weird if they weren't around at all? They exist for the main character's life and her character arc, a family doesn't have to be in danger to be worth existing.

The problem isn't that they exist, it's that I felt they spent too much time on them for them to have no real payoff. For instance, in Age of Extinction, it was relevant to spend a bit of time on Tessa and Shane, because they were characters who were involved with the movie from beginning to end. They contributed in battles, their lives were put in danger. Cade's entire character arc revolves around those two.

In Bumblebee, they spend a lot of time on the family just so they can accumulate to a single joke near the end of the movie. The scene ends, and it feels like they were in the movie just so the could build up to that one joke. That's my problem with them. The movie spent so much time on them, yet they contributed virtually nothing. I feel the same way about the bullies and that whole arc.

If it were me, I would have made the majority of the human scenes about Charlie and that other guy, trying to figure out what they were going to do about Bumblebee. And have that guy involved in the final battle a little bit more too. Have him and Charlie have to work together to achieve a certain goal. Again, just like they did with the human characters in Age of Extinction. I forgot his name, but that guy was another character they spent a lot of time on, just so they could make a joke about him at the end.

[Stargrave]

I haven’t seen the movie yet but I’m excited for a fresh take.

This guy’s story is like my dream since I was a kid too - I love doing voices and always loved doing a Peter Cullen impression like the intro from Voltron. Does anyone have any ideas how I can get started? I’d love to do a cartoon TF voice someday crimeny that’d be the coolest.

[15ngcs1]

What's this? The biggest fan of the movies is not spewing praise like always?

Bay's absence was definitely felt. The movie lacked the sense of scale and "epicness" he brought to the table. There were a handful of scenes I thought were going to build up to an awesome payoff, but then they'd just cut back to an overly goofy joke or something. And the music was terrible. Completely laughable, especially the military theme. It made them feel like cartoon characters instead of a real threat.

But I will say the fight scenes were probably the best in the series. Too bad they were just so few and far between. I definitely liked the movie better than The Last Knight, and it wasn't a bad movie. Just didn't blow me away like I wanted it to.

Yeah I can see you're definitely a Bay fan. They chose to make a smaller scale movie with way less unnecessary explosions. That's what the movie critics are praising for and what this franchise needs. And they are actually loving the humour and heart in this film. Regarding the music and the score? It's the 80's! 80's music is great music and the score, especially the military theme, is supposed to sound like those Spielbergian Amblin movies like E.T! I think it's very fitting! And regarding your cartoon character comment, the Transformers are originated from cartoons/animation!

[15ngcs1]

This movie had no real problems, but there also wasn't really anything to blow you away, whereas the Bay movies were more of a mix of very high highs but also low lows. It seemed like a pretty "safe" effort. The story was pretty predictable and kinda cliche and there wasn't much super memorable, except maybe the brief Cybertron fan service at the beginning. I think the critics will consistently consider it good, but not amazing, so it will probably get the highest tomato meter score of the series.

I think the 2007 movie is still the best, but this was definitely better than the last two efforts. I'm not sure where I'd rank it further from there as far as my personal enjoyment. It's kind of tough to compare it to the Bay films because it was such a different approach, for better or worse (sometimes for better, sometimes for worse).

To use baseball analogy, the Bay movies are like the power hitter that hits a lot of homers, but also strikes out a ton--you take the good with the bad. This movie felt like a solid contact hitter with no power.

So far it's 100% on Rotten Tomatoes.

[15ngcs1]

I went to the advanced screening last night. I will summarize my thoughts, with no Spoilers.
This was just a solid good movie. It felt very warm and kind, with that feel of the G1 messages we all remembered from the cartoon.

The siege on Cybertron is about 4-5 minutes, it shows a absolute ton of characters in G1 form.
Every bot in the movie is completely recognizable during every scene, no confusing bay verse camera work and shoddy action scenes.

Human characters: Charlie is very relatable and has flaws, making her great character to grow with Bee.
Cena’s character does a great job at portraying the military aspect without being over the top.

Humor: Great Humor! Lots of fun pokes at bad story writing, and obvious flaws with past movies. Bee conveys a lot of emotion with his body language and ends up being very silly at the right times.

EasterEggs: Lots of Easter eggs from the G1, and the original animated movie.



Reboot / Soft or Hard? While there is a few characters and a human character which are Bayverse. Those movie completely restarted the Transformers history...AGAIN. There is nothing in BumbleBee which allows it to give any of the other movies credibility story wise. (Not that they had a good story) There is only two things that point to the 2007 movie, and the rest pointed to a whole new story. So my opinion is that this is a medium reboot, they took S7, Simmons, and Bee’s Camaro mode (Although it was a modified 70’s Camaro and not the one we saw in the 2007 movie) The rest of the film follows it’s own narrative. I hope this fully starts a new continuity. Travis Knight really put his heart into this movie and it shows.

Even if you don’t, or never liked BumbleBee before, you will love this movie.

This just shows great direction from Travis Knight (Kubo and the Two Strings), exceptional acting from Hailee Steinfeld (True Grit, The Edge of Seventeen), great acting from John Cena and Jorge Lendeborg Jr, great writing and editing from Christina Hodson (Birds of Prey) and Kelly Fremon Craig (The Edge of Seventeen).

[15ngcs1]

you mean more about humanity? cause that's what's been missing from the past films.

i want to see transformers movie with little to none human intervention

but it's set on Earth, it'll be weird if there's no humans. plus making a movie set only in Cybertron with a lot of transformers and all that visual effects stuff for a live action movie will be extremely expensive.

[15ngcs1]

you mean more about humanity? cause that's what's been missing from the past films.

i want to see transformers movie with little to none human intervention

Same. I thought the humans in this movie were way more annoying than in any of Bay's movies.

people are actually saying Charlie is the best character created out of this entire franchise cause she is empathetic, full of heart, vulnerable and relatable and the relationship between Bumblebee and Charlie is emotional and authentic. This is all thanks to Travis Knight's great direction, Hailee Steinfeld's exceptional acting, Christina Hodson's solid writing, and the visual effects team for showing emotion on Bumblebee's face and eyes, even Bumblebee is acting!

[SlyTF1]

What's this? The biggest fan of the movies is not spewing praise like always?

Bay's absence was definitely felt. The movie lacked the sense of scale and "epicness" he brought to the table. There were a handful of scenes I thought were going to build up to an awesome payoff, but then they'd just cut back to an overly goofy joke or something. And the music was terrible. Completely laughable, especially the military theme. It made them feel like cartoon characters instead of a real threat.

But I will say the fight scenes were probably the best in the series. Too bad they were just so few and far between. I definitely liked the movie better than The Last Knight, and it wasn't a bad movie. Just didn't blow me away like I wanted it to.

Yeah I can see you're definitely a Bay fan. They chose to make a smaller scale movie with way less unnecessary explosions. That's what the movie critics are praising for and what this franchise needs. And they are actually loving the humour and heart in this film. Regarding the music and the score? It's the 80's! 80's music is great music and the score, especially the military theme, is supposed to sound like those Spielbergian Amblin movies like E.T! I think it's very fitting! And regarding your cartoon character comment, the Transformers are originated from cartoons/animation!

But it's a live action movie. I still listen to the scores from Bay's movies to this day. I'll never listen to the score from this movie by itself in my life.

[hausjam]

I feel like some folks are heaping praise on this movie simply because it has a couple minutes worth of G1-esque action. Action that wasn’t even very good and felt very out of place. Especially since bumblebee, shatter, and dropkick were very non-G1. I am still fully convinced all the Cybertron stuff was a hasty afterthought, stuffed in after most of the movie was already made. For the sole purpose of enticing Bay haters and buying Knight goodwill from them.

Still, take all the Cybertron stuff out (which contributed nothing to the story anyway) and it was a pretty good movie. All the cgi of bumblebee on earth was probably the best cgi I have ever seen. It was beautiful. The rendering and physics actually looked real. The cgi alt mode and the real car were indistinguishable. It’s clearly where the cg budget was focused. As it should be.

But this movie’s Optimus? It looked terrible. Like someone took the Sunbow drawings, traced them, added a few panel lines, and called it a day. It was nothing more than cheap fan service. Very cheap.

Furthermore, this movie was littered with plot holes. Not even counting the continuity problems from previous movies (I don’t think anyone really cares about those anyway).

But, the good heavily outweighs the bad. Can’t wait to see it again.

[15ngcs1]

What's this? The biggest fan of the movies is not spewing praise like always?

Bay's absence was definitely felt. The movie lacked the sense of scale and "epicness" he brought to the table. There were a handful of scenes I thought were going to build up to an awesome payoff, but then they'd just cut back to an overly goofy joke or something. And the music was terrible. Completely laughable, especially the military theme. It made them feel like cartoon characters instead of a real threat.

But I will say the fight scenes were probably the best in the series. Too bad they were just so few and far between. I definitely liked the movie better than The Last Knight, and it wasn't a bad movie. Just didn't blow me away like I wanted it to.

Yeah I can see you're definitely a Bay fan. They chose to make a smaller scale movie with way less unnecessary explosions. That's what the movie critics are praising for and what this franchise needs. And they are actually loving the humour and heart in this film. Regarding the music and the score? It's the 80's! 80's music is great music and the score, especially the military theme, is supposed to sound like those Spielbergian Amblin movies like E.T! I think it's very fitting! And regarding your cartoon character comment, the Transformers are originated from cartoons/animation!

But it's a live action movie. I still listen to the scores from Bay's movies to this day. I'll never listen to the score from this movie by itself in my life.

They're paying homage to the G1 cartoons! Plus "the phrase "live action" also occurs within an animation context to refer to non-animated characters: in a live-action/animated film such as Mary Poppins in which humans and cartoons co-exist. In this case the "live-action" characters are the "real" actors, such as Hailee Steinfeld and John Cena, as opposed to the animated "actors", such as Bumblebee."

[15ngcs1]

I feel like some folks are heaping praise on this movie simply because it has a couple minutes worth of G1-esque action. Action that wasn’t even very good and felt very out of place. Especially since bumblebee, shatter, and dropkick were very non-G1. I am still fully convinced all the Cybertron stuff was a hasty afterthought, stuffed in after most of the movie was already made. For the sole purpose of enticing Bay haters and buying Knight goodwill from them.

Still, take all the Cybertron stuff out (which contributed nothing to the story anyway) and it was a pretty good movie. All the cgi of bumblebee on earth was probably the best cgi I have ever seen. It was beautiful. The rendering and physics actually looked real. The cgi alt mode and the real car were indistinguishable. It’s clearly where the cg budget was focused. As it should be.

But this movie’s Optimus? It looked terrible. Like someone took the Sunbow drawings, traced them, added a few panel lines, and called it a day. It was nothing more than cheap fan service. Very cheap.

Furthermore, this movie was littered with plot holes. Not even counting the continuity problems from previous movies (I don’t think anyone really cares about those anyway).

But, the good heavily outweighs the bad. Can’t wait to see it again.

Actually many people and critics are praising for the fresh solid story filled with heart and emotion written by Christina Hodson, well executed 80's tone, exceptional acting from Hailee Steinfeld, and great direction from Travis Knight, a true fan of Transformers (confirmed from the voice of Shockwave and Soundwave). Regarding the action scenes, people and critics actually can see what's going on and think the scenes were well executed. Bumblebee? Not G1? The boxy designs? Volkswagen Beetle? Bumblebee is so G1! Plus Travis Knight already said there's Cybertron (saying it was awesome) during San Diego Comic Con back in July, so clearly there was still lots of post production and reshoots (they had) to be done. The cgi on earth was beautiful and real because Travis Knight has a background in animation (Laika). Of course he has an amazing team (visual effects, production design) working alongside him. Regarding Optimus Prime, people are actually saying Optimus looks like... Optimus! The Optimus they played as a kid! G1 Optimus! Plus it's an origin story! It's a prequel turned ambiguous reboot! They paid homage to the 2007 film, they paid homage to the best parts of Bay transformers films, they paid homage to G1 cartoons, they paid homage to Spielbergian Amblin films like E.T, etc!

[Deadput]

For those who might be upset for the fate of Blitzwing I had an idea for what the film makers could do if they decided to Bring him back obviously this isn't a fact or anything but I think this is a good "concept" to pass to the filmmakers/Hasbro if anyone has that kind of connection (I know there are people on Tfw2005 that do but not sure if anyone here does)


So I would have Sector 7 or maybe some version of MASK or MECH have possession of his, Shatter and Dropkick's remains and are inspired to experiment and create their own triple changer from their remains which would resemble G1 Blitzwing but "Travisfied" an have a couple elements of the Seeker Blitzwing so the audience knows it's the same guy, the tank and plane wouldn't be exact real life vehicles and have kibble of the other vehicle depending on what mode he is in, that way Hasbro wouldn't have problems with triple changer kibble on the toys as well or vehicle licensing costs as well as to justify the unrealistic tan, yellow and purple colors Bltz typically has, since this is humans rebuilding him with parts from 3 different beings and possibly some Cybertron artifact/energy with a non perfect understanding the result has the creation bringing Blitzwing back to life but his mind is "shattered" and is constantly switching between his personality to Shatter's calm and collected as well as Dropkick's simple minded destructive one, with 3 minds influencing the creation all of which were killed because of Bumblebee this Blitzwing would have the single minded goal of taking revenge on the Autobot, the 3 personalities make him have trouble with which way to carry out that plan from subtle tactical planning to full on mindless rampaging. Also not sure how but if someone found a way to make Astrotrain his partner somehow that would be cool to, (Maybe the way he became a triple changer leaves him super depressed or something).


This is just my idea though with no context of whether this is truly a reboot and whether there are already plans for the next Transformers movie.

I think the idea would make for excellent character driven story telling and correct one of the things that several fans were iffed about the film, like seriously someone should get this to Travis or something.

[15ngcs1]

For those who might be upset for the fate of Blitzwing I had an idea for what the film makers could do if they decided to Bring him back obviously this isn't a fact or anything but I think this is a good "concept" to pass to the filmmakers/Hasbro if anyone has that kind of connection (I know there are people on Tfw2005 that do but not sure if anyone here does)


So I would have Sector 7 or maybe some version of MASK or MECH have possession of his, Shatter and Dropkick's remains and are inspired to experiment and create their own triple changer from their remains which would resemble G1 Blitzwing but "Travisfied" an have a couple elements of the Seeker Blitzwing so the audience knows it's the same guy, the tank and plane wouldn't be exact real life vehicles and have kibble of the other vehicle depending on what mode he is in, that way Hasbro wouldn't have problems with triple changer kibble on the toys as well or vehicle licensing costs as well as to justify the unrealistic tan, yellow and purple colors Bltz typically has, since this is humans rebuilding him with parts from 3 different beings and possibly some Cybertron artifact/energy with a non perfect understanding the result has the creation bringing Blitzwing back to life but his mind is "shattered" and is constantly switching between his personality to Shatter's calm and collected as well as Dropkick's simple minded destructive one, with 3 minds influencing the creation all of which were killed because of Bumblebee this Blitzwing would have the single minded goal of taking revenge on the Autobot, the 3 personalities make him have trouble with which way to carry out that plan from subtle tactical planning to full on mindless rampaging. Also not sure how but if someone found a way to make Astrotrain his partner somehow that would be cool to, (Maybe the way he became a triple changer leaves him super depressed or something).


This is just my idea though with no context of whether this is truly a reboot and whether there are already plans for the next Transformers movie.

I think the idea would make for excellent character driven story telling and correct one of the things that several fans were iffed about the film, like seriously someone should get this to Travis or something.

This seems really clever, innovative and very character driven but can be very complicated for people to understand when shown on screen, but I think they can pull it off if deep thought is put into it!

[Deadput]

This seems really clever, innovative and very character driven but can be very complicated for people to understand when shown on screen, but I think they can pull it off if deep thought is put into it!

As long as the "movie" made it clear with Blitzwing clearly knowing what happened to him and it being established that he's made from the body parts of 3 different Decepticons and other bits (So showing the remains of the 3 characters prior to the human organization putting him together) and having another Cybertronian preferably a medic/doctor like Ratchet/Shockwave/Flatline being able to recognize and explain the split personality disorder and being able to recognize the personality and maybe even vocal tones of Shatter and Dropkick coming from Blitzwing, maybe his voice shifts depending on the personality like Blitz voice from Bee as his default personality, a calmer and maybe more "feminine" voice for the Shatter personality and the Dropkick personality having the "vocal synthesizer" voice that Dropkick has. The personalities would be Blitzwing=G1 Blitzwing personality, Shatter=Animated "Ice" personality, Dropkick=Animated "Hot head" personality, I don't think the "random" personality from Animated would translate well to a life action movie outside of maybe a brief possibly tragic gag where the 3 personalities briefly merge to an unpredictable and "random" personality.


Edit: adding on to the brief idea that Astrotrain somehow becomes his partner it would be cool if he was a triple changer engineered by Shockwave or someone like that so there is a stark difference between the two triple changers which would demonstrate the difference between refined Cybertronian engineering and biology and crude human patchwork and would further show how tragic a figure the rebuilt Blitzwing is and leaving the audience sympathetic to him and his predicament but still see him as a ruthless villain since he would still be a vile and violent Decepticon.

[whip_it]

guys keep in mind

i feel like all the major G1 scenes were given away in the trailer

cept for 1/2 second Arcee scenne

LOL, way to get fans to watch the movie hasbro (Y)

[Sabrblade]

you mean more about humanity? cause that's what's been missing from the past films.

i want to see transformers movie with little to none human intervention

Then go watch Predacons Rising.

[william-james88]

What's this? The biggest fan of the movies is not spewing praise like always?

Bay's absence was definitely felt. The movie lacked the sense of scale and "epicness" he brought to the table. There were a handful of scenes I thought were going to build up to an awesome payoff, but then they'd just cut back to an overly goofy joke or something. And the music was terrible. Completely laughable, especially the military theme. It made them feel like cartoon characters instead of a real threat.

But I will say the fight scenes were probably the best in the series. Too bad they were just so few and far between. I definitely liked the movie better than The Last Knight, and it wasn't a bad movie. Just didn't blow me away like I wanted it to.

You know, I always liked you Sly. You always voiced your opinion well, even if it was unpopular and you don't mind people challenging you on it, always answering with heart. And what i like best is that even though you are a fan of the Bay films, you are not a blind follower, you will call him out on missteps, like TLK.

As for the idea of not needing the parents, you bring good arguments. It is not necessary for character growth. The best example is Stranger things. We really dont spend much time with the main character's parents even though they are young teenagers. Of ourse, there's Will's mom but she is an actual main character. SNL even made a joke that we never see Lucas' parents. And its not even a movie, its a whole show. The creators knew that showing interactions with all the parents was uneccesary and preffered to focus on the kids' interaction with the otherworldy aspects. And this is a great comparison to BB because oth BB and Strangers things rely heavily on 80s Nosalgia and Amblin films.

So far it's 100% on Rotten Tomatoes.

Did you know that Age of Exinction was as well before more critics saw it? Not saying it will sink at all, I just always found that funny. And anyways, 100% just means no one hated the film, which is very different than saying its a great movie.

[william-james88]

you mean more about humanity? cause that's what's been missing from the past films.

i want to see transformers movie with little to none human intervention

Then go watch Predacons Rising.

Or the original 86 film. There are only 2 humans in it, where 1 is absent for most of the film and neither are part of the awesome battle in the begining.

Also, while not a movie, there is no human interaction in the Cyberverse cartoon so far. And its turning out pretty good.