Transformers - the live action film

[shardian]

Michael Bay is worse than Uwe Boll.

I was gonnna say that was stretching it, but considering Uwe Boll operates on a $20 million budget, and Michael Bay operates on a $100 million + budget, and both of their end products is still near the bottom of the rotten tomato meter, I'll have to agree with you. 

[thebrownshow]

Yeah, but at least Michael Bay isn't a ---tallywhacker--- about it though.  That Uwe Boll is an ---uvula---.

[shardian]

Yeah, but at least Michael Bay isn't a ---tallywhacker--- about it though.  That Uwe Boll is an ---uvula---.

I'd say most people have no clue what he is like. His movies are so horrible, why would anyone want to meet the guy. I still find it amazing that movie companies are willing to throw money at him. He should be paying THEM (and us) for the right to make movies.

[shmokes]

I don't know.  If he had stuck to fluff like Armegeddon and Bad Boys, but when he suggests that he's recreating the battle at Pearl Harbor with historical accuracy I'd say that's treading dangerously close to the line that separates ---punks--- from non----punks---. 

[thebrownshow]

I don't see him challenging his critics to a ---smurfing--- boxing match.  That's my point.

[shardian]

but when he suggests that he's recreating the battle at Pearl Harbor with historical accuracy I'd say that's treading dangerously close to the line that separates ---punks--- from non----punks---. 

...or bragging that he is realistically transforming big, ugly, artsy fartsy blobs of metal into big, ugly product placements...

[shmokes]

Yeah I read about that boxing match thing.  That was hilarious.  If you only heard about it I seriously recommend tracking down the actual press release.  It's surreal.  Absolutely ---smurfing--- crazy.

And then, just the other day I saw a picture of him on IMDB.com and immediately thought to myself THAT GUY is challenging random people to a boxing match?

But in the end he seemed to be a decent sport.  From what I remember you'd box him, but you'd also get to appear in his movie, which is kinda cool even if the movie is going to suck ass.   And he's paying for your airfare and hotel for the whole ordeal.  I'd imagine that a lot of people jumped at the offer, frankly.

[SithMaster]

?  megatron has fallen on hard times i guess.

hes an alien jet but he cant be a frigging gun?  im going to see the movie but damn him.

excuse me while i drown out my crying with the cartoon movie from the 80s..........................................hours later great movie.  even after watching it 2 times in a row i still love it.

anyway he has no right to deform my beloved transformers.  id get it if soundwave was an ipod or something but megatron is either a gun, cannon, or tank.  otherwise he would be in the seeker corps which would mean someone else would be in charge?  like you said they are alien robots from a planet that is a machine (unless you go by best machines but thats different) so they should be able to mass shift.

and they should have it go by the orig series.  transformers (as far as we know) have never been to mars.  so why would they be there.  they wouldnt.  they would be in the nemesis blowing the hull plating off the ark.  then they plummet into earths atmosphere and into my dreams.....true happiness.

[AtomSmasher]

From what I remember you'd box him, but you'd also get to appear in his movie, which is kinda cool even if the movie is going to suck ass.   And he's paying for your airfare and hotel for the whole ordeal.  I'd imagine that a lot of people jumped at the offer, frankly.

Heres an update on the boxing matches, they now have a list of whos fighting him.

 http://www.rottentomatoes.com/news/comments/?entryid=356343

"GoldenPalace.com Presents Raging Boll

The challengers are:
Carlos Palencia Jim

[jbox]

Oh my, Megatron isn't a gun? Whoever would have guessed that?!?

The paint job doesn't really bother me either, since those things can be fixed in post if it doesn't work. What I can't wait for is the outcry when people finally twig that Megatron will have to be changed since they aren't doing the whole "giant robot shrinks to walkman" thing...

 

[thebrownshow]

Yeah, but jbox, seeing something with your own eyes and being told about it by a know-it-all nerd are two different things entirely.

[Howard_Casto]

Megatron revealed:
http://www.tformers.com/article.php?sid=6418&mode=flat


I think I'll speak for everyone when I say BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOoooooooooooooooooooooooooo!

I'm sure this design is supposed to impress his arthouse friends by being all original and crap.  That would be all well and good if it weren't a lame ripoff of the characters in [Gyver]. 

I can tell by now that he's decided to vary greatly from the original story arc... which is a BAD idea.  The transformers aren't some kind of magical robots that can transform into anything, they are customized, traditional robots who have been retro-fitted with disguises.  That's why it takes a big-frikkin super computer to give them a new disguise, they are just robots. 

The way old megs is designed there it appears he is trying to make them some sort of self-contained re-configurable robot.  This wouldn't bother me except for the fact that the excuse of not being realistic was used to justify the alt-mode changes due to size issues.  A robot that can magically re-configure it's body into anything, that's the most unrealisitic thing I've ever heard. 


Why do directors that get to work on a well-established franchise always say b.s. like "I'm not really familiar with the franchise myself but it doesn't matter because I plan to re-invision  the whole franchise." ?  I for one am sick of it.  Here's an idea gents, when you have a valuable property that you wish to get made into a movie, why not let the people that actually had a hand at making the franchise so popular make the movie?  You know Transformers the animated movie was only made 30 years ago, all the people involved couldn't be dead.  Get them to write a script, or at the very least be in charge of character design.

I've seen power ranger villains that looked more intersting than that megatron design... he just looks like "generic anime-inspired cyborg # 12" and from what I've seen of the others, they look the same save some car-parts glued to their sides.


On a random side-note tangent, cybertron was never assumed to be a totally organic planet on the original series.  The quintacons (sp?) built cyberton so it could be assumed that they started with a much smaller, organic planetoid and built up.  The beast wars and beast machine story lines are actually considered to be a part of the original transformers story arc.   

Now in the comics, it is hinted at that primus (original autobot) once had the entire planet of cyberton as a body, much like unicron.  There are ways to fit this into the main, series cannon though, but I won't bore you with em. 

[jbox]

Crap rip-offs will continue to be made so long as people will continue to pay money to see them... 

Having said that, even involving the original people wont magically assure that the movie is consistant with the "canon" of the theme, like Serenity, or not just really lame, like Legend of the Rangers. 

[NightGod]

Crap rip-offs will continue to be made so long as people will continue to pay money to see them... 

Having said that, even involving the original people wont magically assure that the movie is consistant with the "canon" of the theme, like Serenity, or not just really lame, like Legend of the Rangers. 

The original canon of Serenity consisted of all of 14 episodes...not alot of "canon" to muck with there. And from what I saw of it, it was pretty damn consistant with the show, and I watched them back to back. What am I apparently missing here?

[Howard_Casto]

Agreed, that comparison doesn't make any sense considering the ONLY thing they changed in serenity was making new Haven a full fledged town instead of a single whore house with tin-foil on it.  The only reason that flick didn't do so well is because If I were to judge by the previews, I would have thought it was a stand-alone re-hash rather than the grand finale of the series.  As usual poor marketing was Wheadons downfall. 


Legend of the Rangers doesn't fall into this category either as it's a spin-off direct to dvd miniseries of Babylon 5 rather than a sequel.   The actual b5 movies (containing the original cast) are quite good considering. On a personal note, I like B5 but I never could understand how an obvious rip-off of star trek (particularly ds9) could have survived as long as it did. 

[AtomSmasher]

I thought they did a good job with the farscape mini series.

And I thought B5 was really good (although I haven't seen it in 5+ years, so my memory could be off).  It was pretty unique how the entire show was written start to finish before the first episode was even filmed.  I wish more shows did it like that, it keeps the story really good throughout and keeps them from jumping the shark (assuming they don't milk the cash cow with mini-series and movies, which they did). 

[Howard_Casto]

I thought they did a good job with the farscape mini series.

And I thought B5 was really good (although I haven't seen it in 5+ years, so my memory could be off).  It was pretty unique how the entire show was written start to finish before the first episode was even filmed.  I wish more shows did it like that, it keeps the story really good throughout and keeps them from jumping the shark (assuming they don't milk the cash cow with mini-series and movies, which they did). 

One more reply then we should be back on topic. 

Actually I think that was a weakness, not a strength. While other sci-fi shows would become very topical in times of war or political unrest, b5 was stuck in it's own little bubble.  It was good writing but seemed more like a slow-reading novel than a fluid tv-series.  Being other-worldly is good, but being so disjointed with current events that you look superficial is bad.  You are right, b5 never reduced in quality the duration of it's run.  The problem is the quality was only slightly above average to begin with.

[jbox]

\begin{geek}
DS9 is based on B5, not the other way around. JMS went to them asking for money and got told it was a terrible story that would never work. Then they paid someone else to "dumb it down" to a more "alien of the week" format and thus was DS9 born. And c'mon, *ghosts*? What happened to the deathly doorway thing? The 3D room was cool, but why isn't the PILOT in that room?!? He's the guy trying to dodge the asteroids, even if that doesn't give us a chance to get top-down cleavage shots. Not to mention that changeling nets are MASSIVELY DANGEROUS. That's why every other criminal doesn't have one, even the ones working for big governments like the Centauri-Drakh enclave who have a vested interest in making their agents appear as other races. Switching it on for a minute to send the message to save our life, fine. Walking onto the bridge to impress the chicks while your organs are rapidly boiling into mush...

It is also a myth that B5 never changed throughout the years. Sinclair was originally playing all of the great roles, commander, presidant and then eventually Valen. Watch the first season with that in mind and you will see that was the plan all along (eg. his babe is a solo explorer that likes to do high-risk survey missions on the outer rim...). They brought in Sheridan to basically "punch up the show", and subsequently the triangle philosophy got pumped up to make up for it.

And sure, with only 14 episodes to deal with it is pretty hard to ---fudgesicle--- it up. Yet it turns out our "dirt is icky" city-slicking "babe in the woods" doctor happened to cooly walk into one of the most secure facilities in the Alliance and rescues the slayer. And when she points a gun at everyone in the hold that time, *that* didn't seem like a moment you might use a safe-word? Then all of a sudden, despite the bond that had grown between them, they are kicking the doc out because "he aint one of us". And Jayne, the man who sold them out to the feds, is?!? Then, despite the fact that the further out you go the less alliance ships there are, our operative somehow has an entire fleet of ships all out there to destroy all of your safe havens, but can't set up a simple drag net? Those are just the inconsistancies of the movie, don't get me started on rabid zombie cave men that also sit down for a nice earl grey and operate space ships for ---galactic language--- sake.
\end{end}

I roll 20's biyatch.

[shardian]

\begin{geek}
DS9 is based on B5, not the other way around. JMS went to them asking for money and got told it was a terrible story that would never work. Then they paid someone else to "dumb it down" to a more "alien of the week" format and thus was DS9 born. And c'mon, *ghosts*? What happened to the deathly doorway thing? The 3D room was cool, but why isn't the PILOT in that room?!? He's the guy trying to dodge the asteroids, even if that doesn't give us a chance to get top-down cleavage shots. Not to mention that changeling nets are MASSIVELY DANGEROUS. That's why every other criminal doesn't have one, even the ones working for big governments like the Centauri-Drakh enclave who have a vested interest in making their agents appear as other races. Switching it on for a minute to send the message to save our life, fine. Walking onto the bridge to impress the chicks while your organs are rapidly boiling into mush...

It is also a myth that B5 never changed throughout the years. Sinclair was originally playing all of the great roles, commander, presidant and then eventually Valen. Watch the first season with that in mind and you will see that was the plan all along (eg. his babe is a solo explorer that likes to do high-risk survey missions on the outer rim...). They brought in Sheridan to basically "punch up the show", and subsequently the triangle philosophy got pumped up to make up for it.

And sure, with only 14 episodes to deal with it is pretty hard to ---fudgesicle--- it up. Yet it turns out our "dirt is icky" city-slicking "babe in the woods" doctor happened to cooly walk into one of the most secure facilities in the Alliance and rescues the slayer. And when she points a gun at everyone in the hold that time, *that* didn't seem like a moment you might use a safe-word? Then all of a sudden, despite the bond that had grown between them, they are kicking the doc out because "he aint one of us". And Jayne, the man who sold them out to the feds, is?!? Then, despite the fact that the further out you go the less alliance ships there are, our operative somehow has an entire fleet of ships all out there to destroy all of your safe havens, but can't set up a simple drag net? Those are just the inconsistancies of the movie, don't get me started on rabid zombie cave men that also sit down for a nice earl grey and operate space ships for ---galactic language--- sake.
\end{end}

I roll 20's biyatch.

...man, I'm glad I got a life and gave up Star Wars...I could be you!! 

[jbox]

...man, I'm glad I got a life and gave up Star Wars...I could be you!! 

Oh, don't even get me started on the star wars prequals.               

[Howard_Casto]

For the record b5 is indeed a rip-off of ds9.  Ds9 was in the planning stages loooong before it ever was realized.  See it was one of Gene's pet projects before he died.  The spin-off was being planned as early as 1991 and it was farily pubic knowledge about the plot inside hollywood, including some of the writers of b5 who also wrote episodes for TNG.  And b5 is schlock compared to most sci-fi series... you can throw as many preachy words as you want into a sci-fi script, but without compelling action then it's crap. 


I have no clue why you are complaining about serenity.  The plot made perfect sense save a little bit of steriods injected into the action to make it large enough for the silver screen.  It came out true to the series and nit-piking it apart on really minor plot holes (Which aren't plot holes, you just see them that way, but I'm not so much of a geek that I feel like arguing with you over.) is rather sillly considering it was nothing short of a miracle that wheadon even got the chance to wrap up the story. 

[NightGod]

And sure, with only 14 episodes to deal with it is pretty hard to ---fudgesicle--- it up. Yet it turns out our "dirt is icky" city-slicking "babe in the woods" doctor happened to cooly walk into one of the most secure facilities in the Alliance and rescues the slayer. And when she points a gun at everyone in the hold that time, *that* didn't seem like a moment you might use a safe-word? Then all of a sudden, despite the bond that had grown between them, they are kicking the doc out because "he aint one of us". And Jayne, the man who sold them out to the feds, is?!? Then, despite the fact that the further out you go the less alliance ships there are, our operative somehow has an entire fleet of ships all out there to destroy all of your safe havens, but can't set up a simple drag net? Those are just the inconsistancies of the movie, don't get me started on rabid zombie cave men that also sit down for a nice earl grey and operate space ships for ---galactic language--- sake.\end{end}

I roll 20's biyatch.

Well, it was said from the start of the series that Doc rescued his sister from the ultra-secure facility, how did you think he did it? Sunshine and farts?

Doc always kept himself seperate from most of the crew intentionally and they knew from day one that Jayne was all about the money and his selling out was of Doc and River, not the whole crew.

The Alliance wanted River back in a HUGE way, I don't see getting a half-dozen attack ships as being a difficult thing for the operative when they already showed him commanding a battle cruiser. And exactly how do you set up a drag net in space? It's not like they were trying to leave the country through an international airport and you could pass out pictures at customs.

Rabid zombie cave me piloting ships-it was never said that they lost their intelligence, just their humanity. They even explained how they made new ones by forcing them to watch the raping and torture and killing until their humanity was gone.

[erictrumpet]

I just found this thread, based on the subject line. Transformers movie! Cool! That's what's being discussed at the top of the thread, anyway. Then I get sick of reading and skip to the bottom. Now we're on Serentiy/Firefly continuity. WTF? You fockers are all over the place.

And for the record, Serenity is -- in my opinion of course -- the best (that is, most "faithful") TV-show-turned-into-movie I've ever seen. It plays just like an episode of the show, only better.

As for the Transformers, anything Michael Bay touches inevitably becomes nothing more than summer blockbuster shallow sellout schlock. The Transformers movie will suck unholy ass and we all know it. It's a bummer, but hey you can always go to the closet and pull out your old toys and make up your own story. Autobots to the rescue!

Eric.

[Vigo]

I just found this thread, based on the subject line. Transformers movie! Cool! That's what's being discussed at the top of the thread, anyway. Then I get sick of reading and skip to the bottom. Now we're on Serentiy/Firefly continuity. WTF? You fockers are all over the place.

Yeah, I can't believe I unleashed this unholy evil upon EE by starting this thread. I was so naieve that I thought a transformers topic would consist posts that were 1 paragraph in length or less....now it contains debates as long as the ones found on P&R.