The latest installment in Michael Bay’s mega-franchise is enough to make you question your own taste. So that’s what we did.
Mark Wahlberg with Lockdown in Transformers: Age of Extinction
Industrial Light & Magic/Paramount
Transformers: Age of Extinction, which opens this Friday in 4,000 theaters, is one of the biggest, noisiest, most stupid, and, yes, most dazzling movies ever made. It manages to be extremely complicated and full of nothingness at the same time. It's a feature based on an '80s Hasbro toy line that makes use of the most cutting edge filmmaking and special effects technology available. It has product placement so blatant and shameless, it's kind of awesome. It has dinosaur robots and nanobot ones, as well as a Transformer voiced by John Goodman who's basically just John Goodman in the form of a giant metal dude who can turn into a military truck. And he has a robot beard, raising so many questions about Transformer facial hair that — spoilers! — remain unanswered.
Director Michael Bay, Hollywood's über-bro and a legitimate virtuoso when it comes to pure spectacle, has overseen all four of the films in this franchise (soon to be five), and watching them for me has become a deeply conflicting experience. On one hand, these movies are ridiculous — incoherent, overlong, containing insanely terrible instances of dialogue, character development, and story twists. On the other hand, these movies are ridiculous — they're gleeful odes to excess that never pretend to be anything else than the cinematic equivalent of a double hamburger topped with bacon sandwiched between two grilled cheeses instead of buns.
With Transformers: Age of Extinction opening this week, here's my conversation with myself over how I feel about the movie. In keeping with the spirit of the franchise, I've labeled my pro side "Autobot" and the con "Decepticon."
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