When they first announced the live action Transformers movie , I cringed. Not that the cartoon and toys were sacred from my youth, but that a Michael Bay directed CGI explosion-fest was not the least bit interesting to me. His movies tend to be like fast food, the first bite seems okay, but two hours later you’ve got diarrhea. So to save you the time and intestinal upset, I got my hands on the over-hyped spectacle and gave it the live-blog treatment.
00:43 – They got the guy who did the voice for Optimus Prime in the cartoon to voiceover the backstory. His race was created by THE CUBE, which looks like one of those Borg ships – how convenient, since Paramount is one of the film backers and they have JJ Abrams working on the Star Trek prequel. Anyway, war of good vs. evil, across the galaxy, led to Earth, blah blah blah you get the point.
02:15 – Right off the bat, shit doesn’t make sense. There’s an
army guy talking about getting back home for momma’s alligator ettoufee, but he keeps talking about his heritage and speaking Spanish. Aside from Spanish Cajun, there’s a nice cross-section of clichés so the audience doesn’t have to think: Simple White Guy, Hard Black Man, and GI Joe Who Just Wants To Go Home to His Family (including newborn daughter he’s never met).
03:58 – Our first truly stupid line of dialogue: “a helicopter” “an inbound unidentified infiltrator” is heading towards the Army’s desert base. Count on lots more. Luckily, the characters are written just as stupidly, as they lead the chopper to their base, even though it has no communications to identify itself. But it does have the call markings of a bird that was shot down three months prior, even though there’s no damage to it. Nah, that’s not weird.
05:58 - “MH-53 pilot, power down now…have your crew step out or we will kill you.” No person, in any army ever would say something that ridiculous. Credit to the actor who not only did it for the paycheck, but was able to say it without laughing every time.
06:24 - Surprise! Not a helicopter! The next 2 ½ is a blur of explosions and yelling and robot parts and special effects. No, really. You can’t tell what’s going on. Michael Bay, at least you’re consistent.
09:57 – Our boy hero Youngblood said “sea men”. Get it? Hahaha!
12: 40 - Unnecessary celebrity casting: Bernie Mac as a used car salesman. Who will sell Youngblood a car he’s never seen before.
15:54 - The Secretary Of Defense holds a briefing with military personnel, yet strangely decides to introduce himself by name at the outset. Why? You were just introduced by position by your lackey. The 4 Horsemen Of The Hacker Apocalypse are also there, because the Myspace generation needs to help solve the problem. Apparently, from an audio clip, which is the only thing remained from the earlier blurry CGI explosions, he expects somebody will be able to track the signal back to it’s source.
18:20 – Parents just don’t understand. Especially Youngblood’s. Cliché and unnecessary to boot.
19:18 – Within 10 seconds of each other, two characters in two different locations reference this strange and unknown ”weapons system” they’re facing. Fuck, we’re not all that dumb…we get it, you’re talking about the same thing. Oh, and Spanish Cajun’s mom had “the gift…she saw things,” and he’s got that gene too. Spanish Cajun Native American?
22:00 – Cliché high school characters galore! Dippy Friend,
meet Dumb Jock and Hottie. Gratuitous, prolonged shots of Hottie, and lots of smart-ass stammering by Youngblood. The whole thing is capped off with a rewording of the old Transformers tag line “more than meets the eye”.
28:20 – There’s a boom box under somebody’s seat on Air Force One that can turn into a robot that makes sounds like a Gremlin and moves like it has cerebral palsy. Nice security breech. It this film, 9/11 would have happened every day.
29:26 – A woman eats a Ding Dong off the floor. For no reason.
30:34 – Lady Horseman finds the signal! It’s coming from onboard Air Force One! Y’know, because of the supercomputers they have on there with all the national secrets.
32:01 – Boom Box Gremlin can shoot throwing stars.
34:44 – Low speed car pursuit on bicycle? You betcha! And Youngblood’s car can do an impression of the Luxor.
37:29 – Lady Horseman suggests there could be such a thing as “a living organism…a DNA based computer”. Lucky she’s also hot.
39:21 – Oh, Spanish Cajun, you keep talking in Spanish but everybody already said they don’t speak any. Wacky!
39:42 – Simple White Guy gets impaled by Robot Scorpion. Cliché characters are like red shirts on Star Trek.
41:50 – With only a cell phone and a soldier’s credit card, GI Joe gets connected to the Pentagon…in less than a minute. Wondering what Strike Package: Bravo is? A whole lot of military firepower, buddy. Prepare for “a danger, close fire mission”. Scramble jets against the writers! They’re attacking the English language!
42:22 – “Send the ‘Hawks over to Kill Box One-Alpha.”
44:46 – Another stock character down…oh no it’s Spanish Cajun! We’d pretend to be concerned but he’ll be fine because they wasted so much time on him up to this point that they won’t kill him. He’ll survive until the end. Guaranteed.
45:10 – “There’s only one hacker in the world who can break this code.” Well, Lady Horseman, why the fuck wasn’t he with you and your three pals and the rest of the eggheads in the Pentagon to begin with? Those damn oversights. So how is it the government can’t crack the signal code on their own but they know when Female Horseman puts a copy of it on a flash drive?
48:15 – Now, a low speed bicycle pursuit by car. Youngblood has a pink bike with tassels, because that’s funny. And Burger King gets some serious ad placement.
53:09 – Cars turn into robots that fight. Can’t tell who is winning. Can’t really tell who is fighting. But everything is moving really fast!
55:54 – Youngblood’s car can’t talk like the bad robots, but it will play sound bites through its radio to communicate and do simple charades gestures. Children’s party game robots from outer space?
58:28 – I have seen the decapitated head of Boom Box Gremlin transform into a cell phone and Youngblood’s Camero scan a car from its undercarriage and transform into the newest model. I can’t believe there’s still another hour-fifteen left.
01:01:56 – After crashing into Dodger Stadium, Casa De Cadilac, a TV repair shop, and someone’s backyard, the Autobots introduce themselves after turning into more General Motors vehicles. By the way, one of them makes hip hop gestures and says slang like “what’s crackin’ little bitches”. That wouldn’t make any sense, but they’ve been learning about Earth from the world wide web, so I guess that pretty much covers anything absurd they do until the end of the movie. Like the other Autobot that quotes Clint Eastwood. Or that another can sense Youngblood’s pheromone levels and tell he wants to nail Hottie.
01:06:07 – Let me get all this straight – Youngblood’s great grandfather, while trekking to the Arctic Circle, found the evil Megatron -- who was looking for the Allspark, accidentally activated his navigational system, which imprinted the location on his broken glasses, which Youngblood was earlier trying to hock on eBay for money to buy a car. Fuck, this plot is retarded. The writers should have their hands smashed with cinder blocks until the bones are fine powder. I knew it was going to be bad when Youngblood’s last name was Witwicky, but it just keeps getting worse.
01:08:19 – You’re not supposed to notice that Superhacker changed shirts even though he and Lady Horseman were in FBI custody the whole time.
01:10:19 – “Sorry, my bad.” Is Optimus Prime apologizing for stepping on the fountain in the backyard or for the movie? And would anybody notice five 40-foot tall talking robots walking around the backyard in a residential neighborhood? Okay, maybe not next door, but perhaps in the house?
01:15:20 – Parents still just don’t understand. But helping the Autobots could seem like masturbating to a one-dimensional parent…a drinking, one-dimensional parent. I can’t help but agree with the robot assessment – “the parents are very irritating”.
01:17:52 – Unnecessary celebrity casting: John Turturro as a government spook. You did Miller’s Crossing and The Big Lebowski…why this?
01:22:48 – Youngblood’s Camero “lubricates” John Turturro. It pops a hatch off it’s crotch and pisses fluid on him. I wish I was making this up…
01:27:37 – All it takes to capture an Autobot is a pair of helicopters with tow cables and a few guys with fire extinguishers. The tow cables lock the robot up and the fire extinguishers…um, do nothing. But it translates well visually on film. Oh wait, after two minutes of blasting it, they realize they need to explain it’s something to cryogenically stun the robot. The writers have been learning about Earth from the world wide web too.
01:30:06 – “This was classified above Top Secret.” Huh? Why not just make 10 louder, and stop telling me this one goes to 11. How about your back story exposition at least sounds like it makes sense.
01:35:47 – There’s a secret facility under Hoover Dam, and a cryogenically frozen Megatron has been there since the early 30s. How else would mankind have gotten microchips, lasers, space flight and cars if they hadn’t been reverse engineered from Megatron? Oops, cars were around since the late 19th century. Damn writers, trying to pack too much into an already thin plot.
01:40:37 – That Cube thing? Yeah, also beneath the dam. And they can funnel the power into a small box where they can put electronic devices in and make them come alive. So why with all the big advances could they not detect Boom Box Gremlin in their facility? And why did they make it as annoying as Jar Jar Binks?
01:45:05 – Military intelligence! Take the Allspark Cube, which transformed from being 350 feet around into something the size of a suitcase, out of Hoover Dam and go to the city 22 miles away to hide it there from the Decepticons who are coming for it. I love and army that doesn’t know the meaning of the words collateral damage!
01:47:26 – Sure you can hot-wire a computer to generate a tone to transmit through a 70 year old radio to contact the Air Force. All you need to do is use a screwdriver to…uh, I’m thinking this will be done in the next 3 minutes off camera, which is faster than they could explain digital versus analog systems on-screen.
01:48:33 – It only took slightly more than a minute.
01:49:58 – The industrial sized crane truck just transformed in the middle of the highway and rollerbladed after the Cube. If you’re an evil robot from outer space, is telling your parents you’re gay the hardest part of rollerblading?
01:51:31 – Jar Jar Boom Box killed itself with it’s own stupid throwing stars. Thank God…it was either it or me. I just hope that…no, I’ll wait until the end before I say it.
01:52:16 – “Are there any aircraft orbiting the city?” Orbiting? C’mon Hard Black Man, don’t you know what orbiting means?
01:53:11 – My pizza arrives! Capping on this film made me hungry.
01:53:53 – What do Youngblood’s Camero and Ron Kovic have in common?
02:01:18 – Yeah, about 10 minutes of robot fighting gone by. Not much has happened other than that, which is good, because I needed the time to eat a few slices of my pie. But since you want to know, the fighting is average.
02:03:18 – They’re using a modified instrumental version of Smashing Pumpkins “Doomsday Clock”…I guess that’s cool.
02:07:28 – “At the end of this day, one shall stand…one shall fall.” Even the robots have corny dialogue. But seriously, it’s been two hours. Somebody fall.
02:09:20 – GI Joe laid a bike down sideways and slide on his back about 200 feet. Yeah, he was still able to shoot and destroy one of the robots, and then get up like nothing happened. Wanna know why? In real life he fucks Fergie, that beast-faced pant-pisser. I he can gaze into that buttermug and walk away, a little bike stunt ain’t nothin’.
02:09:44 – Really, really bad GCI of jet fighters flying through downtown LA. Get we now know where the budget ran out.
02:13:55 – Prime, why did you have to take a stab at the ”more than meets the eye” line too? It was bad enough that they’re playing Linkin Park.
Well, that’s two hours I’m never getting back that hopefully I saved you. You’re welcome.
00:43 – They got the guy who did the voice for Optimus Prime in the cartoon to voiceover the backstory. His race was created by THE CUBE, which looks like one of those Borg ships – how convenient, since Paramount is one of the film backers and they have JJ Abrams working on the Star Trek prequel. Anyway, war of good vs. evil, across the galaxy, led to Earth, blah blah blah you get the point.
02:15 – Right off the bat, shit doesn’t make sense. There’s an
army guy talking about getting back home for momma’s alligator ettoufee, but he keeps talking about his heritage and speaking Spanish. Aside from Spanish Cajun, there’s a nice cross-section of clichés so the audience doesn’t have to think: Simple White Guy, Hard Black Man, and GI Joe Who Just Wants To Go Home to His Family (including newborn daughter he’s never met).03:58 – Our first truly stupid line of dialogue: “a helicopter” “an inbound unidentified infiltrator” is heading towards the Army’s desert base. Count on lots more. Luckily, the characters are written just as stupidly, as they lead the chopper to their base, even though it has no communications to identify itself. But it does have the call markings of a bird that was shot down three months prior, even though there’s no damage to it. Nah, that’s not weird.
05:58 - “MH-53 pilot, power down now…have your crew step out or we will kill you.” No person, in any army ever would say something that ridiculous. Credit to the actor who not only did it for the paycheck, but was able to say it without laughing every time.
06:24 - Surprise! Not a helicopter! The next 2 ½ is a blur of explosions and yelling and robot parts and special effects. No, really. You can’t tell what’s going on. Michael Bay, at least you’re consistent.
09:57 – Our boy hero Youngblood said “sea men”. Get it? Hahaha!
12: 40 - Unnecessary celebrity casting: Bernie Mac as a used car salesman. Who will sell Youngblood a car he’s never seen before.
15:54 - The Secretary Of Defense holds a briefing with military personnel, yet strangely decides to introduce himself by name at the outset. Why? You were just introduced by position by your lackey. The 4 Horsemen Of The Hacker Apocalypse are also there, because the Myspace generation needs to help solve the problem. Apparently, from an audio clip, which is the only thing remained from the earlier blurry CGI explosions, he expects somebody will be able to track the signal back to it’s source.
18:20 – Parents just don’t understand. Especially Youngblood’s. Cliché and unnecessary to boot.
19:18 – Within 10 seconds of each other, two characters in two different locations reference this strange and unknown ”weapons system” they’re facing. Fuck, we’re not all that dumb…we get it, you’re talking about the same thing. Oh, and Spanish Cajun’s mom had “the gift…she saw things,” and he’s got that gene too. Spanish Cajun Native American?
22:00 – Cliché high school characters galore! Dippy Friend,
meet Dumb Jock and Hottie. Gratuitous, prolonged shots of Hottie, and lots of smart-ass stammering by Youngblood. The whole thing is capped off with a rewording of the old Transformers tag line “more than meets the eye”.28:20 – There’s a boom box under somebody’s seat on Air Force One that can turn into a robot that makes sounds like a Gremlin and moves like it has cerebral palsy. Nice security breech. It this film, 9/11 would have happened every day.
29:26 – A woman eats a Ding Dong off the floor. For no reason.
30:34 – Lady Horseman finds the signal! It’s coming from onboard Air Force One! Y’know, because of the supercomputers they have on there with all the national secrets.
32:01 – Boom Box Gremlin can shoot throwing stars.
34:44 – Low speed car pursuit on bicycle? You betcha! And Youngblood’s car can do an impression of the Luxor.
37:29 – Lady Horseman suggests there could be such a thing as “a living organism…a DNA based computer”. Lucky she’s also hot.
39:21 – Oh, Spanish Cajun, you keep talking in Spanish but everybody already said they don’t speak any. Wacky!
39:42 – Simple White Guy gets impaled by Robot Scorpion. Cliché characters are like red shirts on Star Trek.
41:50 – With only a cell phone and a soldier’s credit card, GI Joe gets connected to the Pentagon…in less than a minute. Wondering what Strike Package: Bravo is? A whole lot of military firepower, buddy. Prepare for “a danger, close fire mission”. Scramble jets against the writers! They’re attacking the English language!
42:22 – “Send the ‘Hawks over to Kill Box One-Alpha.”
44:46 – Another stock character down…oh no it’s Spanish Cajun! We’d pretend to be concerned but he’ll be fine because they wasted so much time on him up to this point that they won’t kill him. He’ll survive until the end. Guaranteed.
45:10 – “There’s only one hacker in the world who can break this code.” Well, Lady Horseman, why the fuck wasn’t he with you and your three pals and the rest of the eggheads in the Pentagon to begin with? Those damn oversights. So how is it the government can’t crack the signal code on their own but they know when Female Horseman puts a copy of it on a flash drive?
48:15 – Now, a low speed bicycle pursuit by car. Youngblood has a pink bike with tassels, because that’s funny. And Burger King gets some serious ad placement.
53:09 – Cars turn into robots that fight. Can’t tell who is winning. Can’t really tell who is fighting. But everything is moving really fast!
55:54 – Youngblood’s car can’t talk like the bad robots, but it will play sound bites through its radio to communicate and do simple charades gestures. Children’s party game robots from outer space?
58:28 – I have seen the decapitated head of Boom Box Gremlin transform into a cell phone and Youngblood’s Camero scan a car from its undercarriage and transform into the newest model. I can’t believe there’s still another hour-fifteen left.
01:01:56 – After crashing into Dodger Stadium, Casa De Cadilac, a TV repair shop, and someone’s backyard, the Autobots introduce themselves after turning into more General Motors vehicles. By the way, one of them makes hip hop gestures and says slang like “what’s crackin’ little bitches”. That wouldn’t make any sense, but they’ve been learning about Earth from the world wide web, so I guess that pretty much covers anything absurd they do until the end of the movie. Like the other Autobot that quotes Clint Eastwood. Or that another can sense Youngblood’s pheromone levels and tell he wants to nail Hottie.
01:06:07 – Let me get all this straight – Youngblood’s great grandfather, while trekking to the Arctic Circle, found the evil Megatron -- who was looking for the Allspark, accidentally activated his navigational system, which imprinted the location on his broken glasses, which Youngblood was earlier trying to hock on eBay for money to buy a car. Fuck, this plot is retarded. The writers should have their hands smashed with cinder blocks until the bones are fine powder. I knew it was going to be bad when Youngblood’s last name was Witwicky, but it just keeps getting worse.
01:08:19 – You’re not supposed to notice that Superhacker changed shirts even though he and Lady Horseman were in FBI custody the whole time.
01:10:19 – “Sorry, my bad.” Is Optimus Prime apologizing for stepping on the fountain in the backyard or for the movie? And would anybody notice five 40-foot tall talking robots walking around the backyard in a residential neighborhood? Okay, maybe not next door, but perhaps in the house?
01:15:20 – Parents still just don’t understand. But helping the Autobots could seem like masturbating to a one-dimensional parent…a drinking, one-dimensional parent. I can’t help but agree with the robot assessment – “the parents are very irritating”.
01:17:52 – Unnecessary celebrity casting: John Turturro as a government spook. You did Miller’s Crossing and The Big Lebowski…why this?
01:22:48 – Youngblood’s Camero “lubricates” John Turturro. It pops a hatch off it’s crotch and pisses fluid on him. I wish I was making this up…
01:27:37 – All it takes to capture an Autobot is a pair of helicopters with tow cables and a few guys with fire extinguishers. The tow cables lock the robot up and the fire extinguishers…um, do nothing. But it translates well visually on film. Oh wait, after two minutes of blasting it, they realize they need to explain it’s something to cryogenically stun the robot. The writers have been learning about Earth from the world wide web too.
01:30:06 – “This was classified above Top Secret.” Huh? Why not just make 10 louder, and stop telling me this one goes to 11. How about your back story exposition at least sounds like it makes sense.
01:35:47 – There’s a secret facility under Hoover Dam, and a cryogenically frozen Megatron has been there since the early 30s. How else would mankind have gotten microchips, lasers, space flight and cars if they hadn’t been reverse engineered from Megatron? Oops, cars were around since the late 19th century. Damn writers, trying to pack too much into an already thin plot.01:40:37 – That Cube thing? Yeah, also beneath the dam. And they can funnel the power into a small box where they can put electronic devices in and make them come alive. So why with all the big advances could they not detect Boom Box Gremlin in their facility? And why did they make it as annoying as Jar Jar Binks?
01:45:05 – Military intelligence! Take the Allspark Cube, which transformed from being 350 feet around into something the size of a suitcase, out of Hoover Dam and go to the city 22 miles away to hide it there from the Decepticons who are coming for it. I love and army that doesn’t know the meaning of the words collateral damage!
01:47:26 – Sure you can hot-wire a computer to generate a tone to transmit through a 70 year old radio to contact the Air Force. All you need to do is use a screwdriver to…uh, I’m thinking this will be done in the next 3 minutes off camera, which is faster than they could explain digital versus analog systems on-screen.
01:48:33 – It only took slightly more than a minute.
01:49:58 – The industrial sized crane truck just transformed in the middle of the highway and rollerbladed after the Cube. If you’re an evil robot from outer space, is telling your parents you’re gay the hardest part of rollerblading?
01:51:31 – Jar Jar Boom Box killed itself with it’s own stupid throwing stars. Thank God…it was either it or me. I just hope that…no, I’ll wait until the end before I say it.
01:52:16 – “Are there any aircraft orbiting the city?” Orbiting? C’mon Hard Black Man, don’t you know what orbiting means?
01:53:11 – My pizza arrives! Capping on this film made me hungry.
01:53:53 – What do Youngblood’s Camero and Ron Kovic have in common?
02:01:18 – Yeah, about 10 minutes of robot fighting gone by. Not much has happened other than that, which is good, because I needed the time to eat a few slices of my pie. But since you want to know, the fighting is average.
02:03:18 – They’re using a modified instrumental version of Smashing Pumpkins “Doomsday Clock”…I guess that’s cool.
02:07:28 – “At the end of this day, one shall stand…one shall fall.” Even the robots have corny dialogue. But seriously, it’s been two hours. Somebody fall.02:09:20 – GI Joe laid a bike down sideways and slide on his back about 200 feet. Yeah, he was still able to shoot and destroy one of the robots, and then get up like nothing happened. Wanna know why? In real life he fucks Fergie, that beast-faced pant-pisser. I he can gaze into that buttermug and walk away, a little bike stunt ain’t nothin’.
02:09:44 – Really, really bad GCI of jet fighters flying through downtown LA. Get we now know where the budget ran out.
02:13:55 – Prime, why did you have to take a stab at the ”more than meets the eye” line too? It was bad enough that they’re playing Linkin Park.
Well, that’s two hours I’m never getting back that hopefully I saved you. You’re welcome.
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