By Paul Buford III
Transformers: The Last Knight was the best entry since number one. Somehow they managed to tie all the knots together and make all the weird writing worth something. The usual problems are present, with way too many random and unnecessary human story lines, random sexual innuendos and Cherry picking of Transformers lore, but the good parts are excellent, emotional and paced in a way that makes you care about a robot war that should’ve been over awhile ago. I’m also kinda annoyed by the slight sexualization of a 14 year old even though her addition was as spot on as Shia was in the first film.
Isabela Moner does an amazing job of connecting the protagonist dots across the films. Definitely hoping to see them develop her character. Anthony Hopkins and the subsequent English scenes give a certain charm to the film that cannot be ignored and honestly saved the overall narrative from being a typical summer robot war Blockbuster.
Wahlberg is Wahlberg. He’s still as Boston as ever while portraying a Texan. He’s a decent lead, but no Shia, and Duhamel outshines him. (Speaking of which, Josh Duhamel might as well be the real hero of the franchise, being the only real mainstay other than Optimus.)
This movie uses one of the better Arthurian backstories of the year, and Charlie Hunnam is probably mad he didn’t sign on for T5. There’s a lot of timeline jumping and retconing to fill in holes that inadvertently create new holes that I won’t get into, but a few are laughable, more are mildly annoying and ultimately take away from what could’ve been a more fulfilling robot film. At this rate we need a short to piece it all together, including the overarching Cybertronian history, that we get bits and pieces of each film, but have yet to create a cohesive picture.
Its worth a look. Michael Bay finally got it right, shame that he’s walking away now.
Director: Michael Bay
Stars: Mark Wahlberg, Anthony Hopkins, Josh Duhamel, Laura Haddock, Santiago Cabrera
MPAA rating: PG-13, for violence and intense sequences of sci-fi action, language and some innuendo
Running time: 2 hours, 30 minutes
Playing: In general release