Transformers & Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen

TRANSFORMERS has now managed to be a successful franchise for over 25 years and spawned onto all medias imaginable. From toys to television to games to comics. In 2007, the Transformers franchise got a massive makeover for the silver screen in a reboot series for the master of explosions director Michael Bay.

TRANSFORMERS (2007) does not waste time and immediately we see an angry Decepticon completely destroy an american military base with only a small handful of soldiers escaping across the desert only to be chased by another Decepticon. Within the first 10 minutes, we are introduced to the awe inspiring visual effects of the transformations. Naturally the main draw of the new film was how were the creators going to recreate the transformers and their battles. The transformations themselves are excellent and remarkable as the special effects team were able to create the transformations to be possible due to the right measurements. This does however limit the transformers sizes. Transfromers such as Starscream due to being a jet whereas Bumblebee and Jazz are considerably smaller being only sports cars. Megetron himself is incredibly large and could easily destroy each transformer, but of course he doesn't. One of the main problems with the transformers is that we can't tell which one is which. The original cartoon designs had each robot with very distinct colours and weapons. This time around, they have designed to look like mechanical and limited by the measurements already set ahead for them. The battles are also difficult to tell as the action is incredibly fast with cameras flying all over the sets so we can't tell what is actually happening until a transformer has died or run away.

One of the main problems of the film is actually the lack of transformers within the film itself. There is roughly 10 - 12 transformers, and even then they are given very little screen time. Bumblebee is given the spotlight as the main transformer of the film, even out staging the Decepticon leader Megatron (who is only seen in the last quarter of the film) and the legendary Optimus Prime who is easily the best factor of the film. Prime is even voiced by the original voice artist Peter Cullen which does add a large amount of nostalgia to the film. Prime' s entrance is hammed up to max with music playing to him transforming in front of the main humans and declaring himself Optimus Prime: Leader of the Autobots. What we do have an abundance of is human characters. All of which are pretty insufferable.

The main character is Sam Witwicky (portrayed by a very annoying Shia LaBeuf who seems to have the same performance in every production), a teenager attempting to pass grades at school and ultimate ambition to get with Megan Fox's man eater of a character named Mikaela. Whilst buying his first car, he unwittingly is introduced to the Autobot Bumblebee and is now involved in the war to find the All-Spark being an almost endless source of energy. He is in my mind the worst mistake that the writers have made with this film. The character is loud and has been made to try and sound funny and appealing to the late teen audience of the movie. Complete with one liners and bumbling around trying to impress Mikaela with his brand new car and 'charming' personality. Fox herself is nothing more than eye candy for the film and brings almost nothing to it other than that. Out of all the characters she is the one that could have been edited out and there would be no dramatic changes to he story, other than a decrease of orange women. Sam's parents make their segment look nothing more than a coming-of-age-teen comedy with awkward scenes when they believe they have stumbled across their son masturbating, when he is actual fact hiding the Autobots in his garden. Strange but it does happen. Another character that seems to have his own story (that brings almost nothing to the overall plot) is the main surviving soldier of the attack of the beginning of the film. Again he is a character that the writers wanted to make more appealing to the audience than having relevance to the plot. The last sub-character is the Sector Seven Agent Simmons played by the excellent John Turturro. Whilst Turturro's is a fresh breath of talent in the film, his character is nothing more than a typically perverted and abusive portrayal of an Area 51-esque conspiracy. All other characters are insignificant, or annoying. He is made the butt out of the film and is actually 'urinated' (simply fuel) on by Ironhide. Is this really what the hardcore fans want to see? Their childhood television hero's bathroom habits?

The story is very basic as it becomes a series of brawls between the Autobots and Decepticons. Autobots are attempting to the keep both the All-spark and Megatron's location a secret whilst the Decepticons are trying to find them both. Doesn't help that both Megatron and the All-spark are in the same location of the Sector 7 base. The film eventually comes down to the final confrontation as Megatron is awakened and heads towards a heavily populated city to begin destruction and what not. The Autobots follow and attempt to keep Sam safe with the All-spark. This is where the action becomes incredibly confusing as we see at least 3 different fights going on. The most shocking moment is seeing Jazz getting ripped apart by Megatron, which probably made a lot of die-hard Transformer fans livid with killing one of the main Autobots. We are treated to more nostalgia though when Prime and Megatron begin their own battle with the iconic line 'One shall stand, One shall fall' from the 1986 animated 'Transformers the Movie'. Megatron is seemingly killed by Prime and the remaining Decepticons flee (namely Starscream who actually didn't do that much to begin with). The Autobots are now here to stay and to help fight any new threats to the Earth. And of course Sam gets Fox at the end.


Two years later in 2009 and we are given the sequel TRANSFORMERS : REVENGE OF THE FALLEN which promised more action, more Transformers and more explosions. They did deliver and all these counts, but still managed to miss the mark on a decent plot. It is now two years later and the Transformers have become a military aide and are instrumental in seeking out and destroying any Decepticons hiding on Earth. In fact, the opening scenes of the film include the Autobots track down a gigantic Decepticon with Optimus Prime eventually killing it. The chase is possibly the best part of the film which is both thrilling and tremendous in terms of visual effects with the giant Decepticon cutting through a large freeway bridge as if made of lego with the rubble flying everywhere. How the government covers all this up is beyond me. Sam and Mikaela are together now (still don't see the appeal with either of them) and Sam is going to college. Already this part of the plot feels like the 'American Pie' movies. However, Sam is not as insufferable as he was in the first installment. The character has matured slightly (as one does when they are involved in a war between large robots from another world) and is wanting out of the whole situation to get his life back on track and to continue his relationship. Once again, Fox is mere eye candy and brings nothing to the story and could be edited out of the film completely as before with the same effect.

College life is as expected. There are trendy campuses, neon nightclubs, no unattractive women and the most annoying roommates. Sam actually gains my sympathy when we are introduced to his roommate Leo who is driven only by the daily fix of wild conspiracy theories. How convenient that the main character (who is the Earth ally and correspondent to the Autobots and bound to keep them a secret) has to share a room with a man dedicated to government conspiracies (one of which is the final battle from the first film and is wanting to reveal the Transformers to the world). Sounds like a sitcom to me. My belief is that the writers created Leo to be as annoying as Sam from the first film, only to make the maturer Sam look better by comparison. It does work though so. Despite trying to take himself out of the Transformer wars, he is eventually sucked back into the messy situation time and time again as he almost killed by female transformer motorcycle assassins.

The Transformers themselves now get a large amount of screen time this time round which both aides and brings them down. We have the usual crew of Prime, Bumblebee, Ironhide and Rachet, but we now have the displeasure of the Arcee twins. Twin transformers (one green and one red) who transform into identical cars shamefully accompany Sam and Bumblebee on the adventures in order to defeat the new threat of The Fallen. The twins are pure comic relief and there for the kids as they are meant to be from 'the getto' if that were possible for a transformer and bring no serious contibution to the plot. Megatron is revived and flies across the solar system to reunite with Starscream who has been harbouring The Fallen, an ancient transformer who is searching for a machine cappible of harvesting the power of a sun on Earth. The most interesting Decepticon to newly appear is the almighty Devastator from the Constructicons. However, he looks more like a large dog like robot made of a giant scrapyard. He also a scrotum. Another Transformer to appear is the large and ancient Jetfire in the form of a Blackbird jet. Rather than being the scientist and explorer (which he was in the original cartoon and had traveled with Starscream) he is portrayed as an old Decepticon having defected to the Autobots. And has a walking stick. An extremely powerful Transformer, with a walking stick, and a memory problem. Someone severly screwed with the characters in this one. Even Megatron and Starscream have their basic characters messed around with. Megatron is the leader of evil robots and has never once considered anyone to be his equal. Even when he does find someone powerful he usually destroys them, yet in this series he bows down and accepts The Fallen as his master. Starscream is a power hungry and yearns for the day that Megatron falls so he can take over the Decepticons. Here he is nothing more than Megatron's lackey and takes it whilst lying down. The writer's took the characters and dropped the basic principles as to what made them so interesting.

One of the main mistakes with the plot of this film actually involves the death of Optmius Prime. The death was not so much the problem, but that he was revived within the same film. About midway into the feature, Prime is mauled to death by Megatron, Starscream and a third Decpticon (which Prime actually kills) in a rather epic battle and is then disregarded by the government. Sam and his team follow a trail all across the world and eventually ending up in Eygpt where it turns out the sun harvester is hidden within a large temple. The large confrontation between Autobots and Decepticons again happens with the american military thrown in the middle. With explosions left and right, random (and insignificant) Decepticons being killed and with the camera flying trying to catch the action, it's all very difficult to make sense of what is happening. Eventually, Prime is revived and destroys The Fallen and the sun harvester, resulting in both Megatron and Starscream fleeing. In a strange moment at the end, we see a slightly homoerotic attraction between Sam and Prime. This is meant to show they have a strong bond, but it is so out of the blue and over the top, it comes out too strong. What I feel should have been done is keep the death of Prime but have it near the end of the film as that way he would have had more screen time. The third film could have been dedicated to raising Prime from the dead which would highlight the importance of the character.

For all the faults of the first and second films of the new Transformers franchise, they are nothing less of awesome entertainment. Michael Bay has gained a reputation of having more effects than plot devices, but its still manages to keep a person interested in what is happening. To say the films have no redeemable features is harsh even for these features. They have little plot and revelance to the original Transformers, but the effects are still good enough to just keep the films watchible. We are now waiting for the third in the series which is to be released in July 2011. There are rumours that Triple Changers will appear and possibly even the planet Transformer Unicron. Lord knows how they'll do that.

Review by Rory Dunn