Transforming the world one screen at a time

I was going to save this and throw it in with The Simpsons Movie and show how cartoons to film can be good and bad but yesterday I was asked what I thought of Transformers by two people, both ignored me, but hey, here’s what I thought, feel free to disagree.

So, Transformers, those robots that can change into other things, they’re kinda cool aren’t they? Well, I had some of the toys, I watched the cartoons (yes, the re-runs, I know I’m too young) and I was quite into them. Now in case you didn’t know there are two rival factions of transformers, the Autobots (good guys) and the Decepticons (bad guys). Now, if you didn’t know that it’s unlikely you knew the Autobots were led by Optimus Prime and the Decepticons by Megatron. So yes, there was a TV show (5 seasons, even though the 5th was mainly re-runs) and an animated film, and now there is a brand new live-action film.

If you know the TV series, stop reading and scroll down a bit.

It started with the Transformers in space fighting to get some more energy, however during the battle they crashed into a volcano on Earth and lay there, for about four million years until the volcano erupted and they started the battle all over again. Those evil Decepticons tried to take all of Earth’s resources but we were defended by the Autobots. This went on a bit, and the Autobots seemed to always be winning. Then the Decepticons built a ‘bridge’ to Cybertron and they could bring Transformers to Earth, and take them back. This gave them a nice advantage that went on for a few years. Then the Decepticons attacked Autobot City on Earth, they got defeated when Optimus beat Megatron, but died. The stronger Decepticons ran away, leaving the wounded leader and others in space. They got found by Unicron, who rebuilt Megatron as Galvatron. Unicron sent Galvatron/Megatron to fight the autobots and kill them. But the Autobots won, and the new leader Rodimus Prime destroyed Unicron and went off to claim Cybertron for the Autobots.

This began a big battle all over the universe and there was this Plague that killed lots of people, Optimus Prime was rebuilt, took back control of the Autobots, and Cybertron, the Decepticons keep fighting them, and then the cartoons end.

Now, if you knew the story you can come back and read again now.

So, now the film. it’s basically the fact that there is this thing on Earth that is the cause of the whole war (no idea why, the war started on Cybertron) which the Transformers want back. Optimus explains all about the rivalry and stuff, then he crashes in the Arctic circle and freezes. There’s some hacking into the military computers by the Decepticons via a US base in Qatar. That fails, they try Air Force one and find the map to the ‘All Star’ (cause of the war) is being sold on eBay.

So yes, a big treasure hunt with Transformers. On Earth. Not the most original plot line for a story, but hey, it’s Transformers, in live action. Well, the whole CGI Transformer thing is quite good the first one or two times you see it, then you just get past that. The Robots are good, but then you get all the human bits and they are, quite frankly, boring and slow the film day. If the film wasn’t so long then maybe it would have a chance.

It’s a Michael Bay film with Steven Spielberg as a producer, and therein lies the problem. They have very different styles, Spielberg clearly lends the film it’s military story lines and Bay gives the human element. The two contrast so greatly that I feel they really should have picked one and done it well. Or better still not done either and shown us what the Transformers can really do, in cartoon preferably.

If you want to see Transformers as Transformers go back and watch the cartoons, play with the toys, but don’t watch this film. If you want a film with unxderdeveloped human story between overblown CGI enhanced action sequences then watch this.

And if anyone from Dream Works happens to come across this little article change that little green light for the next two sequels to this to red pretty sharpish, or if they must stay green, find a better way to show us Transformers.

MTFBWY