In to first film Optimus seems to not be able to stand up to Megatron at all and is easily defeated. Yet in the second film he pwns.... ...so did he get an adrenalin rush or somthing? What do you think?
In the first one he was in a city and had to restrain himself to avoid casualties. In the second, he was able to go all out.
I think it has more to do with who the filmmakers want to make seem awesome at the given time. Megatron had just been revealed, so they had to make him kick ass. In the second film, Prime was about to die, so they had to make him go out with a bang.
it is a combination of megatron rebuilt quickly in ROTF making him unbalanced and less effective, add the fact they were making both prime and megatron look good in both films. In the first film megatron is the most mobile transformer in the film along with prime and starscream, in the sequel he is allot slower for example - when he try's to swing his heavy gun arm at prime but misses terribly, in the first he would grab prime with his bear hands and throw him like a dummy, and megatron would use allot of combo attacks in his fighting. Prime is allot stronger in ROTF, prime is upgraded in the sequel, he has two guns on his arms and two blades and he switching them time and time again and he attacks like a ninja. While megatron is way to bulky and he uses just one gun, his attacking style is very different from the first film and less effective.
I think its what megatron66661 said and what Kaje said. Especially the part of Optimus having to control himself since hes inside a densely populated city.
As said, the final battle was the time to make Megatron look like an unstoppable kickass villain. Apparently, Prime had to be sacrificed and portrayed as a rag doll compared to Prime. In ROTF, Orci said they wanted to see the fans happy that Prime would kick some serious ass, and he did so maginificiently. Megatron put up a damn good fight, though, until JetPrime did a one-moment beatdown of Megatron and The Fallen. It's really depending on who they want to make look good in the scene.
Probably a combonation of both, if megatron is the tanka truck he could be a monster in DOTM he will be even bigger than 1 and 2. I think megatron was a beast in the first, he was probably the most complete transformer in that film. He could fly he was owning prime his fighting skills were impressive, and prime's shooting had little effect on megatron. It does surprise me how bay and co can just listen to the fans and make prime a little too unstoppable, when he is physically inferior to megatron. Prime uses his head more which makes up for his physical inferiority to megatron, who is allot bigger than prime. Really both megatron and prime should be neck and neck with each other when they battle, where the fight is an even contest where both have their moments, not one looks like a rookie because both are the leaders of their respect sides. Bay and co must get the final fight between megatron and prime spot on where both are made to look strong.
