If Michael Bay had executive-produced the September 11th terrorist attacks, they would have been way more awesome. The buildings would have leaned over sideways and people would have run around the tilting scenery with machine guns and clambered and slid like puppies on a fresh-waxed floor. But Bay’s disaster wouldn’t make you feel terrified and tiny, the way you felt on September 11th. No, it would make you feel goofy and giddy and kind of numbly satisfied, the way all the best summertime product makes you feel. And lo, Michael Bay said it shall be so, and it was so in Transformers: Dark of the Moon, and lo, it was good. (The scene comes near the end of the movie, and its only problem is the soundtrack: The nervous violins punctuated with flatulent BWAAAAAPs was stolen directly from Inception.)
Look. You’re not going to get me to admit that Transformers has a great plot. It has something to do with robots that turn into cars, and evil robots that turn into planes and TVs, and then they fight for well over two hours. Every character is a complete douchebag, with Shia LaBeouf’s Sam Witwicky, a whiny rage-baby who often has nothing more to do than scream impotently, hogging screen time as the biggest douche of all. Some genuinely gifted actors (John Malkovich, Frances McDormand, Ken Jeong, Alan Tudyk rocking a terrible accent) drop by because they heard someone was handing out big paychecks for free. The action stops for those weird racist and sexist asides that you have to expect from Bay.
But it’s totally worth it for those few moments where Bay grabs you by the ears and careens around in your eyeballs for a while. Just when you’re about to get up and search for food because the exposition has gotten too thick and dumb, Bay will slap you in the back of the head and shove a tense, conspiratorial scene in a bathroom stall down your face, or force you to wonder at the strange beauty of an exploded rocket at sunset. And he has a great sense for 3-D; Transformers joins Coraline, Avatar, and Cave of Forgotten Dreams as the fourth movie to understand that modern 3-D techniques aren’t useful for quick jumps, but rather for providing a depth of field, a sumptuousness that mere high-def cameras can’t ever match. Goddamnit, it’s a spectacle, and Bay is a genius of spectacle, so you might as well line up now, sucker. 
I obay.
Is it as shitty as Trannies 2 was? Because, lo, that was an abhorable POS.
Why would anyone voluntarily sit through this?
Pathetic.
as in:
pa·thet·ic/pəˈTHetik/Adjective
1. Arousing pity, esp. through vulnerability or sadness.
2. Miserably inadequate.
Paul,
I actually remember originally hearing those “BWAAAAPS” that have become soup do jour for action trailers in the first Transformers preview. Michael Bay wins again I guess!
I fucking loved it. Even if you don’t like Transformers it’s worth watching. The 3D goes beyond not-annoying, it goes into “whoa, this is awesome”. I wouldn’t recommend watching it on DVD, it’s all about the 3D.
Even the screen capture at the top of the article looks fake and lazy CGI-ish… is that bad web-work or just the kind of stuff we can expect in this Bay-feast?
Finally, somebody got Paul high and took him to the movies. It helps, doesn’t it?
has everybody lost their fucking minds ?.. ya’ll steered me away from the green lantern to recommend this?.. 2 hours and 40 minutes of pure torture. and the bits..the only women who speak are white women, the asian women nod and there are no other women of color in it..even though the bulk of it takes place in chicago. the asian man..is he really named wang ? does leonard nimoy actually quote star trek ? buzz aldrin ? buzz fucking aldrin?.. does no one bleed ? i mean besides the bots. no loss of limbs ? i mean besides the bots.
TYRESE ? for 15 imax dollars ?
my forehead and palms are thickly calloused from slapping myself so much..and no… weed does NOT make a bad time better.
@10: I was on the fence but you’ve convinced me that this is a silly and not at all realistic movie.
Had the asian man been named “Mohammed Singh” I probably would have gone the other way.
Every time a ticket is sold to a Michael Bay movie, an elementary school loses its arts program.
Are you kidding me Paul? I would rather eat nails and shit blood than sit through all three hours of this toy commercial. I left the IMAX after 25 minutes to play in the science center lawn, and regretted nothing.
@ 11 his name wouldn’t have bothered me except bay couldn’t resist making stupid dick jokes around it. and then threw him out of a window
@13.. wise move
As per Roger Ebert: “Transformers: Dark of the Moon (PG-13)
“A saga of loud and ugly toys
“Michael Bay’s ‘Transformers: Dark of the Moon’ is a visually ugly film with an incoherent plot, wooden characters and inane dialog. It provided me with one of the more unpleasant experiences I’ve had at the movies.”
Ever so slightly more believable than anything which calls Michael Bay a genius.
So, what? You expected Shakespeare? I loved it and it made me PROUD to be an American! That black guy who volunteered to fly like a bat down onto the city streets looked so handsome and courageous and athletic and cute that I wanted to be him. (Too bad he was about the first to die.) His skin looked perfect!