Transformers: Age of Extinction

It is with a heavy heart that I tell you Transformers: Age of Extinction is Michael Bay's most disappointing movie since Pearl Harbor.

This is especially disheartening considering Bay's last movie, Pain & Gain, was so great. I realize the two movies have absolutely nothing to do with each other, but I hoped that P&G had given my man enough of a rejuvenation to make a fourth robot flick feel worth it.

Turns out it didn't, as Age of Extinction's biggest problem is that Bay seems more bored with this world than anyone else. Which is weird because I've never gotten that feeling from any of his movies. I could always feel 100% enthusiasm from him even in his worst movies, which at their worst delivered awesome action and/or ridiculous visuals.

The first three Transformer movies are no different. I find the second one, Revenge of the Fallen to be my least favorite of those three, mainly due to an insane amount of non action and exposition scenes in the film that even I couldn't make myself care about despite my love for everything Bay. But the first one is a lot of fun and the third has an entire hour of Bay demolishing Chicago that ranks among the best action the man has put on film.


But Bay's lack of enthusiasm for Age of Extinction just oozes off the screen. It's baffling really, because there is a lot of stuff in this fourth film that would seem to be an upgrade from the previous installments. For example, he has an entirely new human cast here. I'm not the Shia hater a lot of you seem to be, but it's hard to deny that Mark Wahlberg is a step up in the leading man department. The dude gives 100% every time, no matter how good or terrible the movie might be, and his previous collaboration with the Bay was a career highlight for both men. 

Also gone is a lot of the silly and out of place gross humor that was a big part of the first three movies thanks to Shia's on screen parents and other random characters. Don't get me wrong, there is still a lot of silly and out of place humor in the film, just not as much. This stuff never really bothered me though, because the human characters were never a strong point of the franchise. It's called Transformers, after all, not Humans. Anyway, I digress.

My point is, it seemed like Bay was trying to keep things interesting, at least for himself, in order to keep him from doing the same ol' thing he had been with this gigantic robotic franchise.

It doesn't work though, as the movie is boring. Along with his general disinterest in the movie, it also feels like Bay wasn't even interested in trying to top himself action wise, which propels a lot of the fun I get from most of his movies. For instance, if I could put it into a dialogue of how Bay challenged himself on the first three films, I imagine it would go something like this:

"Oh, you like my action movies huh? Well check this out, I've added giant robots!"

"Oh you liked that, did you? Well check out part 2 where I destroy one of Earths' greatest monuments with giant robot balls!"

"Can't get enough, can you? Alright you fuck, watch me murder thousands of people and lay waste to an entire city while I'm at it!"

But with the fourth one, Bay just says,"Here's some more."


So disappointing.

In the end, I don't dislike Transformers: Age of Extinction, but compared to other Bayhem flicks, this one has a tough time reaching the high/low standards I've come to expect from the man. 

I still love Michael Bay though, and I hope he's done with this franchise. Here's wishing that his next movie is something more along the lines of Pain & Gain. Small, insane, and filled with depravity. That or Bad Boys III.


Oh, sidebar. I also just realized how insane the cast of every Michael Bay movie is except for the Transformer films. The dude got people like Nicolas Cage, Sean Connery, Will Smith, Martin Lawrence, Ewan McGregor, Scarlett Johannson, Bruce Willis, Steve Buscemi, William Fichtner, Billy Bob Thornton, Ben Affleck, Michael Clarke Duncan, Owen Wilson, Peter Stormare, Ed Harris, Liv Tyler, The Rock. INSANE. I know there were some great actors who popped up in the robot movies too, but none got to have as much fun or be as memorable as they were in his other movies. Here's also hoping he can get back to amazing casts as well.