Transformers: The Last Knight

It's time to stop with this BS.

It hurts me tremendously to say that my one of my favorite cartoon series ever has reached this sorry state on the big screen. It hurts me because I cannot believe I used to love this film franchise. Ever since the first Transformers film, the fact that the coolest robots got rendered "real" was both spectacular and unbelievable. What can I say, I was too immature to realize its flaws and was exhilarated by the incredible visuals and CGI of Optimus Prime and Megatron blasting each other into the buildings. 2 years later, a sequel was released. My childish eyes lighted up even brighter with excitement, simply because it was more of what I wanted. Naturally, I was yet again faced with a third one. Same story. And as if I didn't get enough, the fourth film tugged me back by giving me a fresh new Optimus and my guilty pleasure, Grimlock the dinosaur transforming autobot. But now, after watching "Transformers: The Last Knight", I am a changed man. I am no longer the same callow child who brashly jumped on anything with the word "Transformers". It took me 5 films, a grand total of 766 minutes, to finally realize that this franchise has gone too far down the drain. If that doesn't exemplify ignorance and stubbornness, then I don't know what else can. Yet, to disappoint even a simpleton like me just shows how "Transformers: The Last Knight" has gloriously failed to do anything correctly. It is absolutely sacrilegious, blasphemous, shameful and idiotic for "Transformers" to be exploited like a joke. Allow me to tell you why.

"Transformers: Dark of the Moon" ended on a good note. Cybertron was destroyed, Megatron was dead, Optimus was without his left arm, and the Autobots were back on agreeable terms with the humans, all of which felt like a perfect epic conclusion to the franchise. Then out of nowhere, Michael Bay decided to whip out another trilogy from his rear and do a "quasi-reboot" for a book that has long closed. Frankly, it was a decision that I was quite open to, and I couldn't wait to see a further extension of the Transformers story. So here we are with "The Last Knight", the fifth installment of the franchise and the second film of the new trilogy, ending up with the most asinine writing and the most tiresome stretch of action sequences. In other words, this science-fiction action film manages to botch 2 of the most important ingredients of its genre. Because of that indisputable fact, "The Last Knight" in its entirety collapses to a pulp. At such point, not even the splendid visual effects and music score can save the film from salvation.

In "Age of Extinction", it was abundantly clear that the Transformers have creators, which makes sense because someone had to build these robots. "The Last Knight" somewhat picks up from that premise, to explore the ancient origins of Transformers and the creators' ties with planet Earth. So is this a reboot? As mentioned before, it is a "quasi-reboot". There are some elements that this film retrieves from the original trilogy, but also ignores other details that can potentially confuse people who are familiar with the series. This form of give-and-take between the new and old trilogy prevents "The Last Knight" from shaping a unique identity. Every well-made film has an identity that the audience can recognize by and separate from the others. "The Last Knight", for all its flamboyant visuals and captivating soundtrack, is the most forgettable blockbuster of this era. It most definitely tries to be one by characterizing Optimus with an evil spin and retelling the entire human history with Transformers. Unfortunately, there is a range of devastating faults all the way from drawing board that prevent this film from giving a both favorable and lasting impression to the audience. 

The greatest problem with "The Last Knight" is keeping their immense number of characters relevant from start to finish. There is no reason to doubt that the uncut version was over 3 hours long, because it seems to be the only way to commit time for properly developing these characters. Whether the uncut version did more justice or not, the finished product emerges as an amalgamation of disjointed sequences with plot-holes in between. Almost no characters feel relevant. Sub-plots, that are common in any writing, do not converge with the main plot at all and seem either random or forced. Transitions between scene to scene are products of awkward editing and poor directorial decisions. The climax that is supposed to unite everyone for the final battle becomes this incoherent mess. Once these shortcomings are realized within the first hour into the film, any further interest or motivation to continue watching becomes nonexistent. At that point, a 7 minute scene feels like 30 minutes and falling asleep even in the midst of the action is not out of question. 

By the end of the film, the objective to finally get an answer to the Transformers' origins did not even brush my consciousness. The point is that literally nothing makes sense. A 154 minute run-time is ludicrous for a film that does so poorly in storytelling. For what was an attempt to form an elaborate story behind the lore of Transformers on Earth got reduced to another substance-less skirmish between the Autobots and Deceptions with a gang of insignificant humans in the crossfire. Although the film scarcely had its epic moments (I really loved the medieval style sequences in the beginning), the only thing that matter is the impression given to the audience as the end credits roll. In my case, "The Last Knight" impressed me as a horror film, because of the on-screen murder that Michael Bay has committed to the Transformers franchise. 

It is unfortunate that the franchise still cannot abandon its tendencies to force humans as the focal point of a Transformers film. As a narrative device, focusing on the humans to introduce the idea of alien robots on Earth works quite well, for the first time. It drives me crazy that the humans have pushed off fan favorites such as Bumblebee and Grimlock into secondary Godzilla-like characters. If "The Last Knight" is supposed to focus on the lore of transformers, how is it effective or even sensible to still shine the spotlight on the humans? It is sad because the set designs, the soundtrack and the CGI are so well tailored to the identity of the transformers, and yet Michael Bay insists on shoving in these human characters like exposition dumps. Granted, there has been a few good ones like Sam Witwicky and Colonel Lennox that appear consistently in the series, but others that appear then disappear, lack the consistency for the audience to even care about them, which is nearly 80% of the case for human characters. When I watch a Transformers film, I want Transformers. When I encounter these new transformers like Hot Rod, Cogman, Grimlock, Dragonstorm, even the Decepticon henchbots with more interesting personalities, I want more of THEM. The choice to rob the titular characters' screen time is disappointing and blasphemous to the pedigree of classic Transformers. Although to be fair, animating these incredibly detailed Transformers is both expensive and time-consuming, so asking for a full film with just CGI in this case may be too much. Nevertheless, I know that a better balanced mix between humans and Transformers is possible because I have seen it happen in the first trilogy (not the best, but better than this latest nonsense). However, this franchise has been on a slippery slope since" Revenge of the Fallen". It has been a failed attempt after another at getting "bigger", resulting in a directionless narrative with no relationships for the audience. In such case, there is no film anymore. It just becomes robots fighting each other with random explosions in the background. In the end, "The Last Knight" has officially hit rock-bottom and as a result, the franchise has probably run its course.

Truthfully, I was infatuated with this franchise ever since 2007. They certainly were not the best ones out there, but as far as quenching my fandom was concerned, they did the job. However, weak writing, female objectification, juvenile humor, stereotypes, excessive patriotism and overused product placement are undoubtedly what tugs these films away from maintaining the audience's attention. I hear these criticisms for every Transformers installment, and I can't help but agree with them. On the other hand, as a simple man who simply wants Transformers in action, splendid visual effects and epic music sufficed. Consequently, the variety of imperfections I often see or miss on the screen doesn't bother me, even in the "The Last Knight". For example, when there is a scene that is blatantly dedicated to a product placement, I'm the type of person to completely miss the marketing, and instead divert my attention towards the explosions or the Transformer (because I never had a keen eye for materialism anyways). The ultimate reason why I despise "The Last Knight" with a passion is because of the Transformers' limited screen time. If this is about the Ancient Transformers and its history, it is impossible to have a sensible and coherent arc by restricting the appearances of the legitimate subjects. That is like having a documentary of Julius Caesar without showing much Julius Caesar himself at all. You just cannot have the humans to explain the story of the Transformers in place, especially when the ultimate goal is to expand the "universe of Transformers"

Michael Bay may be a genuine artist at boiling our blood with explosions and cool music, but he has cemented his destiny with his last ever Transformers film. Has it always been this bad? From the eyes of impartiality, yes. And maybe I never realized or cared about it because I was such a simpleton back then. 5 films later, I have finally received my wake-up call, and you have my word that "The Last Knight" is the greatest joke of the 21st century. Will I continue to watch these Transformers films? Well, there are rumors about the launch of a "Transformers Cinematic Universe" (much like the Marvel Cinematic Universe") with 14 completed scripts so far, a less-than-likely crossover between G.I. Joe and Transformers, and a Bumblebee film set to be released on December 2018. As laughable as these plans may be, I am open to them. Perhaps the departure of Michael Bay can bode more fortune for this franchise or maybe disasters are always meant to be, but I will always be minimally excited when the next Transformer film trailer appears. Whether it draws out love or hate from me is in the directors' hands. No matter how much hate "The Last Knight" has squeezed out from me, deep down, I really wished that it faced better justice than a box-office thirsty hustler who is Michael Bay.

Verdict: Hateful 2

Release Date: June 21. 2017

Box Office: $605.4 million

Rewatchable: No

This parody is almost uncomfortably accurate.