Hippie Funk and Sh*tty Movies

I, like many lemmings yesterday, saw Michael Bay's Transformers. I don't just say I saw Transformers because it's not the Transformers I grew up with and loved. Mind you I know it was a shitty cartoon created to sell a line of toys, but still, it was the shitty cartoon of an entire generation who loved it despite it's shittiness. It's wonderful, campy shittiness. I dare you to find a children's cartoon today that holds up, or is any good. Truth is you probably won't, unless you pick out Transformers Armada, or some other 80s cartoon that's being redone for today's young audiences because the original cartoons they have suck balls, so much so that The Powers That Be are digging through our childhood treasure chest, trying to recreate the magic that made us such rabid fans in the first place.

But I digress.

It's Michael Bay's Transformers, let there be no doubt. But before I get to that, let's talk about hippies.

There's a cool store on Sunset called Amoeba and it sells everything that's music or movie related. Really, you can find yourself spending a crap load of cash in that store as if you were in Wal-Mart. Not that Amoeba is driven by consumerism, though I'm sure that has to play a part, it's just that you can find so many videos you were looking for and most of the time you can get it for cheap. It's also cool that a part of your proceeds will go to some kind of charity, most likely environmental.

Before I handed over my ass to be spanked by Bay I hung out in the store, partly because I was intending to shop and partly because there parking lot is free (when you can get in)and I wanted to save a few bucks from the mandatory cost of parking at the theater structure (1.50 for first two hours w/validation, 1.50 every half hour there after). As soon as i got into the store I was hit with the funk of several unwashed hippies. It only got worse when I got to the second level, where they keep the movies, and there were at least three stinky guys who somehow ended up in the aisle I just happened to be in.

Why is it that the New Agey, anti-establishment, F the Man types fight the hygiene? Really, you grew up in the valley, just because there are flies around you doesn't mean you can identify any more with those Africans you're always talking about. I'm sure they'd appreciate you adding soap to your morning routine just as I would. Body odor is not "hip", it's not "cool" or whatever hippie language you're using now. Oh, it makes you stand out, yes sir're you stand out. But not in the good way. Not in the way that makes me want to hold a conversation with you and your beliefs. You stink. And the only thing I want you to do is get the f*ck away from me. That's why I LEFT the aisle I was in when the video I wanted was right in front of you. I couldn't bring myself to reach across and risk your funk hopping onto me. Do the world a favor and take a nice long bath when you're trying to think of ways to Damn the Man. It'll make you feel better I promise.

Onto other things that stink.

Transformers was good for about ten minutes total and then even for me the wonder of watching giant robots beat the shit out of each other wore off and became redundant and mundane. It wasn't as if the fight were any good either! For the most part, aside from Optimus Prime, Bumblebee and Barricade I couldn't tell who was who when they were fighting. It didn't help that Bay decided we didn't need to see any of the other Decepticons until about twenty minutes before the film ended. You saw TWO and then all of a sudden Megatron wakes up from a thousand years of sleeping and then they put out an all call to the rest of the Decepticons who'd been doing god knows what this entire time. There was a kind of roll call where you saw them saw their names but it really didn't help cause once they transformed they all looked the same. I'm not being racist against the Decepticons, they really did all look alike. It also didn't help matters that they made Megatron a military jet, as well as Starscream and when they were in their non-jet forms you couldn't tell the difference until one of them spoke. I had the same problem with some of the Autobots once the rest of them were introduced. I was pissed to say the least.

There is no story to speak of, though the writers tried to create one by giving us the standard tropes of shitty action pictures: Geeky boy after hot girl? Check. Pretty white boy American solider who wants to get home to his wife and new born baby who he hasn't seen? Check. Fat, loud, black guy who lives with his momma? Check. Idiotic D.C. bureaucrats? Double Check? Realism? Wait..what's that?

I know, trust me, I KNOW that this is a movie about giant alien robots who come to earth and look like cars. I get that. HOWEVER, you could have played at least SOME realism to the way people react to these things, especially Optimus and the rest of the Autobots. They come down to earth and no one seems surprised that there are walking talking 18-wheelers running around. They actually do address that with these horrible Sector-7 guys (it's secret, shhh) when Optimus goes, "You don't look surprised to see us," well Optimus, that's because they've been keeping Megatron on ice since the 1930s, so the fact that there are four more of you now walking and talking freely just isn't that impressive anymore. You're 70 years too late to the party, pal. Go surprise another species.

I mean really, just a few scenes of "oh shit, there are GIANT FUCKING ROBOTS" here on Earth. There would be a myriad of emotions: fear, excitement, curiosity, and yes, even surprise. Even the humans who weren't exposed to Megatron's cold, sleeping body weren't all that surprised that the cars transformed. Shia LeBouf's character does the emotional equivalent of shrugging his shoulders and going "meh". It's like, "Hey, my car's ALIVE, go figure." At least spend a scene of him terrified, and then interacting with Bumblebee on a personal level, ask some questions, poke at him, do SOMETHING aside from playing it off like it happens every other day. I would piss myself with glee if my Toyota Camry turned into a transformer. I also wouldn't go to work for a few days and I'd call my parents.

There were a few honestly funny moments but they were too few and far between. And once Megatron is awake all common sense, human or otherwise (but mostly human) goes out the window and they literally do one of the stupidest things I've ever seen. Let's just say that if you have something Very Important and you need to hide it to get it away from the Decepticons the absolute LAST thing you'd do is take said object into the middle of the FUCKING CITY. Not only that, but once they get it to the city, without ever having specified WHERE they were going to hide it. It was exactly like, "get it to the city and hide it," and none, not ONE person stopped to ask, "Where?" That comes into play later, when the Autobots and Decepticons are fighting it out, with hundreds of people witnessing (and dying) from the carnage, and the pretty boy solider says, "We have to get it out of the city!"

REALLY now? It didn't occur to you BEFOREHAND that that might not have been the best idea to begin with?

So now we come to the battle between Megatron and Optimus and I shake the child in me awake and she rubs the sleep out of her eyes and gets giddy. There are a few good shots of buildings being pummeled from the impact of tons of alien robot smashing into them but over all the fight was 1) way to short and 2) ended TERRIBLY. Optimus didn't even defeat Megatron, Shia did and the child in me cried from the stupidity of it. I honestly don't understand why they couldn't just let Optimus kick Megatron's ass.

Even if there is a sequel, if Bay is at the helm then there's slim to none chance I'll see it. I said I wouldn't see this one but the urge to see Transformers in a real life setting was just too much. What could have been cool, brain dead fun was an excuse for a car commercial.