Quick, First Impression Movie Review

I like a good action movie.

Transformers is not a good action movie.

I actually enjoy it if a movie plays with my emotions. A good escapist movie, for me, is one that plays me like a cheap violin. I respond to everything and I love emoting through a good movie. I love breathlessly wondering what will happen next. I have been known to turn to Chris and enthuse, "That. Was. AWESOME!" (Even if I end up stepping back and re-thinking my feelings about the movie afterwards. See: third Star Wars prequel.)

Transformers, for one thing, played on the wrong emotions for me. For one, the Decepticons were all sharp and pointy. And I have a huge phobia of sharp and pointy things. Any time they were onscreen, I was squirming or hiding. (And, seriously folks: they weren't deceptive at all! They were just bad with no apparent motive. There's so much back story, and it just got thrown out the window for Michael Bay's requisite Hot People Saving The Earth, and God Bless America and Support Our Troops.) It also made me uncomfortable how very Flag-Wavey Militarist it was, as evidenced by my last aside. In spite of a few not-so-subtle digs at the government, it was very very pro-militarist-America. And that also gets me feeling more uncomfortable and less likely to shut off my brain and enjoy.

Also: extreme ham-handedness in the writing doesn't make for my kind of escapism. It gets me burying my head in my hands and shaking my head, when there's Yet Another Speech by Optimus Prime, where he talks about why People Are Worth It. (And action movies don't have to be like that! This is largely why I enjoy the first two X-Men movies and spent the third shaking my fist at Brett Ratner.)

And apparently that makes me ranty.