Transformers: Age of Extinction promo poster
…or better known as Transformers 4, because let’s be honest, who can keep up with all the add-on names of the Transformers franchise? There’s a whole new story line starring Marky Mark (Cade), and his on-screen daughter, Nicola Peltz (Tessa) with none of the original cast returning–unless you count Optimus Prime and Bumblebee. It’s set in the future where Optimus Prime and the rest of the transformers are in hiding from the US government and…aliens? When it came down to it, Transformers 4 was surprisingly good. I don’t know if it was the extremely low expectations I had going into the film after the disaster of Transformers 3, or if it was watching it in a different country on vacation, Singapore, that influenced my reaction to it. That’s not to say there weren’t glaring flaws, such as the length of the movie; it reminded me of the first Hobbit film where there were multiple parts when it seemed as if the ending was upon us, only to keep going. Seriously. Transformers: Age of Extinction just would not quit. I didn’t mind the lengthyness too much in The Hobbit simply because it was a continuous narrative of events that would’ve happened in the sequel anyways. However, in this movie, there was no point, except to introduce Dinosaurs I guess. Which was just a little too much. Also, the Macau/Hong Kong scenes were so confusing, it wasn’t really clear in the film if they had moved locations at an impossibly quick speed or if there were just language inconsistencies (China-Mandarin, Hong Kong- Cantonese). Stanley Tucci, in my opinion, was integral in saving this film. He provided hilarious one liners and comic relief: best part of the movie. Mark Wahlberg was also great in his role as a overly worried single father and inventor, he seemed to really enjoy playing Cade, which made watching him that much more enjoyable in itself. Tessa, his daughter, was at least half useful not quite as much as Megan Fox was in the first film, but definitely more than that blonde model in the third film that I can’t even remember the name of. She did have this weird smart good girl/rebellious short-shorts sex symbol dichotomy going on which was strange; definitely a character that was all over the place trying to fulfill multiple “roles”. There’s one scene where she’s on the alien spaceship and it’s literally just her running around trying to escape but breathing REALLY heavily and screaming the whole time. I couldn’t help but burst into laughter at that. But it definitely was alright, much better than the third one–and if you actually thoroughly enjoyed the third Transformers, then you’ll really like this one.
Bland Popcorn 