More than meets the eye

I'm going to skip my intended reviews of something like five movies because some movies just deserve to skip the queue. (I'm even bypassing Ratatouille for this one, which really says all you need to know!)

Anyway, I was a Transformers fanboy when I was growing up, so the microsecond that I found out about a live-action Transformers movie, I was so there. The trailers could have been total crap, but I was already so there either on opening night or shortly thereafter.

Well, yesterday I got to see the movie and, as Lemming writes, the movie did not disappoint. Indeed, it was a big win. Put another way, it was bloody awesome! (Here are links to the film's IMDB and wikipedia entries.)

Now I don't know if it will be my favorite movie of the year because I'm going to somehow have to separate the nostalgia factor when I figure that out, because for me the Transformers can't really be separated from my childhood. I had a lot of Transformer toys and I was a big fan of the cartoon series and original (cartoon) movie. I have a bunch of Transformers scattered around my parents' house, but most important, I still have my favorite one (Shockwave) intact and in excellent condition. By the way, the Transformer who is closest to my paradigm is Shockwave. Soundwave is second, and none of the others are close.

Before I get to my favorite part of the movie, let me go into Comicbook Guy mode briefly and explained what annoyed me. Principally, it was two things: (1) Megatron is a gun, not a plane! (2) The Decepticon selection was really weak. Two Constructicons without having them as a set? Either have all of them or none of them! One of Soundwave's "casettes" (updated for modern technology) but not Soundwave? Strange. Granted, Frenzy's Scratch-like style and antics were very amusing, but how can one have him without Soundwave. (Apparently, both Soundwave and Shockwave were in the original plans.)

As for things to love about the movie, there were many of them. There was awesome action. (In fact, there was eye candy of all sorts.) There was a lot more humor than I was expecting. There were live-action Transformers, and that enough would have made the movie worth it for me! The best parts were the homages to the original series. Optimus Prime had the same honor, nobility, and chivalry I remembered and the addition of some more humor to his personality worked well. I remember several lines from the original series. Prime saying "Autobots, roll out!" brought back a ton of memories. The individual line that I like the best was "You have failed me yet again, Starscream.", which only occurs about every other episode in the original series. And as far as nostalgia goes, the best part of the film occurred near the beginning in which I heard the narrator for the first time. And do you know why? Simple, because that's when I found out that the voice for Optimus Prime was being done by the original guy who did that voice. Lemming mentions this as well, but when I heard that I was 8 years old again and there are very few things that make me feel that way. I had not been previously aware of this choice, but to shout out my approval would just be way too mild. To be more accurate, my favorite part of the movie (which contains tons and tons of awesomeness) was the entire movie of hearing the right voice as Optimus Prime. But it was the beginning of the narration when I found that out that was truly special, and the feeling that gave me was worth the price of admission all by itself.

By the way, for those of you who have never read this, here is a history of the Transformers. It's high-quality reading.