Do You Feel That Transformers: The Last Knight Has Gotten A Bad Rap?

Features, Top Story

****The latest Transformers film from Michael Bay is out this week, how do you feel the series has progressed? Do you feel the series has gotten a bad rap?*********

Jake Ziegler

The first “Transformers” was actually a fairly enjoyable movie. It certainly wasn’t a masterpiece by any means. The sequels have all been varying degrees of terrible. I remember the second being the worst, but honestly they’re all pretty bad. If Bay could reel himself in and maybe keep them around 90-105 minutes, they might be stupid fun. But the bloated run times, insanely convoluted storylines, and sophomoric at best (robots kicking each other in the groin area), and racially insensitive at worst (Skids and Mudflap), have made this entire series a blight on the summer schedule every time one comes out.

Mike Noyes

I do not like this series. As a fan of the toys and the tv show as a kid I get no enjoyment from the films as an adult. I saw the first one and thought it was meh. I skipped the second one because it looked bad and then the third one was sent to me to review and man was that film a steaming pile! I haven’t seen any others and don’t want to. I’m not even sure how many there have been now. I don’t like the look of the movie versions and I hate that Bumblebee is a sports car who can’t talk. I could go on, but I think you get where I’m coming from.

Brendan Campbell

The Transformers franchise has definitely gotten a bad rap, as has most things that involve Michael Bay. Personally, I’m a huge fan of his, and while a great deal of the Transformers franchise is explosions and massive, epic battle sequences, that’s exactly the reason most people go and see these movies, so it’s kind of silly to hate on them for the reason they’re so successful.

Both of the last two sequels have hit over a billion dollars worldwide, with the first two before them coming quite close to that number as well. So even though a lot of people love to hate on Bay, or call this franchise abysmal, there are loads and loads of others filing into theaters to watch these movies with every release.

The first film was released in 2007, and starred Shia LaBeouf and Megan Fox. It introduced the Autobots and Decepticons to those on earth in a way that worked quite well. It was the most grounded film of the franchise in terms of simplicity, and holds up quite well a decade later.

Two years later, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen was released, and it was the weakest of the entire franchise — something even Bay admits. The writers strike was looming, and they basically came up with the script in three weeks, which clearly shows in the final product. The action and visuals were still top tier, but the story floundered, and it’s just one you’re more or less okay to skip when revisiting the series.

Two more years into the future, Transformers: Dark of the Moon was released, which is personally my favourite film of the franchise (https://insidepulse.com/…/transformers-dark-of-the-moon…/). It’s just a lot of fun, and I basically view it as Transformers meets Independence Day. It’s La Beouf’s final time out in the franchise, with Fox being replaced by Rosie Huntington-Whiteley as his love interest. They did just about everything right with this installment, and it went on to become the highest grossing of the series to date.

So three years pass, and Bay decides to jump back into the Transformers mix after a little break, and Age of Extinction is born. This is a revamp of the franchise, dropping actors previously involved and going in a new direction. Enter Mark Wahlberg, Kelsey Grammer, Nicola Peltz and Jack Reynor. This film introduced the Dinobots, and continued to push the action limits of film, as Bay so masterfully does.

So up next is The Last Knight, which I’m eager to see. I have no doubt that it’ll be a huge financial success, though it’ll also likely be Bay’s last outing as director in the franchise. Sure, we’ve heard that before, but I think he’ll look to tell stories elsewhere unless something big really brings him back into the fold. Will The Last Knight be as entertaining as Dark of the Moon? Or will it flounder in the storytelling department like Revenge of the Fallen? Well, we’ll have to wait and see on that front.

As a whole, the Transformers franchise is a lot of summer blockbuster fun, that’s really only had one big miss in four films. I watch them to see beautiful visuals, incredible action, and magic that Bay brings to his films as director. Love him or hate him, you can’t deny that he’s as successful as he is because he’s an incredibly talented director, and that shows in his work with the Transformers franchise.

Jonathan Widro is the owner and founder of Inside Pulse. Over a decade ago he burst onto the scene with a pro-WCW reporting style that earned him the nickname WCWidro. Check him out on Twitter for mostly inane non sequiturs