The Energon Pub

[Counterpunch]

[wingdarkness]

Dude your opening post has more plotholes than TF2...I deserve better than this, but maybe you don’t…Don’t perceive to understand why many of my ilk find this movie pretty terrible…I think I understand why you guys love it…

Explosions
Megan Fox

Am I missing anything?

I’ve read like 15 reviews, ALL SCORCHING, even local reviews…When you have critics universally scorching this movie when many of the same critics were down the middle on the first movie, maybe they aren’t conspiring to bash Summer Movies…Maybe it actually sucks (Obviously not to you, but for many)…

[Phenotype]

What you don't seem to realize is that if enough people don't like the movie franchise it wont be around much longer. And you are so very lucky to have anything else..

No, I realize that, that's how it is with anything else. I don't think you have much to worry about though considering ROTF is breaking all sorts of box-office records.

Beyond that, if something sucks then it should go away, fans shouldn't support something that isn't quality. ROTF is making plenty of money so you have nothing to worry about, however if a day ever came where they made a movie that was completely unwatchable the fans have the right to say they aren't going to support it. Why can't you understand this?

Its dumbfounding to find any kind of opinion like yours from an apparent Tran fan, however from what I have experienced you are much less than that, someone too dedicated, too precious, to listen to any other kind of view point.

This quote is hilarious. You're the one who won't listen to any other point of view. You seem to have no concept of what it means to be a fan, a fan doesn't just blindly follow whatever they're told to, a true fan knows how to think for themselves and decides what they like or dislike. People are entitled to their opinions and if they didn't like the movie that's their right.

I would end any kind of further discussion with yourself on this matter, this is a forum, and I would like to see some other view points come forward.

Sorry buck-o, that's not how it works. This is a public forum and I have just as much right to post here as you.

If you found any part of ROTF awe inspiring -ly great cinema, be it OP rolling out against the remaning DC in the planet, or him fighting the DC in the forest, or any other Epic moment, please, enjoy for what it was/is.

Ha! That's not what you said in your first post. You said anyone who didn't feel proud and amazed didn't deserve to have watched the movie. That's rubbish. I certainly did find parts of ROTF awe-inspiring but overall I wasn't proud or amazed, I was a little disappointed because I felt the story was convoluted and I didn't like a lot of the characters.

[Steamed_Ham]

I know I should resist, but...

What you don't seem to realize is that if enough people don't like the movie franchise it wont be around much longer. And you are so very lucky to have anything else..

It's set to become the biggest film of the year. It's had the biggest Wednesday opening gross of all time (by a margin of $15million), and the second biggest opening day gross of all time. The toys are flying off the shelves. The series ain't going anywhere anytime soon.

Its dumbfounding to find any kind of opinion like yours from an apparent Tran fan, however from what I have experienced you are much less than that, someone too dedicated, too precious, to listen to any other kind of view point.

Are you serious? Don't you realise that the exact same thing about you? You're literally saying that TF fans should praise the movie no matter what we think of it. As far as I can tell, you're not even happy with people saying "I loved it but...", you think it should be praised unequivocally.

If you found any part of ROTF awe inspiring -ly great cinema, be it OP rolling out against the remaning DC in the planet, or him fighting the DC in the forest, or any other Epic moment, please, enjoy for what it was/is.

But what if there was only one moment we liked in the whole movie and the rest was a pain to sit through? "The film was a pain, but there was one moment I liked so I give it 10 of 10" It doesn't work like that.

Look, I'm sure you mean well but what you are proposing would deprive posters of their free speach, leaving the existence of the forum essentially pointless. Your theory for why we should praise the film no matter what is that we are lucky to get a big budget Transformers film at all, and it would be just plain ungreatful of us to not accept whatever was in that film. This doesn't work. Lets say the first film was a big budget movie that was more or less a shot for shot remake of Police Academy 7 except at the end Optimus comes down from the sky, burps, and then flies off back into the sky again. According to you we would have to love this movie because, hey, it's a live action Transformers movie, you've wanted one all these years, so what if it's a piece of crap, not accepting it anyway would be plain ungreatful.

Now I should add that I actually liked ROTF, and I don't envisige myself posting any more complaints about the movie. But there's absolutley nothing wrong with people who didn't like the movie posting their's, infact there would be little point to board's like these if they couldn't. What is more I actually thought ROTF was an improvement over the first movie. Could it be that these improvements were made partly as a result of critics pointing out some of the flaws of the first film? I wonder.

[Counterpunch]

Sorry buck-o, that's not how it works. This is a public forum and I have just as much right to post here as you.

Don't bait with the 'buck-o' stuff. The line is being pushed.

I think I understand why you guys love it…

Explosions
Megan Fox

Am I missing anything?

Samething here, but you're establishing a pattern of backhanded insulting speech.

Issues may be addressed. Any more personal attacking/baiting and I'm just dropping infractions into your account. EDIT: I mean any and everyone, not just as a result of these issues above.

[First-Aid]

Counterpunch bro...you gots your hands full in this one doncha? LOL

[Optimus Jigga Prime]

Like the majority of you all, I am an 80's Dude who only grew up ONLY on Transformers. Even though I have just recently joined, I have been an advert reader of this forum for a while, checking out everyone's view. So be it that my 1st post is in regards to the movie.

I can personally see why alot of people didnt like the movie (G1, Beastwars, Headmasters, Masterforce Armada, ALL fans - no exclusions) due to the holes in the movie.

Simple things which would have made the experience enjoyable (again some points already mentioned on this forum will be repeated):

(1) Megatron - For one, I didnt like that Megatron taking orders from the Fallen. Everydude knows he answers to NOBODY!

(2) Arcee, Ironhide, Ratchet, Sideswipe, Jolt & Sideways - Not given enough screen time. No dialogue for the new characters was pretty poor.

(3) The Twins - In my opinion, they should have left these guys out and have just Sideswipe and Sunstreaker. That would have made more sense to the francise. However I can see why they put the Twins in as that would appeal to getting more Kids in seats (thought their language was a bit much for a 12a).

(4) Devastator - I was so hyped up about Devastator (even wore my retro Devastator shirt to the show)! It was amazing see him on screen but felt he was killed of too easily. I dont think the writers and Bay thought this one through as it would have made sense for another Assembler robot i.e Aerial Bots/Superion to take him on. If they couldnt afford to put another in, then just leave him out.

HOWEVER, I appreciated the following:

(1) Optimus Prime - My favourite of all time Transformers. Even though its all fiction, what he stands for is something which makes up a great role model. I appreciated his dark side where he was a bit more vigalent. I had no idea on how he was gonna take down Demolishor being 3 times he size but that showed bravery. His courage was pushed to the limits when he took on 3 decepticons and went all out. I liked seeing that side of Prime. At the end of the day, their is no retreat like they use to do in the Cartoon. Kill or be KILLED... Simple as that.

(2) Megatron & Starscream - I am glad that they bought back the banter between both characters. Its something which all fans appreciate as it shows demostrates the struggle for power among the Decepticons.

(3) Sam (Shia LaBeouf) & Seymour (John Turturro) - These guys raised their game up for the 2nd franchise. Seymour was not annoying like he was in the 1st installment. As for Shia, he is a consistent actor who does a decent job in whatever he takes on.

(4) CGI - Simply out of this world. After seeing the patchy efforts of Wolverine and the not-impressive Terminator Salvation. Arguebly the best CGI ever I have ever seen in a movie. The Transformations between the Autobots/Decepticons are breathtaking.

As its my 1st viewing (will be seeing it at least 3 times), I would give it a 3.5 out of 5. In some instances it was epic and enjoyable but for the reasons at the top of post, it loses out on reaching 0.5 to reach 4.

I dont agree that Bay has ruined this one. Not everything can be perfect but at the sametime, we as Transformer fans have the right to be critical. I for one would like to see him and the writers do a poll for what they want us fans to vote for to be in the 3rd installment? What do you guys think of that?

Will be seeing it a 2nd time at the IMAX in London within the next few hours so will have time to study the movie more indept. I had some really annoying kids with their father who kept talking at random points through the movie 1st time round so hoping I will be ok this time!

[Kibble]

Not entirely sure what I thought about the movie other than it was definitely action packed. I'll have to see it again, preferably from home where distractions are less and even rewinding is an option, to determine how much I actually like it. As it stands, I think I'm more impressed with the first one as a movie, but I didn't dislike this one. There were definitely a lot of things that could have been better, though. I think Spacebridge's review on page 6 was quite good and says a lot of the negatives or areas of improvement.


***Spoilers...although by now if you haven't seen it and are reading these there's not much point in warning you off.

My biggest gripes were probably Devastator having such a lame role and being such a puss...I mean the retard bros were able to give him all he could handle! These are same two Bumblebee effortlessly slapped up and tossed aside on his own...WTF? Guess it's a good thing all Devoltron really had to do is tear up the top of a pyramid... They should have avoided using the name Devastator, too, because there was nothing "devastating" about him other than them calling that wuss-pile Devastator. And it was also odd how certain battles were just a breeze, most notably the end ones...Devastator, Megatron, and The Fallen. Megs is supposed to have a 10 in strength and The Fallen is supposed to have infinite, yet Powered-up Prime defeats the both of them in like 20 seconds combined. And yeah, the many no name, no role Decepticons were lackluster as well as the fact a handful of Autobots and a small army unit was able to overcome with relative ease.

So I don't know whether I'll like it more or less after I get to see it another time or two or three...but it was everything you’d expect from an action packed summer flick, I guess.

[SamYarbrough77]

It was terrible, just awful.... at times when the bots were fist fighting i could not even tell what the hell was going on.... human plot sucked. the first movie was better by far and that is saying something. ss and soundwave were good....but they could not save this crappy film

[Kryptikore]

After giving it 2 days after seeing TF:ROTF I can say I do not want Transformers 3 to come out! It was funny going through all the steps of emotion through those 2-1/2 days (Visual Aww, embaressment, dissapointment, Extreme Anger). Instead I would like to have a new director and writers and even some; not all, but some new actors. For a "lets start over" Transformers Movie just like IMO The Incredible Hulk. I would have even waited till next year for better editing. This is all putting aside the fact of G1 likeness flaws and me being a fan of how careless this movie was. Ok everybody; those of you that are happy with this film have your mind blowing plotless movie (popcorn flick). I on the other hand want a deep rich plot. If you cut out all the crap from the Transformers long 25 year history. You have one hell of a story! Lets reverse the typical set up that we have now of where the humans are the main focus and the Transformers are in the background. Dim down the special effects with easier tranforming designs. Even though at the time; I thought it was stupid when Starwars came out with a prequel. I think Transformers could do the same on Cybertron (Hint TF4). Feel free to comment.

[Prime Riblet]

Dude your opening post has more plotholes than TF2...I deserve better than this, but maybe you don’t…Don’t perceive to understand why many of my ilk find this movie pretty terrible…I think I understand why you guys love it…

Explosions
Megan Fox

Am I missing anything?

I’ve read like 15 reviews, ALL SCORCHING, even local reviews…When you have critics universally scorching this movie when many of the same critics were down the middle on the first movie, maybe they aren’t conspiring to bash Summer Movies…Maybe it actually sucks (Obviously not to you, but for many)…

If people like it, then it really doesn't matter how many critics give it a thumbs down. It also doesn't matter if you believe it to be fact that the movie sucked. It's ok to have an opinion. You don't need to condemn people for liking a movie. That's actually a waste of YOUR time, since you aren't presenting your arguments in a very constructive way. Bashing the movie is one thing; bashing the people who watch and/or like the movie is wrong.

[wingdarkness]

Sorry Prime Riblet, that was meant for the specific poster of the thread he made before it got merged with this thread where he basically called out all TF fans for not being happy that we atleast got a movie...That we should just be happy that a TF movie was made no matter how it's made or how terrible it may be perceived to be...The fact it ends up in this thread kinda skews the context of it all....

[dryxler]

wow, lotsa flak flying around here. talked to the my friend/coworker this morning at work about the movie we saw wednesday, and after voicing my complaints (i.e. crude language/humor, characterization, consistency issues) he assumed i disliked it. i told him i did like it, i think it just fell short of my expectations. i will see it again, more than once. and i will appreciate it for it's qualities: the action, visuals, intensity, complexity, and raw power were awesome in Bayishness. but the glaring problems i can't ignore. the movie wasn't perfect, but it was still awesome. if you watch this movie and accept it for what it is, it's not that bad. i was just expecting more. they did fix some issues (more decepticon dialogue, more characters, better fight sequences, stronger characterization, megatron is a F'N TANK AND NOT A JET LIKE SS!!!) so some improvements were made. hopefully next time Bay (or whomever) will make some more improvements. less dirty jokes/language and more fluid/deeper characterization. i love sideswipe, really. but why do i miss him?

i will hope and pray for Grimlock. if he can't fix the problem, he will at least kick it's a$$ with insults.
BTW for all who haven't seen him Masterpiece Grimlock ROCKS!

[Omega-1]

I just saw the movie and I'm not surprised that the critics don't like it but I'm surprised with how many fans don't like it. I really liked it. My only complaint is that it's a little bit disjointed, ie. robots/people coming out of nowhere.

[SPOILERS BELOW]

I don't mind that not all the robots got special focus. I know that there's not enough time/money for that but this is supposed to be a big epic war so they need to have a lot of robots in there even if the robots are not given special attention. And in a big war, a lot of robots are going to get killed. It's pretty much like a live-action version of the animated movie. I really liked the relationship between Megatron and Starscream. I liked how they killed off one of their own to revive Megatron. I loved the fight scenes. My only complaint is that Prime finished off the Fallen too easily and that the Fallen didn't seem badass enough. I expected the Fallen to be more like Unicron but maybe they are saving that for the 3rd movie.

[Nico]

My only major complaint was that the fallen got killed too easily. Maybe the Jetfire Prime combination was simply way stronger than him.

[kicker_of_elves]

Maybe somebody already alluded to this in the previous postings, so apologies if so.

I generally liked the movie and disliked it for many of the same reasons already listed. I especially liked what I took to be references or nods to Supergod Masterforce (the college student who transforms from a human to a 'con, and the combined Jetfire/Optimus Prime looking a great deal like God Ginrai with the Godbomber armour).

[jacksonspade]

I feel devastated.



Really I can not believe the reviews given by critics; I thought surely they would appreciate ROTF for what it was.. What it stood for, what it was attempting as a movie. I trusted they would be intelligent enough to see that..

I have been searching frantically trying to find somewhere on the net that saw my point, that ROTF was simply brilliant, a step forward for the new generation of movie go-ers.
I can appreciate why the critics would not enjoy this movie, the sight of a bare ankle would be enough to make most of them blush and disapprove, let alone Megan Fox's sexy motorbike pose.

Transformers, as a movie, or **** even as a cartoon series, were NEVER about brilliantly complex plot lines or carefully written dialogue, it was about action, about brilliantly heroic robots that were protecting us from an evil, from the enemy.

That's what ROTF was all about, and it delivered. From the early moments of Bumble Bee crashing out of the shed to ward off the kitchen appliances, to the epic battle between basically Optimus and every Deception on earth at the time!

"I'll take you all ON!"

If you didn’t feel proud and amazed at that then sorry you don’t deserve to have watched the movie. Really it’s that simple.

Simply put, Revenge of the fallen gives so much, and asks so little, it’s ridiculous and pretentious that anyone could try to fault it. And that’s why I’ve felt it necessary to sign up and write this thread. I could not believe that you guys, THE FANS, were saying the same **** they critics were!?

Do you have any idea HOW lucky we are to have ONE Hollywood movie made about a slightly obscure 1980's Japanese cartoon series?
Now think how fortunate that is, then ask for a sequel. One that surpassed the original as best as a sequel can, with already established shallow characters, a constricted plot, but a hell of a lot of heart.

Even if you didn’t like one small section etc, GET OVER IT! You have TWO Hollywood Transformers Movies made!!?? I can’t believe how UN appreciative so many people are..


Could not believe it, from Transformers fans themselves. Couldnt believe it.

This is where I start my slow clap that will catch on and burst into thunderous applause!

Spot on, Sir!

[GetterDragun]

Dude your opening post has more plotholes than TF2...I deserve better than this, but maybe you don’t…Don’t perceive to understand why many of my ilk find this movie pretty terrible…I think I understand why you guys love it…

Explosions
Megan Fox

Am I missing anything?

I’ve read like 15 reviews, ALL SCORCHING, even local reviews…When you have critics universally scorching this movie when many of the same critics were down the middle on the first movie, maybe they aren’t conspiring to bash Summer Movies…Maybe it actually sucks (Obviously not to you, but for many)…

Doesn't matter. The numbers are showing people are seeing it in spite of the reviews. I've seen it a few times already and I have never heard such a positive reaction...people were cheering like it was a BotCon event or something (you'd think they were fans like us). And after seeing a few times, I realized it's not much different than a G2 episode or the original cartoon movie that we all like. So if the critics had to review any of the original cartoon stuff I'm sure they would say it was not that good either, but guess what? That's what made Transformers popular, and that's what will make this movie one of the largest blockbusters of all time.

[Renne]

Critics liking something or not seriously does not mean squat. Ticket sales and bums on seats is what decides whether a franchise will continue, and there's not a lot critics can do about that.

Like GetterDragun, I have never heard such a positive response. There was lots of clapping throughout the movie and as embarrassing as it was (and I LIKED the movie!) the applause at the end was really, really loud.

Seriously? The only thing the panning by the critics might get us is a bit more of an indepth look at the perceived flaws of ROTF by TPTB when the third movie is made. And this is a good thing!





....I'm just glad we got Optimus being killed and coming back to life out of the way. Hopefully this means he won't bite it for good in the third one because I don't think my nerves could take it.

[oldskooltf]

Just saw the movie tonight for the first time at IMAX:

What I liked

- CGI = awesome

- Prime fighting = awesome

- Jetfire was cool.

- Wheelie was actually alright.

- The twins were not as bad as what I was lead to believe by all this negative-hype that I've read online about them. I actually found them to be funny at times and only a little annoying.

- Starscream was like classic starscream! His relationship with Megatron was really shown well.

- The Doctor was pretty cool.

- Insecticon-like decepticon was cool -- for the little that we saw it.

- Devastator filling the whole IMAX screen was cool.

- Soundwave was done right. Props to the writers for not allowing Frenzy from the first movie nor Blackout from the first movie to end up being the Soundwave character. This movie 2 soundwave's alt mode made sense and kept his classic role as the intel guy for the deceps. Well done!

- Parents were funny.


What I didn't like
- The action scenes were blurry at IMAX and hard to follow on the gi-normous screen. Seriously -- that was a slight complaint from the group I saw the movie with. Don't get me wrong, the movie still was cool to see at IMAX, but now I can't wait to see it in 1080p on Blu Ray.

- I could do with a little less sexual humor, but it wasn't as distasteful as I was lead to believe from what I read the days before tonight online.

- I was waiting to see Megatron and Starscream escape to outerspace to join back up with Soundwave during the credits... but no such thing was shown. Oh well.


What confused me (and my friends who aren't into TF like I am)
- Why no Barricade? Did I miss something?

- Was that Blackout or this "Grindor" toy character?

- I thought Bay said in an interview that Arcee was killed. I only saw one bike killed after her one line. Did I miss something?

- The whole constructicons -- so are there like twins of these guys or something of that nature? I'm guessing yes. Two Long Haul-like guys, two mixmaster-like guys, one yellow Rampage-like guy who makes Devastator and the other is red, etc... I guess that makes a more logical reason for why the Devastator toy is just the vehicles making Devastator with no individual robot modes - just like the movie.

- We see what appears to be Bonecrusher -- vehicle mode and very briefly in robot mode in the desert. Another twin??

- If there's all these look-a-likes or "twins", then can we get Thundercracker, Skywarps, Ramjet, etc. in TF3?

-EDIT/ADD: Did I see it correctly that a decep had to be killed as part of the process of restoring Megatron? Who was it? Do we know? (I read in another thread that it was a HighTower look-a-like, or possibly HighTower himself)


The plot was ok. Nice to give some back-story to the TFs in the movie. I liked the movie. Some parts of me like it more than TF1, and other parts of me find TF1 to be more "charming" than this movie. I hope Bay stays as director and the writers come back too. Very cool summer movie. Not perfect, but enjoyable. (what movie is perfect, anyway)

[Grendel]

personally, I liked it, but wouldn't go to say it was anything to be happy with, TF fan or not, there was still alot that ticked me off. would rather of had Sideswipe and Jolt or the Arcee's have scenes rather than the obnoxious twins, tye started out funny, then it got old fast.
Megatron calling the Fallen Master, yeah, didn't like that.
And I'm still holding out hope that some day, we can actually get a transformers movie about transformers, and not mostly about the army with transformers just showing up once in awhile. And I could do less with Sam's whining about wanting a normal life, in exchange for maybe a scene wih some autobots reminising about Cybertron or something.
I do like the movie as it is, but wish it had been better.

[Galvatron628]

I finally went at 3:40PM yesturday to my IMAX screening of ROTF. About half way through I started thinking to myself "whats so bad about this movie that all the critics hate it? IT kicks ass so far". And at the end, the whole theatre gave the movie a round of applause. ROTF was awesome. I have a few gripes.

I didn't see any plotholes to this movie, or anything lead to believe the ignored the source material from the first one. The whole movie seemed pretty connected to Transformers. But when it comes to gripes, first and formost I have to admit the Fallen wasn't want I expected. The way I understood it, the only bot supposively more scary is Unicron, and he's supposed to be the Satan of the Transformer universe. But his lack of screentime, overall weak voice (they should of used Nimoy liked they planned) and begging for his life and just getting his ass kicked quickly by Optimus at end just kind of made him another generic 'con.

Speaking of Generic con's thats my other gripe. The decepticons are waaaaaaaaayyyyyyy too generic in this one. Why are there so many decepticons and less than 10 Autobots? The constructicons are a good example, as there seems to be about 200 of them! Frenzy was cool in the first movie, but this time it seemed like they had way too many Frenzy style bots in between Wheelie, the little insecticon, the millions of nano bots that Ravage dropped, and of course The Doctor. I also thought the whole Pretender Alice thing was just completly worthless. She really didn't accomplish much at all other than ripping off the TX from Terminator 3.

I also just didn't see the point of having 3 Arcee's when they could of easily just had one. It was my understanding, they didn't want her to be smaller than the rest of the Autobots, and It was SUPPOSED to be 3 bikes that combined into one robot. So what happend to that idea?

Also lets talk about Devastator's balls. Unnecessary. To me this is just the sequel to Bumblebee taking a piss on Agent Simmons in the first one. While I enjoyed most of the humor, both these instances were just toilet humor and out of place and unnecessary. Transfomers do not reproduce through sexual intercourse therefore they do NOT need balls!

That was really about it on gripes. For the most part it seemed like one long episode of G1, and it ended like a cartoon with Megatron uttering the words "This isn't over Prime" and then cowardly retreating with Starscream.

[Judge Deliberata]

I'm going to make a rare move and interject here, moving to dismiss entirely the notion of "fandom" from this debate. I don't normally do this, but, whatever.

Does being a TF fan mean you HAVE to stick by the franchise and worship the ground it walks on through every step of the way? I don't think so. Nor does it mean everything must come under an ultra-filtered lens.

The people who have come into this thread with negative reviews have done so because they're TF fans - would they have made an account on a TF messageboard if they weren't?

Point is, this movie has drawn very mixed reaction from both fans and especially non-fans/casual moviegoers. We're all on a TF board here, and as much as we'd like to think that nothing TF could possibly have anything remotely describable as bad associated with the name, the fact is not everyone sees this flick as a great thing - or, conversely, as a horrible thing. Being ABLE to view what, in one's own opinion, this film means for the franchise, and interpret it in their own way, should be enough to prove all that matters - that one is a fan at all. This movie isn't the best ever made or the worst - anyone using their head can see that. Let's just talk about what we liked and didn't like, leaving fan status outside, mmkay? We're all here because we love TF, regardless of incarnation.

Critical opinions do not matter in the long run (look at how the original Willy Wonka did in theatres, and how it's loved now). Neither do sales figures (you can't honestly tell me everyone here loved Titanic?) Neither of those prove either quality, or fan status.

[roblinb]

The first part of this thread is good, actual REVIEWS but the second half or so is mainly a bunch of forum regulars bickering back and forth about certain details or what not. I'm sure all of you know more about Transformers than I do, I'm just a fan. I grew up watching the t.v. show (I'm 34 now) and I had some of the toys. I saw the cartoon movie in the theater, and a couple of years back I watched the dvd. I also collected the Marvel comics, and I guess I'm what you call a casual fan who knows a bit about the mythos. However, I will not participate in the flame war going on because the majority of us are here to read poster reviews.

Here's mine.

I give it a 8/10. It was a very entertaining movie, some parts I felt the hairs on the back of my neck stand up because they were just how I thought they should be portrayed.

What I liked:

- The Megatron/Starscream dialogue. Wow. In the first movie I loved it when Starscream said "I live to serve you Lord Megatron" but that was nothing compared to this. Orci/Kurtzman nailed it SPOT ON. I'm glad Megs didn't kill Starscream because this hate-hate relationship has more potential... especially if Unicron is in the next movie and enlists Starscream as a major pawn (by promising to help him attain his goal of Decepticon leadership).
- Sam and Bumblebee. The relationship is more of a friendship now, and less of a guardian protecting an innocent. I wasn't keen of Bumblebee crying but all in all the relationship has developed.
- Optimus. Enough can't be said of the forest scene, and although this Prime is a bit harsher than the one I remember I liked it. This version eliminates the problem instead of letting it live just to kill more innocents.
- Ravage. Another thing that Orci/Kurtzman nailed. Ravage was relentless, but he died too easily. But then again, Ravage is more about stealth and hit and run tactics vice being a true combatant.
- Simmons. Talk about making an annoying character cool. His one annoying line was about Devastator's wrecking "balls" but other than that he was likeable.
- Wheelie. Aside from humping legs, he was a neat and interesting new addition.
- The special effects. With a budget this big, you know it's going to be impressive but they really raised the bar. The Transformers looked real, and the action was top notch.

What I didn't like:

- The Twins. They were stupid as hell, not as annoying as Jar Jar but close. There's no way they should have been able to take down Devastator.
- The Fallen. He talked trash but couldn't back it up. He went down like a biotch and I can't believe this guy commands Megatron. They named the movie after him, and he did little to nothing to deserve such an honor.
- Soundwave. His voice was cool, but if I hadn't known he was in it I might not have realized it was him. For being such a major character he was merely an afterthought in this movie.
- The re-use of scenes from the first movie. WTF the meteor scene was the same as the first one! They spend money on Devastator's balls but can't afford to give us a new scene of Transformers entering the atmosphere?
- Was that Cybertron beside Saturn?
- Confusing plot. I have to watch it again, because I think I missed a lot. Some sun thing and the Matrix or what not. I'm not the sharpest tool in the tool shed but I didn't know what was going on at the end, and I don't feel I was alone there.

Still, it was awesome. I won't say all the critics are wrong, they're just harsher than me because I am a fan. I think Bay did a very good job in the areas that mattered (the fights and the relationships between the important Transformers). I don't care that some of them didn't have any lines or just a few lines. Not every character will get the screen time they deserve. The main ones did, and that's all that mattered to me.

I'll go see it a second time and hopefully catch onto the plot points I missed. Thanks for reading.

[Evolution Prime]

Critical opinions do not matter in the long run (look at how the original Willy Wonka did in theatres, and how it's loved now). Neither do sales figures (you can't honestly tell me everyone here loved Titanic?) Neither of those prove either quality, or fan status.

Actually I can honestly say I did. But that's because I'm a huge RMS Titanic buff. Loved studying since I was in grade school.