Kurona wrote:Deadput wrote:I think when people want more "character" their talking about screen-time and lines which we definitely got in the last movie with Optimus (as always), Crosshairs, Hound, Lockdown.
Bumblebee was a bit less of a screen hog in Aoe with Hound pretty much taking his place in the movie and Drift was good too although he got the less screen time out of all the main Autobots in that movie doesn't help that it's difficult to make a stoic personality stick out compared to loud or snarky ones such as Hound and Crosshairs.
The only characters I felt needing more screen time were The Dinobots (Although I understand since they show up at the end of the movie not much time to develop character there although a line or two from Grimlock would help at least Grimlock is coming back) and some more screemtime or at least some action scenes to make Stinger stand out more then he actually did in the final film since it's obvious compared to what we saw during filming that several scenes with Stinger were cut out of the movie.
Oh true, characters are certainly important and AoE making its Autobot cast stand out a lot more compared to the previous movies was certainly an improvement - while action should be prioritised, one should also make an effort to have the characters stand out a little and be enjoyable and likeable. Nothing groundbreaking or full of depth; but just someone that you might be able to relate to on some small level and someone who you're rooting for when they're taking the fight to the bad guys. So you can certainly criticise these movies for not having likeable, enjoyable characters if that's how you feel (it's personally how I feel; I find Optimus in these movies to be an extremely unlikable character for instance - but that's not the point I'm making here and I won't bore you all by going into why).
What I was getting at is that a lot of people seem to criticise the movie for having plots and characters that lack depth. But, as I keep saying, that's generally how action movies work best. It's not where you look for your deeply impactful stories or something that will re-define cinema for generations or have characters the like of which you've never seen before. I mean hey, maybe these movies
do do that for you; I dunno. If they do, all the power to you! But for those complaining that they don't... this is a summer action blockbuster. You go in, you have fun, you get out. That's generally the point, so I don't see much worth in complaining that the first movie's story was simple or that Hound doesn't have a deeply developed backstory. One of the few points I'll agree with Bay on is that ROTF having an overly-complex mythos
was a detriment because it's distracting from what should be the focus; the action.
A lot of the criticisms about the movies (ESPECIALLY the first couple) were that the Transformers themselves didn't get a lot of screen time compared to the human characters and that when they did, they were hard to tell apart. This lack of screen time led to the lack of character depth and was caused mainly by design.
There was a lot of complaining early on about how the design of the Transformers was far too complicated; basically a skeleton with wires and pistons and various gizmos and doodads barely covered up by bits and pieces of the vehicle mode. This did two things; the first being small - they were so similar in build and color that it was hard to tell them apart during fight scenes or just walking around together. The second being that, especially for the technology at the time, it was incredibly difficult to animate them. So many moving parts, so many exposed surfaces, so many exposed bits and pieces all over the place takes a LOT of time and money to render.
To put any Transformer up on the screen for longer than they did, even if it was to give more depth or more backstory that would have made the movie that much better would have cost hundreds of thousands if not millions of dollars more and hundred of man and computer hours that they didn't have in the budget. So they sacrificed story for substance.
I honestly think that's why a lot of the story has been becoming more robo-centric and the designs since have been getting more and more individual and recognizable. Look at the most recent rounds of design releases. Much more solid coverage, much more color, much more variance in shape and height. And, if these previews and trailers are to be believed, much, much more presence in the movie. Which is why I'm going to give it one more try.
Kurona wrote:... in my opinion, one of the best movie designs was Jazz. He had enough visual cues from the original character to tell you that, yes, this is Jazz (the visor, the hood chest, I'm pretty sure he turned into a porche?) while also having enough new traits to give him his own visual identity separate from the original while still clearly being an update. I personally would have given him a colour scheme more reminiscent of his G1 self, but that's just my own personal aesthetic preference; I like a bit of colour compared to the grays and silvers.
And then his only line in the entire movie was basically " 'Sup, bitches?"...
