Transformers : Revenge of the Fallen!

I know everyone is just dying to know what I thought of the new Transformers flick: Revenge of the fallen. Allow me to scratch that itch.

Let me set the scene as far as I personally am concerned. I loved the old Transformers cartoon when I was a wee lad, but I haven't seen them since then. I'm also pretty sure I once owned an Optimus Prime toy. I've gotten to be pretty far removed from those years, so any storylines or whatever from yesteryear I do not hold dear. As far as I remember, the cartoon was about a bunch of good robots led by Prime, who transformed into vehicles and fought a bunch of evil transforming robots led by Megatron and the movie keeps that idea going, so I'm okay with that.

So, let me start out with the bad.

THE BAD:

*Shaky cam. I've said it before, so allow me to repeat myself: I don't care for feeling like I'm in the "middle" of the action. I prefer to "watch" the action. So for crying out loud, pull the camera back a little! Michael Bay - watch some classic Spielberg action flick to see how it's done. Holy Crap! Spielberg was Executive Producer? Well, when the master is watching you work and you still pull that crap, maybe there's no help.

*Simplify the look of the robots. There's just too much going on with nuts, bolts and gears and crap. Too much for the eye to take in. The only way to tell which robot is what is what color they are. And I'm color blind.

*Shoulda cut out a bit of the Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum of gangsta autobots to concentrate on cooler autobots I could give a poop about.

*Trim some time off this thing. I had to pee really bad by the time the credits rolled.

THE GOOD:

*Turturro - I don't care how goofy John Turturro's Agent Simmons was in these two movies, the man made me laugh.

*Optimus vs. Several Decepticons in the forest. This is why Optimus is king.

*The humor is sometimes goofy, but it's what keeps these movies entertaining.

*LaBeof. He gets a lot of crap for being popular and in a lot of movies and it's true, he seems to play the same type of neurosis in all these movies, but it works for this one. I like him and his character and I won't apologize. So there.

*Flat out entertaining. There's a lot going on with this movie, and though there's a sequence here or there that could be trimmed, it keeps moving. A lot of action and humor and "Holy Crap that's cool" scenes rank it high on the entertainometer. Too me, that's the strongest point. You could nitpick this movie to shreds if you wanted to, but the entertainment factor overshadows. For me, it always does. Entertain me and I'm happy.

THE OVERRATED:

* Megan Fox. Okay, I'll give you that she ain't ugly, but c'mon. If it wasn't Michael By shooting her the way he does, she wouldn't make near the blip that she does. Besides, I would rather the return of the Aussie hacker gal from Part 1.

So all in all, I was quite entertained. This thing isn't gonna win any Oscars, but that's okay. It kept me in a good mood for 2 1/2 hours and you can't beat that. What can I say? Being easily entertained keeps me a happier movie goer.