Transformers A Movie Review	MPAA Rated - PG-13 It's 2:23 Long A Review by The Dude on the Right

It seems a long, long, long time ago, Megatron, leader of the Decepticons, crashed here on Earth in search of the Allspark, a super-fantastic energy source that would help him rule the Universe. Too bad for Megatron he crashed in the Arctic Circle and was frozen. On an expedition in the late 1800’s, Granddad Witwicky discovered Megatron, sort of reactivated him, and now Decepticons are coming to Earth to find their missing leader. How do they plan on finding Megatron? By infiltrating the Defense Department’s computers, of course (Duh?), which tell where Megatron is now being kept safely, on ice. But it’s also the year 2007, and Sam Witwicky (Shia LeBeouf) is in high school, trying to raise some cash on eBay to buy a car, and impress the hottest girl ever, Mikaela (Megan Fox). Lucky for him the Autobot named Bumblebee, who when he’s not a robot is a Camaro, inserts himself into Sam’s life, helping him both get the girl and protecting the secret Sam holds to the location of the Allspark.

Oh, hell, why am I wasting time on the entire plot and story? The Decepticons have come to Earth to resurrect Megatron and destroy us, while the Autobots are here to keep the bad robots at bay, thus ensuring our survival. All of the Transformers do what they do best, namely transform from a robot to things like cars, planes, cell phones, and boom boxes, and then transform back again, and then fight each other. We humans are pretty much useless in fighting them, but try to help however we can. Enough plot, was the movie any good?

Hell yes, almost.

Let’s start with the great. Pretty much I was enjoying all of "Transformers." For me I didn’t need a lot of back-story about the Autobots and the Decepticons, but the movie gave probably just enough of why they ended up here, and what they do. A lot of the first half of the movie had to do simply with two things. First, there were a couple of Decepticons working to infiltrate the Defense Department computers and taking out a military outpost, with the military trying to find out what the hell is going on. Second, Sam gets the cash for a car, Bumblebee inserts himself into Sam’s life (with some of the best radio ever), and Sam, somehow, is able to insert himself into Mikaela’s life. But the thing is that the first half was full of funny, still had some action, introduced us to the fantastic CGI work of the Transformer characters, and really worked to set-up the second half of the film. The second half of the film turned everything up a ton of notches, still kept with the comedy (the Autobots outside of Sam’s house were hilarious), all leading up to the giant, climactic Transformer fight where Megatron has gotten free, it’s the battle we are looking for, but sadly let’s get to the not as great.

For me it was the final battle scene.

For almost all of "Transformers" somehow Michael Bay was able to keep the movie not being a Michael Bay film, even poking fun with a mention about Armageddon. Then the final battle came and Michael Bay was reborn: Lots of pacing music, that "Bum, (pause), bum, bum, bum, bum, bum" we know from a lot of his films; The "Let’s show this in slow-motion" action sequences; And then the "now it’s serious, now it’s war, and how are we going to actually beat the bad robots" part of the film.

I mostly really liked "Transformers." Even with the bizarre seriousness of the film the film folks kept it funny at times, just a little serious, and I loved everyone in their role (and it was great and a flashback moment to hear Peter Cullen back voicing Optimus Prime). I think the final battle scene would have been better in real time, without the slow-motion, but visual-wise it was still fantastic. The last thing that really made my movie going experience grand was that a bunch of us who used to watch "The Transformers" in college all went to see it, but behind us was another group of folks who were singing the same songs we knew, namely the lyrics "You’ve got the touch. You’ve got the power. Yea!!!" Who says that the animated "The Transformers" feature film from 1986 wasn’t memorable?

With the funny the movie had, the action the movie had, and the just so coolness the movie had, I really want to give "Transformers" a solid 4 ½ or 5 stars, but I’ve got to knock off a little rating because of the ending fight scene that didn’t need to have any slow-motion, didn’t need to have the usual Michael Bay soundtrack, and just needed to get on with it and let the robot fighting happen. The only other thing that was missing, and I wish I had actually come up with this quote but I must attribute it to one DirkBelig, was "the lack of Megan Fox being doused in water then thrown in a cold room." In the end it’s 4 out of 5 stars for "Transformers."

That’s it for this one! I’m The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!!