More Than Meets the Eye

A good portion of my childhood was spent in a world created by Hasbro. I was always incredibly enamored with the Transformers. I played with the toys; watched the cartoon; read the comic books; pretended to be the characters; and talked about the toys, cartoon, comic books, and characters with friends and family. I would recreate the sounds from the cartoon every time one of my toys or my pretend body would go from one physical state to another. Needless to say, I was looking forward to the movie.

Anne mentioned that if we wanted to, we could head to the theater when we were at her folks' for the weekend and see Transformers. You can see why I love this woman. We went to the theater, paid way too much for two people going to see a movie, grabbed our pop and our seats, and prepared for the movie.

First, the good. The special effects were really, really good. There wasn't any "out of place" effects where the actors don't seem to be part of the special effect that I noticed, which is a feat in and of itself. There was a slight nod to the sound of the transforming the first time that we saw a vehicle change in to robot form which I greatly appreciated considering how many times I mimicked that noise on my own. Then there is the voice. I would have boycotted this movie if Peter Cullen wasn't the voice of Optimus Prime. Any other voice commanding the Autobots under the name Optimus Prime would have been a travesty of epic proportions. I got goosebumps when he said "Autobots, roll out." They need to get a recording of Cullen doing every possible sound in the English language so that he can always be the voice of Prime. Nothing else will do. The human characters did an admirable job in the "I'm shocked by this car turning in to a giant robot" category. Also, they served as good comic relief in appropriate places. The director, Michael Bay, seemed willing to embrace the "cheese" of the animated series which was actually welcome from a nostalgic point of view.

Now, the bad. The plot seemed to skip forward in several different places such that I felt like we missed something. Some characters just seemed to be abandoned without seeing the ultimate resolution of their plot lines. The fight scenes felt too brief. I wanted to see Prime lay some smack down over a few minutes. Also, during the battle scenes, it was sometimes hard to determine which giant robot was which. They seemed to mesh together at different times.

This is a movie that is crying, screaming, yelling, and begging for a director's cut. For me, Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring did not feel complete until we received the extended version. I think the same is true for Transformers. I want the holes in the story to be filled. I want to be able to watch the giant robots pummel each other for more than 30 seconds at a time. I want there to be an educational section at the end to close the show with someone saying "Now I know!" and to have someone respond "And knowing is half the battle." Oh, wait. Wrong '80's cartoon show.

Final verdict: Very good, but not awesome action movie. Four out of five energon cubes.