Transformers: The Last Knight

photo courtesy of superherohype.com

SPOILER-FREE REVIEW

     Autobots and Dinobots and Decepticons, oh my! From director Michael Bay comes Transformers: The Last Knight, the fifth Transformers movie and (despite what some marketing says) most definitely not the last. This time around, Cade Yeager (Mark Wahlberg) and his Autobot allies must work together to stop Quintessa (Gemma Chan), whose nefarious designs threaten the whole of humanity. With help from professor Viviane Wembly (Laura Haddock), historian Sir Edmund Burton (Anthony Hopkins), and tech-savvy loner Izabella (Isabela Moner), the Autobots seek to find the powerful Staff of Merlin and defeat the Decepticons before time runs out.

     Let’s be honest. At this point, if you’re watching a Transformers movie, you probably know what you’re getting into. Rest assured: this Transformers packs in everything (good and bad) that you expect from a rollicking Transformers adventure. So if the idea of mindless, punishing action, cheesy humor, and ridiculous blockbuster stakes excite you, this one will do the job.

photo courtesy of yahoo.com

     It’s hard to critique a movie like Transformers: The Last Knight, because it’s apparent that the movie does exactly what it set out to do—even if that bar is decidedly low. I think, in fairness, that these movies are best received along the lines of a billion-dollar Sharknado or Mega Shark vs. Giant Octopus; they’re so completely nonsensical that it’s for the best to just embrace the madness from the get-go.

     That’s not to say it’s not horrible. The plot is absurd, the action incomprehensible, the characters sexualized cardboard cut-outs, the runtime overlong. Things happen in such quick succession that the entire experience is vaguely surreal; the movie almost seems to discourage you from attempting to process one plot beat before it moves on to another. There’s good reason for the critical disdain that the series consistently earns.

photo courtesy of maxim.com

     It’s not an entirely miserable affair, however. The CGI is as impressive and immersive as always, and it’s legitimately hilarious (and heartbreaking?) to hear well-respected actors like Anthony Hopkins spout b-movie dialogue and silly Transformers jargon with an ounce of self-seriousness. And of course, the movie packs in an extraordinarily high explosion-per-frame rate.

     FINAL VERDICT: Transformers: The Last Knight is everything we’ve come to expect from the series… though we shouldn’t expect much.

photo courtesy of geektyrant.com