It had:

• The best balance of humans and Transformers
• The best action
• Limited parents (I enjoy them in doses)
• The best and most realistic relationship between Sam and his girlfriend
• Less goofy humour (but the humour was entertaining)
• Greater drama
• Grittier plot
• Characterisation of Sam (often overlooked - he needed a purpose)
• Greater G1 throwbacks

The film does what people wanted and they say that it was the worst of the three films. We had less parents, less bad humour, more focus on Transformers (Autobots in space, Decepticons in Africa, Optimus and Sentinel debating leadership), an hour of intense action.

Am I the only one who thought that this was one of the greatest action films ever? The action was so well done and I actually felt that there was a real invasion happening (unlike films like The Avengers).

 

I wasn't aware anybody thought it was the worst of the 3. It had better acting, a great plot twist, it was literally the G1 story arc of "The Ultimate Doom," more bots, more characterization, etc. The goofiness was toned down to lower-than-TF07 levels too, though it was still too much.

I think it goes TF07, DotM, RotF. Although I think RotF had the best action, by a pretty sizable margin.

I can't imagine anybody hating DotM unless the only thing they wanted out of it was Shockwave.

 

I thought it was ok, but to me not as good as could have been as it still did most of the things people hated ROTF for. All the talk about Bay and co how they'd totally learned from their mistakes, but DOTM proved they didn't, really:

-still too much goofy humour. Ken Jeong's character is a MESS. Bruze Brazzos is superweird. There's some other pretty awkward parts, like the girl with the 'latina meltdown'.
-Bay said there would be less military involvement because the army gets cut off from the city. Sure, there are no tanks and jets, but there's still a shit ton of soldiers who find their way into the city. Just as army-heavy as the previous movies, in the end.
-The parents are still there. The mom is still super awkward. Dat book.
-Still tons and tons of grey genericons. In fact, there's even a scene where a policecar transforms into robot mode and you can't even tell what its altmode was as it turns into yet another grey flunky.
-Megatron's role diminshed even further.
-the movie's again pretty terrible at showing how the Autobots are any better than the Decepticons. Dino throws a Con onto a civilian car. Prime executes an enemy who is already down and out with two shots into the head. The Wreckers tear apart a Con and eat him. We KNOW the Cons are worse, yes, but Autobot portrayal could be a bit more tasteful, in my opinion.
-Crucial scene, Autobots captured, happens off screen.
-Just like in the previous two movies they have no idea what to do with Optimus, who's too overpowered, so this time they take him out of the battle for a while by getting him stuck in cables.
-Heavy focus on a scene with a totally unneccesary 'character': the Driller. His scene in the building takes wayyy too long, too.
-I think Wheelie and Brains were funny ( Wheelie definitely toned down from his awful persona in ROTF), but a lot of people don't see the point in adding yet more little comic relief critters (and then there's Igor).
-Sam's character arc is awful. Last movie he 'just wanted to be normal', and now he wants the complete opposite. His character is pretty much acting like an arrogant, whiny kid the entire first half of the movie and is completely unlikeable (I don't dislike LaBeouf, by the way, so I'm not projecting any hate onto the movie character).

One of the greatest action movies ever made? Not by a longshot, in my opinion.
I'm happy you really enjoy it though, yay! I feel it was 'just' a step into the right direction, but in the end is only marginally better than ROTF.
Not sure which people say it is the worst of the three, I'd say that honor belongs to ROTF.

(I'm still excited for AOE!     )

 

Agree   I like it too

 

The best of the trilogy for sure and Bay really hit his stride for no.3. ROTF is absolutely the worst.

I'd have to watch it again to take it apart in more detail but I do remember feeling that this was definitely the best of the three movies.

As for one of greatest action movies? Maybe. It certainly was the best and actually had fights that you could follow, but I dunno. A lot of the movie felt very cut and paste and for me at least it did not have the same emotional resonance that the Avengers invasion had. Namely, you never really felt for the people in the city. Sure, you saw them getting blasted in the beginning but that...really isn't enough.

Here's what I mean. We have a part in the Avengers invasion where Captain America is in a building, and he finds a ton of people who have nowhere to go, no safe place to be. He stares at them and he realizes in that moment that this invasion is goddamn serious. Like a hero he fights off invaders and he saves the people. This was pretty short and woven in, but this is what I mean when I talk about the resonance. We have the heroes realizing that there is truly more at stake here. There's more than just...fighting off the alien invasion. They have to step up and become heroes, because everyone is looking up to them and everyone is hoping that they save the day. That resonates with us viewers. We expect this out of our heroes and we can see ourselves in those situations hoping that someone will save us.

Beyond the invasion the movie tried to get me to become emotional and it failed utterly. Two scenes come to mind, the Ironhide death and Que death. I didn't feel a damn thing because I did not feel like I knew anything about these two guys. The only thing I knew is that Ironhide is an army dude and he loves big guns. The only thing I knew about Que is that he is a bit whacky and makes things. How can I be expected to be emotionally attached to characters I know next to nothing about?

I would contrast to Avengers but that is hardly fair as the characters all had movies prior to Avengers to set up their personalities and build attachments. However, I will say that this is where the trilogy ultimately fails...in making you truly feel connected.

You have **FAILED** to have the audience connect when you are forced to read a comic or a novel on the side just to build attachments. Again, in contrast to the Avengers that they built these attachments soley through the movies, without having to read side material. Just watching the movies alone, you know everything you need to know about everyone except for the Avengers rendition of The Hulk prior to getting into the Avengers. No one should be forced to read side material just to get the full story in a movie like action movies...action movies must stand on their own.

I always feel like that movie fans won't really gel with what I say but I will end by saying that good media is more than just having not-annoying characters, good action, and "gritty and dark" themes. Good movies are also about having stuff like character growth, emotional attachment and resonance, and a plot that gels all the elements together in a cohesive and holistic whole. I feel Transformers is only good at what it does, and that is being a "Big Dumb Action Movie" and nothing more. The action tends to be pretty good, and it was refined very well for DOTM and I'm sure it will be great for AoE, but the Transformers movies aren't anything more than what they are. They don't resonate with us, and the times they try it falls flat because of poor build up from previous movies.

There's a lot of bias because we are Transformers fans, and I understand that, but sometimes you have to take off the fan shoes and see things with a different set of eyes.

 

DOTM is better than the other two. But it's a bit like choosing your favourite STD!

Seriously though, DOTM is not that bad, the main problem is the perspective of the narrative. After all the technical problems they fixed from the first two, they still couldn't work out how to make the story about Transformers, instead of about "the adventures of Sam."

Oh and Shockwave! WTF.

 

i'm surprised you are surprised anybody would require a valid reason hating something in this fandom.

 

I'm surprised that you're surprised that he's surprised!!

(I'm not really, I just really wanted to write that!   )

 

DOTM wasn't bad at all.. My favourite in the live-action films so far.. One small thing I will 'dislike' about it is that they killed Shockwave, I thought they could have worked with him abit more but oh well.. AOE looks like a great movie just a shame critics probably won't.

 

same film as the third film, just more stupid shit. more unfunny humor, anyone of those throw back to g1, episodes he borrowed from, were better then anything Bay has ever come up with, ever.

you know what the problem with bayformers are?

it isn't the jokes. *although those seem to be written by a horny 13 year old.* it isn't even the humans.

it's the fact that the transformers are secondary characters in their own franchise.

transformers 1 through 3. are not about optimus and bumblebee.

they are about Sam, and his super model girlfriend. *it doesn't matter which one you choose, they're both the same character. both Mikaela and Carly, are both the same exact character.* Sam somehow gets medals for doing nothing.

Sam is a mary sue. in the same way, if not in a worse way, then Rod is in Birdemic.

these should not be called transformers; they should be called Sam Guest starring the transformers.

the transformers are not treated as characters. they're treated as props.

and that's the problem with these movies. every single one of them.

in every single other series, from g1, to the comics, to animated, to even prime. the transformers were the leads. even when it took place on earth. they were the characters we followed. even when the kids were involved. WE learned about the kids, and earth, the same time the transformers did.

transformers should be about the transformers. optimus and bumblebee should be our heroes.

NOT SAM.

ps; the humor was more annoying then An Adam Sandler movie, where he's doing a stupid voice.

and i can't stand that guy. but after you get through the hour and a half of stuff, and finally get to that final battle, then it becomes fun.

but you have to tread through a lot of BS to get to that. the lone ranger had a very similar thing. which i would easily argue is a better movie then this. and that's a piece of shit.

 

its good if you cut the human half, and forget the plot

 

DOTM suffered from a weak plot.

I thought it was the best movie up until the Autobot's are exiled.

Then is devolves into one way traffic and creates many problems for itself.

Shockwave dies due to a parachute landing over his head - I mean really?
Megatron might as well have stayed in Africa, he died like a biatch.
Massive Decepticon invasion stopped by two comic relief Autobots

TF movies are yet to feature a good villain who actually you can despise.

I hope that Lockdown in AOE holds his own.

 

I'm regularly surprised the sky is sometimes blue.

 

'Hate' is such a strong word. 'Disliked' is probably more likely for many people that weren't feeling the movie.

I liked DotM more than RotF. But then after RotF the only way was ever going to be up, even if perhaps not by much.

You can have the best ingredients in the world. But if the guy making the meal is generally a poor chef then it'll taste like crap regardless.

There was action in DotM, but I certainly wouldn't personally say it was the greatest ever.

 

Watching over it, it was bad. When I thought there was actually MORE robot action there turned out to be even less than I thought. The Army took the spotlight, the Autobots had such few fight scenes that they just didn't feel like they had a point to the story at all, and even Sentinel who has been my favourite movie character did not feel like he got the amount of screen time he deserved. Action was great, mostly the robot action, but it was still pretty for a movie.

 

I agree about Avengers, the way it was shot it was more like New York was being attacked by an Alien Motorcycle gang than anything that serious. they hardly did any damage to the city at all. Perhaps they were to cowardly to have building falling down in New York due to local sensitivities - which sort of begs the point - why set it in new york then - as bay Showed you can flatten Chicago Paris, Detroit or Shanghai and no one says a word about 911 sensitivities. Avengers may have painted itself into a corner perhaps.

As for if DOTM is any good - no Idea not seen it.

 

I agree with everything, though, I do love Sam's parents. They're hilarious! It surprises me as well.

 

Ron and Judy were characters that always made me smile in the films.. shame we won't be seeing any more of them.

 

I'm kinda happy they're gone now. Because they really make me cringe whenever they're around talking about Sam's life.

 

Shockwave is killed by OP not by a parachute lol