*erk ork ark*...ACK!

State of mind: hopped-up
Current soundtrack: Animated!TF Movie theme on loop %3

After a long long absence from the theaters (the last silver screening I caught was 300 — yey manchest!), I decided I needed to go see Transformers, for my sanity. I used to love them robots back in the day. They also introduced me to the idea of death, for I clearly remember Ultra Magnus getting, um, stepped on by Megatron and wondering for years and years whyyyyy they filled his coffin with SPIDERS...Yeah, I don't get it either. (._.;) It was actually a whole mess of daisies. But it looks like this was something out of Headmasters, or so the Transformers Wiki tells me.

So! I accompanied my fellow fangirl Lynn to the theater. We came, er, a bit late, and had to squeeze past a lot of people to get to our seats. I then realised we were...rather close to the screen. But no matter! Movie! Hilarity! Big shiny robots!

Transformers: The Movie

The Not-so-rabid Fangirl Review

To summarise the story very very quickly, the uber 1337 powderfull Cybertronian Allspark plummets to Earth. Powderfull indeed, as not only is it able to Create Life, the right person touches it and it neatly compresses into a cube about, oh, a tenth-maybe-twentieth of its original size. Megatron pursues, but gets frozen in the Artic (n00b!). 19th century Witwicky finds Megatron, gives him a bad touch and gets the map to the Allspark printed onto his eyeglasses - many years later, Autobots and Decepticons show up to find the map to the Allspark, then the Allspark itself, and finally there's a big crash-boom-bang-through-buildings kind of fight, and the Autobots decide to make Earth their second home.

Now, I didn't want to watch the movie at first. I mean, I saw what they'd done to the designs first. Where was the sleekness? Where was the simplicity? Where was the Inherent Cheese?! And I'm talking about the Autobot designs here! And then I saw the really ah beng flames they'd painted on OP. But I did end up here, partly because it looked like the treatment was going to end up something like the 2004 ULTRAMAN movie - a modern reimagining of an old concept. If you compared Ultraman to The Next and then the robot redesigns, sure, it made sense.

...'mma going to kill that pimptastic Michael Bay. At least ULTRAMAN's got a three-minute time limit excuse hidden in the fandom's core consciousness. Transformers doesn't have enough Transformers. Not enough for my liking or Lynn's, anyway.

When I saw this, I squeed. Out loud. In a packed cinema. Thankfully nobody shushed me. *dies*

I mean, it was a pretty movie. It was full of crashes and booms and bangs, and every time the Autobots convoy rolled out, it sent shivers up and down and diagonally through my spine. There was a lot of pop culture references, like the insignia and the leaking lubricant. (I thought leaking lubricant meant to blather on? Or am I thinking of Kup from the other movie?) And it was full of human drama. Which meant there weren't enough Transformers.

There were also a few other problems I would like to address here:

How am I NOT supposed to love a woobie face like this? @_@

• Um, Mikaela. Just a little, in the beginning. After that she rocks socks in box...es. Because really, doesn't this kinda look like that Sideshow Mary Jane figure that has/d feminists up in arms? All right, it's fanservice, we get it. Cheez. Some of your audience happens to be female, you know. -_-;


• One has to sit through about half the movie before any Autobots finally appear. Hi, can we please have our protagonists nice and up front?


• The Autobots learned their English...over the Internet. Er. I'm just kind of glad nobody burst out in a string of 'all your base are belong to us' or 'zomg' or even 'is it can be cheezburger tiem nao pleez?' They seem to have picked up...rather a lot of slangy language, but thank god they didn't pick up Memeglish or Macroese. ^^;


• What did they do to Optimus Prime?! He's PRIME fercryin'! He's witty, but not snarky, grumpy or impatient; nor, for that matter, does he say things like 'My bad.'


• Snarktimus Prime also needs to keep that mouth-mask thing on. Mostly because it looks like his lips are pasted onto his chin. x_x Umf, do not want!


• The head of Sector 7? Needs to be given a goooood kick in the pants. He only useful for five minutes, and pretty much a turd for the rest of the movie.


• Did we really need to have Bumblebee's...lubricator outlet...there? I mean it was funny and all, but the term 'golden showers' never seemed so appropriate before.


• Those parties who decided to rope Bumblebee like a beef steer, tie him down and freeze him? OMAIGOD DAI. YU DAI NAO IN FAIYAR THXBI.


• [kindoflargespoiler]Did they HAVE to kill of Jazz? I mean, G1 Jazz roxxor the soxxor in the boxxor! He was one of my favourites along with Bumblebee and Ultra Magnus, and you SNAPPED HIM IN BLIMMIN' TWO![/kindoflargespoiler]


• Bumblebee's unusual British accent. British? Not that I have anything against the Commonwealth, but...nice, proper, mature British? I thought Bumblebee was supposed to be small and nippy and quick and young. D:


• Please do not perform petting or making out on top of Transformers, people. Even if they're in car form. Specially if they're in car form. Special-specially if the OTHERS are kind of parked around. Teehee voyeur TFs


• Not enough Transformers already, confound it.

In conclusion, while it was an adequate movie, humourous and awe-inspiring in good amounts. the focus might have been a smidge misplaced. Because I honestly and whole-heartedly tell you, there just weren't enough Transformers. For me, anyway. It's worth a tub of popcorn for the boom-bang visuals and the unintentional LOLmoments. Seeing 5 TFs trying to conceal themselves in a suburban yard is like watching Iron Giant in quintiplicate.

Oh, here. To show I'm not ENTIRELY humourless, have a Burger King commercial with Prime in it.

ETA: VGCats has summed up my feelings about the situation, and much better than I could. Hooray Intart00bz!