It was a year of fighting robots, brawling neighbors, battling tanks, and so much more. SPOILERS BELOW.
Optimus Prime vs. Grimlock, Transformers: Age of Extinction
2014 was the year we fully surrendered to the blockbuster franchise, with its nine-figure budgets, shared universes, and promises of inevitable reboots, full of sound, fury, and spectacle. But given how much grand action there was on screen, there were surprisingly few standout fight sequences. Part of it's that the swooping digital battles that are everywhere now are... well, everywhere now, the new norm. Take Transformers: Age of Extinction, a movie overflowing with the expected Michael Bay eye-popping visuals, but also one that, at least for me, faded into a blur almost immediately. Except for this scene, which uses the most cutting edge cinematic technology to render, in exquisite detail, a robot that can turn into a truck fighting a robot that can turn into a dinosaur, and then riding it through the streets of Hong Kong. What really cements this moment is not the bewildering speech about freedom Optimus Prime gives the Dinobot he's beating up, but that the observing Autobots seem just as surprised at the T-rex transformation and the expanding rules of their franchise as anyone watching. "I was expecting a giant car!" gasps Drift.
Paramount Home Entertainment
Lucy vs. Taiwanese Gangsters, Lucy
Lucy writes itself into a bit of a corner by having its main character accelerate toward post-human transcendence so quickly — no one can win against or even surprise Lucy (Scarlett Johansson) once she begins her journey. That said, the scene in which she first puts her new awareness to use, taking out the men holding her captive in the back of a Taipei restaurant, digging out the bullet in her shoulder, and passing for some quick caloric intake, is a minor joy in all of its brisk, cold-eyed efficiency.
Universal Pictures
The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies
The Hobbit was obviously stretching its material for its final chapter, but who isn't thankful that left plenty of room for one last great Legolas fight? Orlando Bloom's elf prince has gotten to do something physics-defyingly awesome in just about every one of Peter Jackson's Tolkien adaptations, and his rematch with the Orc chieftain Bolg on a crumbling bridge was another cleverly orchestrated, impossibly athletic bit of Legolas action.
Warner Bros.
Godzilla vs. MUTO, Godzilla
Gareth Edwards' Godzilla reboot was all about anticipation, teasing the first appearance of the MUTOs, the giant monsters that end up terrorizing various American cities, not to mention the famous kaiju himself. When the monsters finally do meet in San Francisco, the battle escalates as well, never more satisfyingly than in the moment in which Godzilla first shows off his nuclear capabilities. A MUTO is closing in on Ford Brody (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) when, just in time, Godzilla rises out of the darkness, spines glowing blue as he prepares a blast of atomic breath.
Warner Home Video
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