Movie Review: Transformers Dark Side of the Moon

Movie Review: Transformers Dark Side of the Moon

Well here it is boys and girls. The final installment in the Michael Bay franchise and the movie he should have made instead of Revenge of the Fallen. Bay has it all this time around. Action, romance and comedy.

The first notable difference is the lack of Megan Fox and the addition of Rose Huntington-Whitely. There has been some less than friendly reviews about Rose's acting in the movie. Those reviews must have been written by jealous Megan Fox fans who were annoyed that Mikaela didn't return. How was that worked around? She dumped Sam apparently. Precious little gets said about the character which, for some of us, is a positive.

Also appearing in the movie is the legendary Leonard Nimoy. No stranger to the Transformer universe, Nimoy voiced Galvatron in the 1986 animated debacle Transformers: The Movie. Nimoy comes on board to play Sentinel Prime, the leader of the autobots before Optimus assumed the role.

Other stars pop up such as Patrick Dempsey, Frances McDormand and Ken Jeong. They have their own roles. Some you can't help but like. Others... well. No so much. They do give it a good go though, don't hesitate to believe otherwise. Of course there is also the franchise staples like Shia LaBeouf, Josh Duhamel, Tyrese Gibson and John Turturro.

For those not sure how Bay handled the movie, the answer is simple. Very well. The movie contains all the explosions of the second movie and the chemistry of the first movie and blended them well together. The fanboys and fangirls are going to try to tell you it was a bad movie. Sorry children, the cannon has changed and the original cartoon universe no longer applies.

The story is actually well put together with only one or two flaws but, all in all, isn't a bad yarn. The one that was heard most when leaving the cinema was "That's BS. How can there be Sentinel Prime in this movie when they said Optimus was the last prime in the last movie?" Apparently, people didn't actually consider that no one knew Sentinel Prime was still 'alive' until NEST soldiers told Optimus.

Without trying to reveal the ending, it seems highly unlikely that there will be any more movies in the franchise. Unless, of course, they decide to do a reboot in which case they're just going to irritate a lot of people.

The final verdict... it's a good movie. The audience, mostly, seemed to enjoy it. There's a lot going on in the movie and it's certainly a no-brainer. The story line is easy to follow, the one liners are perfectly delivered and the last hour is back-to-back action sequences with stealth, big bangs, fireworks and lots of oversized robots dying. The twist though, was perfectly thought up and well delivered. They say the third time is the charm. In this case, it certainly was.

Transformers Dark Side of the Moon is out now.