In some ways, this is probably the best Transformers films yet and is certainly a step above the last two. Bay has managed to tone down the offensiveness to a degree and the human characters within the film are marginally less annoying than the previous ones. The plot still makes no sense and is just an excuse to string some action sequences together, but then that could be said about many summer blockbuster films. Bay certainly has visual flair, but his editing style remains confusing at best and here the visual spectacle of watching Transformers do their thing has become stale after three films. Even the complex shots of many of the robots mechanically transforming have been replaced with some far less visually interesting. But Bay's biggest problem is his consistent misunderstanding of what should be his target audience - young children who buy the toys, not the teenage boys who have long since moved on from playing with them. The overt leering shots at some of the women in the film have been toned down a little (though only Bay could have one of his characters tell his teenage daughter to put some clothes on whilst the camera focuses on her figure) but the film remains overly long and dull and for many young children far too intense and violent despite the survival of the majority of human characters amid the carnage. It also still astounds how many excuse these films as summer blockbusters that are intended to be bombastic and that audience members should leave their brains at the door and just enjoy it - yet fail to understand that films like this require a modicum of interest and emotional investment in the characters for them to entertain at this basic level.

One question: Why? :o :D It has action and some fun but there isn't really much besides that. I mean, it's not that bad, but it didn't feal meaningful at all. It kinda was just frustrating and embarrassing to watch as it shows humanity from such a bad side and it doesn't even feel that far fetched. Sure lots of things were just stupid but it's not totally unimaginable, unfortunately...

Anyway, this time even the intro (opening credits) was boring. Why did they stop using those sounds? At least the space ship scene that came right after that was kinda cool.

The biggest improvement seemed that the camera shots at daytime looked much better. At least on Netflix this isn't available in 4K but the scenes with enough natural light looked sharp and beautiful. The scenes at night do unfortunately look worse than they should (I mean, the cameras couldn't've been that bad at that time, right?!?).

And then the bad story of the last movie repeated itself. Bad humans do bad things. Some crazy black ops that no one seems to care about. Lukas died (that sucked... :o he was one of my favorite characters... and his little car (Mini) was cool :D but at least he was the one who called the cops).

Optimus Prime looked like complete shit. Then he was suddenly able to fight and a bit after that he transformed into his old self and suddenly looked like new. WTF?!? And why didn't he try to hide by transforming into something else while they were chased by the cops?

Some new types of transformers. A chopper, dinosaurs, dogs, etc. And then there are those Transformers 2.0 that the humans created. It feels like they should be basically unkillable (they don't have a spark, can transform into anything, out of nothing) but somehow they still are.

Some very poor gun aim, IIRC.

"Aliens would never do that to people."

And at that point it started to feel a bit like crap... :o

Then "The Creators" were mentioned. That seems interesting but we didn't really learn much(/anything) about them.

And last but not least we got to see mechanical dinosaurs in a Transformers movie. At that point I found the beautiful landscape more interesting though (lots of bright green nature, a waterfall, rocks, etc. - looked quite cool/nice).

PS: And the whole time I was super unsure if I've even seen this movie before. A few things felt familiar but mostly at the beginning (so it could be from the trailer). I probably wasn't paying attention back then, was too tired, or it was just too boring, etc. I basically didn't know what would happen next at all...

I guess even Michael Bay must have realised that by the fourth outing, this franchise needed refreshing. To that end, the previously long-suffering cast have been allowed hang up their screwdrivers and a new set of characters have been drafted in. They are led by "Cade" (an enthusiastic Mark Wahlberg). Now he just happens to buy an old truck and it just happens to turn out to be the long lost "Optimus Prime". Of course, there are still agencies hunting for the robots and soon he and daughter "Tessa" (Nicola Peltz Beckham) are on the run from a militia controlled by the manipulative industrialist "Joyce" (Stanley Tucci). Quite why it needs to take 2¾ hours to get to the standard denouement is anyone's guess. Despite the inclusion of some Tyrannosaur-bots, the film has the same relentless predictability as the "Autobots" and "Decepticons" (if you can spot the difference) go through the same repetitively staged combat scenes before an ending that relies unduly on human intervention (oh yes, and lots of sentimentality too) before we essentially start back at square one with the usual "Optimus" monologue concluding the proceedings. This has the added benefit of a truly terrible performance from the always over-rated Kelsey Grammer who had a few, entirely futile, goes at being a cinema baddie and unlike the other films which had a semblance of internationalism to them, this is now an entirely American affair that just bored me. Surely no more...?

Is there any excuse available that will justify spending 2 hours, 45 minutes to watch this film? Or why I am gifting it three stars?

It was a free rental at Redox.
I normally enjoy Mark Wahlberg movies.
I love Bumblebee.

Do any of these hold water?

I know one thing that doesn’t hold a lot of water – the story. Does it really matter at this point in the franchise? There are good guy Transformers called Autobots and bad guy Transformers called Decepticons and standing between them are stupid humans that betray their species for profit – normally it’s the U.S. Government. BUT wait – there is one hero that will change all of this and talk Optimus Prime (Autobot Boss Daddy) into fighting one last battle (for the fourth or fifth time – I’ve lost count at this point) while some hot-looking woman runs around explosions in short-shorts.

You now know all you need to know about the entire _Transformer_ franchise.

For this incarnation we trade out Shia LeBeouf for Mark Wahlberg and Courtney Fox for Nicola Pelz. And now for the twist…wait for it… Mark Wahlberg plays Nicola Pelz’s FATHER. That’s right – the FATHER. Yeah, it totally doesn’t work. At all.

There’s a point in the movie about 90 minutes in where it looks like all the loose ends are going to get tied up and I thought: You know, that wasn’t so bad. Good action flick, a bit hoaky at points but watchable.

And then the movie keeps going. And going. For another 90 minutes. And you basically watch the movie again except instead of it being in Texas and Chicago, it’s in China and Hong Kong.

It’s too long, too many explosions, too many American flags and Texas flags in the background. This movie desperately needs an editor or it needs to be euthanized. Probably the latter.

John Goodman and Ken Watanabe lend their voices serve as decent comic relief but there’s not a lot that can save this film. Bumblebee deserved better.