Revenge of the fallen had the best Autobot fight scenes hands down. From the Shanghai fight, to the nostalgic forest battle, to Bumblebee vs rampage, and hell, even the twins vs devastator. I remember reading that Dark of the moon would have a "more robot-related story"(which transformers film doesn't??) I also remember reading "Chicago is pretty much left up to the bots, with a little rescue team following in their tracks". What an amazing lie that was! 90% of the climax of the movie centered around Sam, Carly, and Epps's team running around chicago, with tiny robot involved sequences(which could have been longer, had they dropped the mechanical worm). Don't get me wrong, there were good parts,(optimus's rage, optimus vs sentinel, optimus vs sentinel vs megatron), and thats where the "bots handling chicago" part kicks in, but only for so long, and most of it was just Optimus pwning everything. As far as story goes between both films, revenge of the fallen was very action packed so of course you lost the story, but it became clear by the end that IT DID HAVE A STORY AND THE CRITICS ARE JUST   . DOTM had a story that was more deep because sentinel was Optimus's mentor and all, and with a betrayal, makes a good story. But in my opinion, since people bash rotf, acting like dotm had better fight sequences, i'd just like to point this out  

 

i really liked rotf,

 

I think both movies had their share of great scenes. I, for one, really liked the highway scene in the third movie. It's actually one of my favorite scenes from the trilogy. I wish the bots had been more front and center at the end of DOTM, but I've come to expect that they just get pushed to the side.

 

I liked ROTF, but it was very vague with its story (I understood it, but non-Transformers fans were like "WTF is this?"), whereas DOTM storyline was more apparent and easier to understand. In my opinion though, each movie had their own respective awesome scenes, so they're even in my book.

 

I'm one of the few who will never bash or say anything bad towards ROTF I thoroughly enjoyed the movie even more than the first, but i personally felt DOTM had the most even feeling of the whole trilogy. Yeah the humans were in it but it wasnt entirely based around them for once, not to mention the pacing was far better than either of the previous films. For me it's DOTM, ROTF, TF1 (personal opinion of course) But i do think that ROTF had some great autobot fight scenes, but im gonna have to stick with DOTM for Optimus Vs. all of the decepticons as far as coolest and best autobot fight scenes, especially with the highway scene. Personal opinion of course.

 

The forest battle is hands down the best fight scene in Transformers. You can't even lie and say I'm wrong.

 

I gotta agree with you there.

Too bad after it was over, the movie basically went downhill.

 

Me, too. In fact, I loved it.

But I went in with lowered expectations, which probably helped a lot. I was excited for the first movie, but found it kind of boring. A military action movie combined with an inane primetime sitcom, briefly co-starring the Transformers. So when RotF came out and people said it was worse, I didn't even bother. Didn't go to the theater, didn't buy it on dvd, didn't rent it. Never read any synopsis, never bought any toys, never gave the movie a second thought. In fact, after the first movie, I kind of got out of Transformers in general.

Then, eventually, trailers for the third movie came along, and I said F it, this one looks kind of interesting, I'll give it a shot. And I really liked DotM. And DotM brought me back to Transformers. Of course, I still heard a lot of the same complaining from the same types of people, which led me to wonder if maybe RotF was possibly not quite as bad as all the complaining indicated. Plus, I was hungry to watch more live-action TF during the wait for the DotM blu-ray. I thought what the hell, it's probably horrible like everyone says, but maybe there will at least be something slightly redeeming about it.

And surprise, surprise, I liked it. Not quite as much as DotM, but more than the first movie, for sure. The story was a lot more coherent than I'd been led to believe, and yeah, a lot of the action was among the best of the series.

I'd never claim it was a flawless movie, but it was a lot of fun. I'm sure I'll watch it many more times in the years to come.

 

A fun movie indeed!

 

Who cares!?!?!? It was still a good movie!!!

 

Glad to hear that you enjoyed RotF more than you thought you might.  

 

ROTF had some bad-ass scenes! I don't know anyone that can deny the Forest Battle as the best fight of the trilogy! I really liked ROTF when it came out, still do actually, and just don't understand the hate it gets.

 

I'll like the movie that has either (if they're pathetically incapable of both) good Decepticon fight scenes or a good plot. And as for the depth of Sentinels betrayal, I disagree. Optimus acts sad for five seconds before deciding to kill everything. Plus, trailer spoiled the Autobots return so them leaving wasn't that sad, this place and amazon spoiled Sentinels betrayal, while I didn't know he would kill Hide, everyone was talking as if it would happen so I assumed he would get killed by the dreads and he only got killed a few seconds later and trailers spoiled Que getting killed. I don't know any other franchise that has such massive spoiler problems. I guess I'll have to give up the movie forum, if not all of TFW for TF4 and only watch 1 or 2 trailers.

 

No kidding. I don't hate ROTF by any stretch, but it's final battle was such a letdown after the forest battle. The CGI was lower quality, the fight choreo... chore... the fighting was not as good, and the camera angles were not bad, but it didn't convey the size of the robots. Nothing says "I was a truck a few minutes ago" like picking up a fucking tree like a baseball bat and clobbering someone with it.

 

Sorry, OP, but DOTM had some absolutely stunning fight choreography. Pretty much anytime anyone engages Sentinel Prime, there's nothing any of the other two films can do to match it.

 

Yes, but in terms of large-scale battle, it sucks. Large scale battles in Transformers media are usually done poorly, IMO.

 

ROTF was a good film. It doesn't deserve a fraction of the criticisms leveled at it.

I think I even liked the film more than some of the most over-sensitive fanboys.

 

All i've got say is the forest fight, was so AWESOME!! It was my favorite fight scene in the trilogy and it showed how much of a bad-ass he is (and Optimus ripping the Fallen's face off was cool too).

 

question is: is it better than ROTF in that regard?

 

Nah after having time to think on it, I do enjoy ROTF more than DOTM. The forest battle, and Shanghai were beautiful fights. Nobody of significance died except the main villain at the end, which I think is a good thing, because if characters die just for shock value only to be fogotten seconds later (Ironhide) exist solely to die to make it look like the Autobots are supposed to be in mortal danger (Que) or quickly eliminated to tie up loose ends (all Decepticons) you might as well just not bother at all.

And it was fun. Much like the same reason I prefer Batman Begins to Dark Knight (although DK I still love alot unlike DOTM) after awhile the slaughter and grim darkness just makes you how giant robots or superheroes are supposed to be awesome fun again. The end didn't really triumphant. Just.....the end of the slaughter.

And the twins at least stood out, for better or worse, unlike red Sideswipe, or scottish warrior guy times 3, and the only new character that actually is unique does nothing, and then dies.

Now it's not perfect. The Desert Battle had some good scenes, like Jetfire vs Mixmaster, Optimus's final battle, and Devastator. But the bulk of it was really boring, consisting of NEST Ratchet and Sideswipe firing at the desert while the con horde wades through it from afar. Most of it seemed set up just so Bay could break the world record of the biggest live on set explosion (which honestly wasn't really that impressive.

DOTM wasn't perfect either, as most of it consisted of Sam and Carly and Epps being terrorized by ships, and the Driller, and Starscream for a half hour while Optimus got stuck in cords and the other bots dissappeared. And how the hell do you make a building fall down boring? But it really kicked off once Optimus started his murder run and Sentinel joined the fray.

DOTM does have one edge on ROTF and that's vehicle modes. In ROTF none of the vehicle modes get much of a showing aside from Bee and the twins. Optimus only gets 15 seconds of shots in truck mode. And Jolt only gets a single second shot. DOTM everyone gets a good showing, except Megatron's new truck mode.

Still though, both films pale compared to the first. All of the Autobots get good characterisation, all Decepticons get cool designs, everyone gets something to do, and the final battle doesn't drag once. I find it interesting how the least visually impressive film of the trilogy is still the best one.