We just watched Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen and have returned to the studio, along with our guest, Chris Jones, to give you our initial reactions. What did we think of the movie? None of us were impressed. Our overall opinion is to stick to the first movie. There were whole parts of this movie that, if they were removed, would have made the movie a lot better.
Spoiler Alert
This podcast episode and shownotes do contain spoilers. If you haven’t seen the movie and don’t want it ruined (although it’s our opinion that it’s already ruined), stop reading or listening here and see the movie before finishing this episode.
Who is the intended audience for this movie? Since the subject matter of the movie is based on toys, you would think that the movie might be intended for children, especially since the first movie reignited the market for the toys. But it could also be intended for the adults who grew up with the toys. However, the language and much of the content of Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen was totally inappropriate for children. This movie, in our opinion, should have been rated R. Daniel talks about how Megan Fox was included to be eye candy for men, which annoys him—he sees no purpose for all that skin in furthering the plot. Eve mentions the scene where the agent pulls his pants down as being completely inappropriate.
The movie starts out talking about the history of earth. The time scale of when transformers and humans first interacted is given as 17,000 BC. Chris mentions that the tiger the people are hunting is not even a prehistoric tiger. Eve mentions the presenting of non-Caucasians as primitive—one of the ways that evolutionary views fuel racism.
Daniel brings up Optimus Prime’s opening dialogue—”humans are capable of great compassion as well as great violence.” This is actually a valid statement. As created by God, we are capable of love, and yet in our sin, we are capable of great violence when we disregard the absolute authority of our Creator. Eve mentions the statement by one of the soldiers, “If God made us in His image, then who made [the Transformers]?”
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen first portray’s Sam’s parents as comic relief, but they seem to be redeemed near the end of the movie. This is one way this sequel was better than the first , where the parents were foolish and comic relief through the whole story.
Another interesting thing in the movie is that Sam remains loyal to his girlfriend Mikaela, but we noticed the whole setup that he wouldn’t say he loved her until she said it first. All three of us agreed that this was cowardly of Sam and that he should have been man enough to be honest.
The movie seemed to have stolen multiple plot points from Star Wars. The Decepticon villain—The Fallen—is called the Master, and he calls Megatron and Starscream his apprentices. Chris mentions that The Fallen reminds her of Jabba the Hutt. There were also some Decepticons that looked like the killer droids at the beginning of the . But Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen stopped short of using Old English.
Eve gives a quick synopsis of the movie plot to show the analogy with Satan and fallen angels—a kind of war in heaven type of story.
Daniel comments how when they exit the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum (for which they didn’t show the real building), they are suddenly among a bunch of planes outside, supposedly an outdoor exhibit, but Daniel feels strongly that it was filmed in an airplane graveyard out west. This bugs Daniel’s military upbringing.
Eve mentions the “old” transformer with a beard (the SR-71 Blackbird) and using a cane, and we discuss the biological personification of the Transformers in this Revenge of the Fallen. We also talk about how the transformations are always shown slow the first time, and then they are conveniently super fast afterward.
“Fate rarely calls on us at a moment of our choosing.” Chris comments on how that statement reminds her of Frodo’s quest in . Eve compares it with the story of Esther—”for such a time as this.” A further religious type of analogy comes out when Sam appears to have died and sees the lost Primes in a kind of afterlife dream. Does this mean that Transformers have an afterlife? Chris mentions that there is some kind of extra something to them—that they aren’t portrayed as just machines. After all, they express conscience, emotion, and will, with definitions of right and wrong.
Another interesting aspect is that the Allspark always creates evil Transformers. So where do the Autobots gain their conscience? How did they become good? The old Transformer, Blackbird, explained that Decepticons can switch sides.
There is a part of the movie where Sam tells Mikaela that he believes that the dust of the Key to Leadership will restore Optimus Prime, and he refuses to think about any other outcome. A friend of ours gave this the label “the Tinkerbell effect”—”I believe it, therefore, it will happen.”
Listener Michael had previously writen in regarding how movies generally portray man as his own savior. Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen definitely holds true to this form.
What did we like? We all loved Bumblebee. He is really awesome in the fight scenes. The , was wonderful, and we play a bit of it in the podcast. The special effects were very nice. Chis liked that Sam’s parents were brave enough to return at the end for their son.
With the disclaimer that there was way too many sexual innuendos and sexual jokes, and visual sex jokes using dogs and a little robot, and the language was very bad too, Daniel loved the score (Jablonsky is one of Daniel’s favorite composers), the special effects, the sound engineering. And he really liked the Egyptian and ancient civilization tie-ins.
Eve wonders if this will increase the defacing of these ancient artifacts as people look for hidden treasures. We also mention how so many of the ancient wonders are billed by Hollywood as “built by aliens.” And why didn’t they just blow up the pyramids? This disappointed Daniel.
We don’t recommend this movie at all. We all gave it very low rating. If we were to score card it, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen would probably be a “plucked eye” movie.
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Daniel,
They have broken the Air & Space Museum into several locations. The main one is now outside DC at Dulles Airport (Chantilly, VA). It is called The Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center (http://www.nasm.si.edu/museum/udvarhazy/). I went and visited it 2 years ago. The did show the front and the insides correctly and the building does have hangar doors at each end of the main part of the building. Not sure about the planes outside though.
Thanks for the clarification! But I'm still convinced they filmed the outdoor scene in an airplane graveyard. Weren't there brown mountains in the background? That makes me think it was out west, but the dry grass on the ground makes me think it wasn't the airplane graveyards near Tuscan, AZ, which I've visited before.