TRANSFORMERS: DARK OF THE MOON

TRANSFORMERS: DARK OF THE MOON (2011)

Tagline: The invasion we always feared. An enemy we never expected.

(Action, Sci-Fi, Doesn’t Chicago Have Enough Problems?) [PG-13]

Time to find out.

In this one NEST has been restored and the Autobots are working secret ops with humans to continue eliminating hiding Decepticons. Meanwhile, with the help of Megatron, a powerful new Decepticon named Shockwave, the remaining Deceptions, and human operatives, the world is about to see the lengths Megatron will go to in order to restore Cybertron as its ruler. As it turns out, the space race was a result of an extraterrestrial vessel hitting the dark side of the moon. What Russia finds there is the key to a greater secret that could lead to the end of humanity, but as usual there is more than meets the eye when it comes to Cybertron history. Meanwhile, Sam is struggling to make his way in life when it comes to getting a job, but he has moved on from Mikaela and started dating Carly. It doesn’t take long before once again he is sucked into a battle for the fate of mankind. 

Of the first 3 TRANSFORMERS movies, this one was the best even in the absence of Megan Fox. I don’t have the issues with her a lot of other people do, but this one just ended up being the best story. One thing they did an amazing job with was the effects once again. This one is beyond over the top. Just the effects for Shockwave and his giant metal Graboid-type sidekick are worth watching this movie for. Shockwave’s design is actually better than the original design as far as looking more menacing, but I do wish they had thrown some purple in there so they didn’t have to “tell” which Decepticon he was. 

This movie also has some crazy cool ship designs I will say that I think it’s quite possible that the Chitauri armies ship concepts were lifted from the Cybertronian ships in this film. I could be wrong on that, but the main idea is that they are both very similar. What I wasn’t crazy about was Sentinel Prime’s design for the head. I am not a fan of when they make the Transformers look old. I know we got some of this in the cartoons as well, but I wasn’t a fan of back in the ’80s either. Both Sentinel Prime and Optimus Prime looked awesome in every fighting scene. A lot of the Transformers in general are more visually impressive when they are fighting than just sitting there, driving, or flying. Another design I wasn’t too thrilled about was Laserbeak. I have had the Laserbeak figure since I was a kid and always thought it was one of the best Transformer designs from the G1 series next to Ravage. I also owned Soundwave which made both those figures even more awesome. 

Acting wise Rosie Huntington-Whiteley as Carly was not the best choice. Nothing against her, but Megan Fox felt a lot more ready for this series than Rosie did. Needless to say, both she and Shia LaBeouf are now no longer part of the series along with the rest of the human cast for the first 3 Transformers movies. New human characters included Frances McDormand as Mearing, Patrick Dempsey (CAN’T BUY ME LOVE) as Dylan, and John Malkovich (WHITE ELEPHANT) as Bruce. Leonard Nimoy voiced the role of Sentinel Prime and does a great job. He also voiced Galvatron in TRANSFORMERS: THE MOVIE who was Megatron’s replacement after Megatron. All of the additions work really well and add credibility to this in the casting department, but I don’t know if they were necessary because this is like a bajillion-dollar box office giant and just the name TRANSFORMERS seems to put butts in the seats. Critically the best film in the series was BUMBLEBEE, but this one actually brought in the most of all the TRANSFORMERS movies that have come out so far. 

Regarding the pacing, this one has several lulls, but it wasn’t the end of the world. Probably the worst thing about this one was the soundtrack even though the score was fine. 

Overall as whacky as this story is, at least it’s coherent which is more than I can say for some other installments in the saga. This one gets a 5 out of 7. I never regret watching this thing. 

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