"Bubblebee?"
hm. anyway, just watched it and it was... alright? say what you want about shia lebouf and mark wahlberg, they are at least charismatic... NO ONE in this movie had any of it. even peter cullen, who's voice SHOULD command all kinds of respect is just... either he's getting long in the tooth or just phoning it in at this point but i just wasn't feeling it in this movie. i suppose optimus primal was good... michael bay has a lot of issues with his movies, but he does know how to make characters look heroic... i can't think of a single heroic moment from this movie that wasn't also just silly.
i think the dialogue was awful and the inter-team drama felt completely forced. it may be one of those things where better actors could have pulled it off but to the two human leads were... lacking. maybe it's because i found them unattractive and insufferable, but whatever romance angle they were going for felt so contrived and non-existant. the ONLY reason they had anything going on between them is because they were literally the only 2 humans in sight for 75% of their scenes. they know nothing about each other beyond their names and so the couple of moments where they have heart to heart talks feel utterly forced because they aren't communicating the way people do. it comes across as just exposition with flirty eyes.
and another thing. notice how the dude has plenty of real life skills but can't get a job, can't get anything going for him, can't get a win in any way at all... but the chick who is AN INTERN knows all kinds of ancient egyptian and sudanese languages and can EASILY decipher whether or not all these art pieces are fake or not and her boss can't seem to actually do anything at all without her help? the insight of AN INTERN? wtf. i'm not asking for complex characters, i'm just asking for hollywood to write realistic characters. read: NOT strong, independent young women who are excellent at everything without ever having to actually work at being good at anything.
i'm not one of those guys who screams about woke this and that, girls get it done, all women are mary sue's... but good gravy when it's over the top obvious i can't help it. and it's not like i think they were nefariously trying to preach "the agenda" i just think the writers were so awful that this is just how it turned out.
anyway, the end scene made me think "hmm... that is POTENTIALLY very cool..." i just honestly don't think this will do well enough to warrant any further sequels.