Review: Transformers: Revenge Of The Fallen, Why Are There Still People In My Transformers Movie
- Jun 18, 2017
- 2 min read
Picking two years after the last film left off, Revenge Of The Fallen promises bigger action, more Transformers and giant metal testicles. Wait, what? What do you mean Transformers have been on Earth since the stone age? Are those robots intentionally racist? I mean, I wasn’t expecting a masterpiece but, seriously? Well, it’s not like anybody watches these movies for the plot and characters anyway.
After the death of Megatron (Hugo Weaving), Autobot forces, their numbers now bolstered by a number of new arrivals, now work with NEST, a taskforce established to hunt down any remaining Decepticons. Led by Optimus Prime (Peter Cullen) the taskforce is incredibly successful. When a dying Decepticon warns that “The Fallen” will rise again, events are set in motion that will change the world forever. Also Sam (Shia LaBeouf) has to go to college and deal with relationship problems because, in the face of the total destruction of mankind, these things are important.
Revenge Of The Fallen has a greater focus on the human element as well as humour, the two components of the first film that were almost universally panned. Whether or not this was a conscious decision or simply the way it turned out is unknown but the results are apparent, and unliked. The writing of the original film was far from great and this time around it is, somehow, worse. The “jokes” mostly delivered through a pair of entirely awful Autobots, is neither funny nor warranted. Instead it’s mostly painful. But there’s still some big robots around, which is nice.
We’ve got some good Transformer lore, much more than the previous entry, and it’s actually pretty solid. We are introduced to The Fallen, Megatron’s own Emperor Palpatine, a slew of new Decepticons and Autobots and some pretty great fight scenes. There’s a battle in a forest which is unlike anything you've ever seen as well as a a combined forces fight in Egypt which is pretty neat. But it always seems that whenever the Transformer components get really interesting, either on their own or with the military, it switches back to Sam and whatever boring drama he’s dealing with.
Peter Cullen and Hugo Weaving are once again excellent and the action scenes are thoroughly entertaining but it’s the bad parts, the writing, the people and the “humour” that leave an impression. If they were removed, or at least lessened, the movie would be far more watchable but, as it stands, just catch the highlights on Youtube.
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