I've seen the first one, and I'm thankful that I didn't see "Revenge of the Fallen". I'll have to see how the third film holds up.

Hooray another Transformer movie I won't see.

What is it TTG? The action or the plot overall?

I'll go to it. {...puts paper bag over head...}

It's the fact that they've turned a cartoon about transforming robots into a coming of age story for a scrawny whiny franchise ruiner. The first one was terrible, outside of the first 10 - 15 minutes. The beginning was exactly what I wanted, giant laser shooting transforming robots wrecking house. Then they had Optimus tip toeing through gardens and various other bit humor BS. I've realized that they aren't making these movies for me, they are making them for the current crop of 7-11 year olds, and given up on the current Transformers. I'll always hold onto my childhood with G1 autobots and decepticons duking it out every saturday morning. The less I watch of the new stuff the less it ruins what I enjoyed when I was younger. I'll leave it for the young 'uns to watch and enjoy.

Ahhh. I see.

My guess at what is contained within Ebert's 1-Star review of Transformer's 3.

-The 3D makes shit dark.

-The special effects were incomprehensible - the action doesn't flow.

-The story is nonsense.

-I'm sorta old.

-Transformers are toys.



Now off to read it.

http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20110628/REVIEWS/110629981

Hey, I didn't do too bad! Just when I thought he wasn't going to bitch about shit being dark he added it in as a sidenote!

Roger Ebert Reviews Disney's Space Mountain.

-It was very dim and dark on the coaster.

-There was no context to these asteroids coming at me.

-The dialogue was unintelligible. Just a bunch of screaming.

-The direction was so concerned with frenetic and fast movement I often felt nauseous.

-Obviously not made with any attention to artistic merit or detail. Although smaller in scale I would recommend you just re-ride "The Mouse" at Riverside. Though not nearly as bombastic and loud as Space Mountain, it truly captures the essence of what it is to be an actual mouse.

There's no reason why they should ever transform.

Removed this image of lots o' money because it was making the thread all wide and crappy.

Saw it.

If you liked the first, see it. Don't let the second ruin it for you.

It isn't a great movie by any stretch. There is an hour and a half of mind numbingly terrible exposition. But that last hour, wow. It really was great spectacle. Still, wide angle shots that don't obscure the action. Brilliant set pieces. Literally everything you could want in a robot war. I was blown away.

The problem is you have to sit through that first 90 minutes to get to it. It's so bad, I'm not entirely sure the reward was worth it. But it was very cool.

Just got back from it. Totally agree with Dante on this.

In fact, I feel the need, to prop it because between Ebert's 1-star review and Rolling Stone's ridiculous Zero Star review, I really want to know what exactly these guys were expecting. They'll shove us and our 10 bucks off to Thor and Green Lantern with no guilt, but bring in Michael Bay and its like the end of the world. If this is so bad, I wonder what they give "Transmorphers"?

But furthermore, it sort of pisses me off because if we pair this with the glowing reviews of Tree of Life - and every actual person I know who's seen Tree of Life, including Dante who's a total film nut calls it "unwatchable" - these two reviews together really just come off as intellectual snobbery with no real purpose except to go against the grain, and maybe, possibly garner hits for their respective websites. Even RS.com, a music publication, has Travers zero star review as the main article on their front page.

I suppose that Ebert and Travers, even as I type, are shaking their heads over how many more Tree of Life's could have been made with that Transformer 3 money. You know what? No thanks, and go fuck yourselves.

It's fucking robots that turn into cars based off a Saturday morning cartoon from the 1980's. Considering its pedigree its pretty fucking good. Why can't they review it based off of that? And Dante's right - my eyeballs were happy. We also had a pretty pumped crowd in the theatre so it also might be one that'll be fun to catch this opening weekend.

Lastly:

Ebert - "...incomprehensible Autobots and Decepticons sliced up into spurts of action with no sense of the space they occupy." This is a favorite complaint of Ebert's regarding any action movie he doesn't like. Here it holds no water. There was no moment in the action - (which could arguably be said to go on to long - I won't argue that, but it could be argued) - where I didn't know what was going on from shot to shot or what space I or the robots were in. In fact, several times the action went into slow motion so you could enjoy exactly what was happening in full, slo-mo, ultra-dramatic detail.

Do you think its sour grapes, as Travers alludes to in his review, that critics really have no effect on the grosses of this type of film - that it is in fact critic proof, so instead of fairly rating it on the popcorn, bullshit, bubble gum it is (a concession they're more than willing to give 2nd tier superhero flicks Green Lantern and Thor) they rate it instead poorly only to prove to themselves their own impotence? So they have yet another thing to shake their heads sadly over? It is so sad and what a great thing the average movie goer is missing out on in not listening to them, not reading them, not giving their money to the "unwatchable" Tree of Life?

The movie is far from perfect, and so are these asshole reviews.

After reading these posts, I have to agree that some critics hate this movie with no real understanding of its concept.

I won't be seeing Transformers 3. The first one was fun okay stuff but the second Transformers was just so fucking awful... I don't think I'll be wasting my ten bucks on Transformers 3.

No matter how bad these sequels might be, nothing can faze me after the shocking dissappointment I got from the first film. The trailer for the original was so teasing with potential all the way up to having Spielberg's name all over it to seal the deal. The robots were actually scary in that trailer (it helped that they didnt talk in it like they do in the movie). Like James Cameron's aliens and even Spielberg's shark there was a sense of awe and dread watching glimpses of these mechanical leviathons that made me actually psyched to learn what exactly are they and where did they come from? However I lost any desire to learn the rest of that story as soon as optimus prime started talking in that ridiculous saturday morning cartoon voice of his. Any shred of suspension of disbelief was out the window after that. I realize that it is based on a cartoon but why bother to put your cgi animators to such toil and trouble to make the robots look so 3-dimensionally real and then give them a voice that sounds like bad english dubbing for an anime porn movie? I checked out immediately. If none of the robots ever talked during the whole movie it would have been so much better. My mind would still be able to make a connection between them and other movie unexplained lifeforms like Jaws and Aliens. Instead, their voices kept filling my head with images of he-man, smurfs, lunchboxes and every matchbox toy commercial I've ever seen (I'll wager whoever does Optimus Prime's voice narrated those commercials too; can't you just hear him saying "batteries not included!").

Having said that I'd say part 3 was better than part 2 and that part one at least had some semblance of structure to the story that the sequels lacked that allowed me to at least pretend that it earned some catharsis by the end.

Best things about TF3:
1) The Maxim's sexiest girl's entrance ass shot. I didn't see the 3d version but I hope they did something with that. Also the fact that she's that much taller than Shia Lebouf than even Megan Fox was made their relationship hilariously unbelievable.

2) Patrick Dempsey's tacky-bad-guy camp-performance will make for an interesting social experiment to see if this film has any negative effect on Doctor Mcdreamy's appeal to females since it has been well established that this is the one guy in show business every girl on the planet wants to sleep with.

3) The animators are still obviously working very hard. Somebody please write up a decent script for a live action Neon Genesis Evangeleon movie and give these boys a project worhy of their talents!

4) One of the trailers before the movie was for the next Mission Impossible installment which is being directed by Brad Bird; ding ding ding! I think we have a winner! It also looks like the movie will be implementing an idea I strongly endorse which is to use more of Simon Pegg in whatever movie he is in because the guy can do no wrong in my book.

Speaking of Brad Bird if anyone wants to watch a REAL GOOD movie about a boy bonding with a transforming robot from outer space they need to check out The Iron Giant. Its a given that the writing and direction is on another universe from transformers, but even visually this 2-d animated movie leaves transformers in the dust proving its not about how upgraded your software is its how you use it.

What about that Hugh Jackman robot boxing movie - how'd that thing ever get past the pitch....? Twas like Stallone's Over the Top mashed with Transformers.

Just got back. I agree with ebert 100%. There was no soul in this movie, it was like a big rich computer geek's room full of invested gadgets high tech computers money shooting from every inch of the room and what it should have been was boy's first computer first electronic machine the connection the discovery the feeling of attachment to something so special.


I don't think anyone will understand what I mean, because I think most will disagree with my view of the film. Anyways I gave the movie a 5 out of 10, a little generous I think now. Why did sam have such a hot girlfriend who in my opinion was as random as any character could ever get in a movie. She didn't belong in this movie at all and it amazes me as to why they chose her, what is so special about her. It was funny to at the end of the movie everybody was scraped bruised bleeding dirty and she was perfect, hair makeup clothes (her white jacket was still white from rolling in the dirt so much) no cuts no bleeding, WTF!!

Sam is pussy boy. He's randam, he's useless, he was running to be a part of the fight instead of running away from it. UNlikable to the max. Parents are as annoying as fuck too!!

and the autobots were barely in the movie, I saw more of the model than the stars of the movie!!! I want to know more about them, their world, if they had families...more more more. less whiney pedestrian

Hey Sarah,

Everything you said are perfectly legitimate gripes, however, you obviously do not agree with Roger Ebert as he have the film 1 out of 4 stars. Your 10 star scale converts to a 2.5 out of 4 stars on the Ebert scale, which is a fair score.

Regarding what MeBossy said - you got me recalling the first time I saw that trailer for the original film with the Transformer crawling out of the pool in front of that little girl. That was a great moment that lead to expectations far beyond what was delivered...

I sense a bit of patronizing. I guess that's all she wrote.

I didn't mean to come off as patronizing. I was just saying that your score is fairly higher than Ebert's.

I like that height is what makes Shia's relationship unbelievable.

I am and probably will forever be a Shia hater... any relationship he has in a movie is unbelievable in my book. Having not seen the movie and having not seen the second one I'll make some completely uninformed and possibly absolutely incorrect assessments.

1- If Shia has more than 10 total minutes of dialogue it will be borderline unwatchable
2- 2.5 hours! jesus that's long for a mind numbing popcorn flick
3- If I have to see those robo lips of Optimus's I may lose it
4- The new girl looks kind of like a duck not saying she's not hot but I'm guessing she was casted solely on that characteristic
5- The first movie trailer was so spot on I wish they had never made a movie and just let me live in suspense and expectations

I think I may just go and loop the first 15 minutes of the first movie over and over for 2 hours and save me some money.

Love Shia.

Again we are at odds... TO ARMS!

I really do think he gets a bad rap because of the flicks he's been in. Most all of which I don't like. But I can separate him as an actor from the shit he's in. Because really, over the last four years or so, we know him from three Transformers flicks and an Indiana Jones movie so bad many consider it to retroactively ruin Indy.

But things like The Greatest Game Ever Played and Wall Street 2 (even though it isn't that great of a movie) make me think he has a lot of potential. I think he's great now.

I've never seen The Greatest Game Ever, but Wall Street 2 I couldn't stomach. The whole 'You could ride your whole life and you'll never ride like I ride' line was too much for me. Coming from a person that has made a career of ruining my childhood did not win him credibility in my book. Now as a person I don't get the same douchiness that oozes from a lot of hollywood, so he may be a decent human being. Who knows?

IF:
Shia (aka- short guy but wired and kinetically vocal in that "eager-to-please-thespian" kind of way)+ Megan Fox (aka- smokin hot chick) = "unbelievable"

THEN:
Shia (aka- short guy etc) + Rosie Huntington-Whitely (aka- duck-faced yet still smokin hot and also REALLY TALL chick) = "hilariously unbelievable"

Yea I feel you on the Wall Street 2 stuff, like I said, not a great movie. But that line was going to be delivered by someone, Shia or otherwise. Transformers 2 was going to be the exact same bad movie regardless if he was in it or not, etc. Separating the skill from the script. I have a lot of hope for him in the future and can see him becoming one of my faves like DiCaprio did once he got over the Titanic, Romeo Juliet, Basketball Diaries type of schlock.

And I guess the plausibility of romantic relationships in a movie where semi trucks morph into talking/fighting robots wasn't really something I had considered.

are you implying that any relationship in a movie that revolves around cgi-filled fantastical mythology (however juvenile) should be considered implausible? Does the suspension of disbelief that the audiece pays towards the "realistic" elements in a fantasy movie really hinge upon how far the "fantasy" element stretches? Seems like a mixing of apples and oranges there. When a victoria secret model is in Shia's bedroom wearing nothing but his shirt and her panties, I'm not too concerned with associations of silliness I can make to cars and robots thanks to living in the era of toys r us and nickelodeon. No, what I'm wondering in that moment is what is a chick like that doing with a guy like Shia? Methinks tis not against the movie rule book to let the "real" parts in a movie play real. Otherwise I'd have had a hard time processing Han Solo and Princess' Leias romance in the SW trilogy and Dorothy's homesickness in Wizard of Oz.

Having said that, my original point was quite simple and had nothing to do with whether or not a romance subplot is a dissonance in a specific genre;
She's really hot and really tall. He's short, hyper and pissed-off alot. Seeing them together I just don't buy it. But it's funny.

You're really over thinking this one and seem really upset. Is everything okay at home? Text me.

"And I guess the plausibility of romantic relationships in a movie where semi trucks morph into talking/fighting robots wasn't really something I had considered"

hmmm...who's the one overthinking here? Tall hot chicks with angry midgets look funny and ridiculous to me. You seemed to not get it the first time (remember what your therapist said about listening honey) so I had to get thorough. And yes I just called your boyfriend a midget, get over it. So what if I'm about as frugal with words as you are with sarcasm? Doesn't mean I'm upset. My pulse never got above 85, even when I ate your tongue.

To quote an ancient internet forum professional: "This oughta be good, *grabs popcorn*"

Wendy?

Yes this is Wendy. I had sex with Shia last night. He says he wants you to stop defending him. He says the autobots taught him the importance of fighting his own battles.

It was probably in one of those old PSA's

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eyU-yGPqvB8

Did the tranformers only bother to lecture mormon kids? Whoever did the girl's voice, that was the funniest attempt at falsetto I've ever heard. Oh and I think its really unbelievable that a hot chick would want to hang out with three mormons (wink!)