Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen

Allow me to offer a halfhearted defense of Michael Bay’s latest toy commercial/military-recruitment video. Movie tickets cost 10 bucks (more if you’re talking IMAX 3-D); throw in snacks, the gas to drive to the theater and the costs of your kids and/or date, and you’re sinking a lot of money into a simple trip to the movies. For prices like that, don’t you sort of want the film to be a big, brainless, breathless, subintellectual, nonstop “thrill ride”? Isn’t that the only way to justify the outrageous price tag? Michael Bay didn’t create the beast, he just gorged it on car chases and product placement. It’s the system’s fault, sort of. That said, the last hour of Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen is some of the dumbest, saddest, most racist, most depressing shit I have ever seen.