HOLLYWOOD—Look, we have reached seven movies in the “Transformers” franchise and you would think things would start to run out of steam at this point. I will admit the last two films I was not the biggest fan, but I found myself quite immersed in the latest entry “Transformers: Rise of the Beasts.” Perhaps that is a direct result of nostalgia. For starters, me and my oldest nephew bonded over the “Transformers” film when it first hit theaters in 2007. We saw all of the films of the original trilogy starring Shia LaBeouf and Megan Fox in theaters.
After that ended, things feel off, but here we are with the latest entry “Transformers: Rise of the Beasts” that I was thoroughly entertained from start to finish. I think this one truly has the nostalgia factor because I know the beasts all too well. I had and played with the action figures growing up, so I was familiar and eager to see all these action figures that were so hard to transform into actual robots onto the big screen.
There is something important I have to point out with this entry. It does NOT take place in the present time, it takes place in 1994. Yes, it feels like a prequel, but fresh in a way that I did not even notice it. That is a good thing for the script. Bringing something fresh to the franchise stops it from getting stale. The audience is immediately introduced to the Maximals, led by Optimus Primal (voice of Ron Pearlman) and his allies Airazor (voice of Michelle Yeoh), Mirage (voice of Pete Davidson) and Arcee (voice of Liza Kozhy). The voice work by the actors here is great, you think you’re actually hearing robots communicate. We also see the return of Optimus Prime (voice of Peter Cullen) and Bumblbee amongst others who we have seen in previous movies.
For our protagonists they have villains known as the Terrorcons led by Scourge (voice of Peter Dinklage) and his sidekicks Battletrap (voice of David Sobolov) and Nightbird (voice of Michaela Jae Rodriguez). Watching that opening sequence between the Maximals and the Terrorcons was so visually appealing to witness. That brings us to our human counterparts, Noah Diaz (Anthony Ramos) and Elena (Dominque Fishback).
Noah is ex-military and struggling to find a job to help support his family and cover the healthcare for his baby brother, Kris (Dean Scott Vasquez). Elena is an intern for a museum which specializes in old artifacts. Ramos does a solid job as the lead, but I will admit the scenes with his brother are a bit cheesy and the jokes that the movie attempts to land just don’t land like the first few installments in the franchise. Fishback is solid as his sidekick who helps the robots along their journey to obtain some magical key to stop a titan of a villain Unicron (voice of Colman Domingo) from dominating Earth. FYI the audience never actually gets to see that villain, which sucks.
This movie gives all the action and special effects you expect from a movie of this caliber. The battle scenes are amazing and the big climax is truly a thrill-a-minute. The ending is a bit of a headscratcher and gives you that ah-ha moment, that makes you wonder precisely where the next installment in the movie will go.
It definitely opens the doors for something that could be quite exciting and interesting to say the least. Director Steven Caple does a solid job with delivering a film that moves at a solid pace and doesn’t deliver a stale moment. Fans of the previous films will enjoy this one and those who have NEVER seen a “Transformers” flick can watch ‘Rise of the Beasts’ and be completely entertained without filling lost.
