Transformers: Age of Extinction Review

Before I dive into my review of the latest pile of trash by Michael Bay, I think it's important for me to quickly review to you my history of the Transformers movies. Outside a few exceptions, Michael Bay is a director whose style of movies I just don't enjoy and thus most of the time when a new Michael Bay movie comes out, you can count on a poor review from me. No, I'm not a hater. I don't do this on purpose. That's just what typically happens. As far as exceptions go, the first Transformers movie was one of them. No, it wasn't perfect, but it was a really fun movie and awesome seeing the transformers on the big screen. Then Transformers 2 happened. Holy cow. It was almost epic how quickly this franchise went from being really good to really bad. Transformers 3 was an upgrade over Transformers 2. I will admit that I was mildly entertained, but not enough to say it was a good movie. Going into Transformers 4, I had some hope it could be good. New cast. Dinobots. Perhaps this could be good? Haha! Nope! Transformers: Age of Extinction rivals for the worst Transformers movie yet. So if you hated 2 and 3, but are thinking about giving 4 a chance in hopes that it could be good, let me save you some time and money. It's not worth it. Skip this one.

Yeah, that's how I felt, too

The brand new cast in this movie is something that gave me hope that it could be good. I mean, there is Mark Wahlberg as the lead with Bates Motel's Nicola Peltz playing his daughter. Also in the movie is Kelsey Grammer, Stanley Tucci, John Goodman, and Ken Watanabe. This is a good cast. But as you know, good casts don't always equal good movies even if the cast as a whole does a good job. That's the case here. Mark Wahlberg plays that messed up inventor father who won't even let his 17-year-old daughter go on a date until she graduates High School. In addition to the over-protection, he's not a very smart father or adult as Nicola Peltz' character essentially has to be the one taking care of him. Then one day he finds this old beaten up truck that he takes to his garage. Yup. That truck ends up being Optimus Prime. Before he knows it, the government is over at his house because they are trying to get rid of all transformers. One thing leads to another and suddenly their house has exploded and they are on the run. That's where the movie lost me. What happened next?

BOOM! BOOM! BAM! EXPLOSION! EXPLOSION! BAM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! EXPLOSION! BAM! BAM! BAM! EXPLOSION! EXPLOSION! EXPLOSION! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BAM! BOOM! EXPLOSION! BOOM! BOOM! BAM! EXPLOSION! EXPLOSION! BAM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! EXPLOSION! BAM! BAM! BAM! EXPLOSION! EXPLOSION! EXPLOSION! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BAM! BOOM! EXPLOSION! BOOM! BOOM! BAM! EXPLOSION! EXPLOSION! BAM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! EXPLOSION! BAM! BAM! BAM! EXPLOSION! EXPLOSION! EXPLOSION! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BAM! BOOM! EXPLOSION! BOOM! BOOM! BAM! EXPLOSION! EXPLOSION! BAM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! EXPLOSION! BAM! BAM! BAM! EXPLOSION! EXPLOSION! EXPLOSION! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BAM! BOOM! EXPLOSION!

 And it didn't stop. In fact, this went on for nearly three hours. Yes, the run time in this movie is 165 minutes. The problem? I got bored. Yes, I love action movies and even if the plot is awful, I can usually turn off my brain and enjoy. But not here. In fact, I was so bored, that I even dozed off a couple of times. And I wasn't tired when I started the movie. Was there an actual plot that goes deeper than what I explained? Kind of. The government is trying to get rid of all the transformers and along with that Stanley Tucci's character has created new transformers while unintentionally using Megatron to do so, so the bad mojo is spread through all these transformers. That's pretty much it. I would say that this is easily the thinnest plot out of all the Transformer movies and yet it's the longest of all of them, meaning even more of Michael Bay's explosions than the others. And they weren't even realistic explosions. You have things exploding when really there is no reason for them to be exploding and all the explosions looked like fireworks. Sure this style is the same in the others, but it's a lot worse and magnified in this.

I don't blame the actors in this movie. Mark Wahlberg, Nicola Peltz, and Stanley Tucci are the main players in this one and they did the best they could with what they were given. But what they were given was a bunch of crap. And so despite their good acting, I had zero connection with any of them. In fact, I will say that I actually had more of a connection with Shia LeBeouf and Megan Fox than I did with this new cast, and I didn't even like those two. It was just like, who are these new people? Why do I care about them? Why are they in this Transformers movie? Why on earth have you completely wasted such good talent Michael Bay?

Dinobots? Remember how I said that this was the other thing that gave me a little hope in this movie? Yeah, we were two hours into this movie and they hadn't even shown up yet. And then out of nowhere, Optimus Prime wanders on the outskirts of this city and just like magic there were dinobots that helped them in the final battle. Then they were gone. Yeah, they had like 20 minutes of screen time and how and why they showed up made no sense. What a waste. And speaking of being two hours in, there was a point in this movie where it had been going on for so long, that I felt we must be entering the final act and thus the movie should be almost over. So I checked my phone to see what time it was. First off, when I check the time in the movie, that's a bad enough sign. But second, when I did check the time, I realized that there was a WHOLE HOUR LEFT! AHHHHHH!!!! THIS MOVIE DIDN'T END! IT JUST KEPT GOING AND GOING AND GOING AND GOING AND GOING AND GOING!!!!! Then you are screaming to yourself to for the movie to end and it never did. At the end, I almost cheered. Not because the movie was good, but because it was finally over.

Overall, Transformers: Age of Extinction was a complete disaster. It had good actors that were completely wasted. It had a storyline that barely existed and made no sense when it did. This led to no connection with any of the characters, human or transformer. And it was just awful explosions and action that went on forever. If you hated the previous two, your going to hate this one as well. If you liked those two, well, I don't know what to tell you. Maybe you'll like this one? But for me, the previous worst Transformers movie was definitely Transformers 2 and I'm honestly having a tough time deciding which one is worst, that one or this one. I thought 2 was awful and boring for most of it, but I don't remember finishing it hating it as much as this one, so Transformers 4 could be the worst one in my opinion. But I'm not going to go back and re-watch Transformers 2 just to make that decision, so who knows. Moral of the story is they are probably about equal. Regardless, my grade for Transformers: Age of Extinction is a 4/10.