Movie Review - Bumblebee

MegaSoulhero Before I start, I wanna point out that one of the trailers that played before this movie was Uglydolls. Which seems like a really weird choice of a trailer to play with this kind of movie. I mean, what kind of adult would want to see that movie? I doubt even kids would want to see that. Anyway, I saw Bumblebee which is a Transformers movie that’s NOT directed by Michael Bay. Instead, it’s directed by the guy responsible for Kubo and the Two Strings. A movie that I absolutely love. I was surprisingly looking forward to this and I gotta say, it wasn’t bad.

The movie takes place in the 80s where Bumblebee gets sent to Earth and gets found by the insanely attractive Hailee Steinfeld. Interesting that she was in two movies in the same month with this one coming out a week after the other one. Basically, Hailee Steinfeld befriends Bumblebee and she does whatever it takes to protect him. First of all, the relationship between Bumblebee and Hailee is amazing. Despite one of them being a CGI character, I actually felt the connection between the two. There is one thing that I thought weakened the connection, which I will talk about in the negatives, but I thought this was a pretty strong relationship. Hailee Steinfeld’s character is very well developed. There some information we find out about her in the film and it actually becomes useful later on. I like that she’s a female character who actually feels like a character and not just some object. I’m sure if Michael Bay has directed this, we’d be seeing her wear some very revealing outfits. Which I personally wouldn’t mind since I have such a huge crush on Hailee Steinfeld. Focusing on human characters was something I hated about the previous films, but it worked because they actually are interesting characters. However, I would still like to see a Transformers movie about Transformers. Bumblebee surprisingly doesn’t get focused on a lot despite the movie being named after him, but he has some really great scenes. He can’t talk, but he shows a lot of emotion through his facial expressions. It’s also great seeing him learn how to communicate with the radio. Even the action scenes are very well structured. It isn’t just a bunch of visual noise like in the other films. I can actually tell what is happening and I actually care about what is happening.

However, even though I enjoyed this movie, there are still some pretty big problems with it. For one, it’s extremely cliché. Not only does it take elements from E.T. but there are tons of moments that I’ve seen done before in multiple things. For example, there was a scene where Hailee’s character embarrasses herself at work in front of a hot guy, she gets made fun of by some pretty girls who are hanging out with the hot guy, then the guy takes off the shirt he’s wearing because of Hailee spilling food on it, then he washes his car afterwards. That’s 5 clichés in a one minute scene. Speaking of those characters, they only appear in a couple of scenes and don’t have much of an impact on the film. In another scene, they taunt Hailee and try to get her to do something that she has a fear of doing, which she ends up not doing because she’s too scared. That’s pretty much also a pretty big cliché. With the exception of one of those bullies who appears in a scene immediately after this one, we do not see them again for the rest of the film. They were only there just to act as a very small plot device. John Cena is in the movie and I personally thought he was phoning in his performance. He was trying too hard to act like a tough guy. It didn’t feel natural. I also really didn’t like the little brother of Hailee’s character. I just found him annoying and didn’t serve much of a purpose. Also, I kept on trying to figure out where I’ve seen him before because he looked familiar. Then I realized that he was the kid who played Greg in Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Long Haul. That’s probably another reason why I didn’t like him. He made me think of that terrible movie.

Another character who I thought was VERY shoehorned in was the love interest character who has a crush on Hailee’s character. First of all, they DID NOT need to force in a love sub-plot and they SHOULD NOT have done that. Not only was it extremely unneeded, it kinda took away from the relationship between Hailee and Bumblebee. Secondly, this guy got on my nerves very quickly. He’s a stereotypical nerdy character who has a crush on a girl who is totally out of his league. Which, again, is a pretty big cliché! Also, he apparently just barges into people’s garages without knocking which is very rude. That was the only way for him to find out about Bumblebee which was just straight up lazy writing. He also takes off his shirt at one point. Because we need guys to show off their abs in this movie apparently. I wouldn’t be surprised if this was a response to Michael Bay constantly objectifying women in his films. Also, despite Hailee constantly trying to keep Bumblebee a secret, we see them at one point in a neighborhood, out in the open, and he’s in full robot mode. It was late at night, but someone could’ve looked out their window or someone going out for a night walk could’ve seen him and alert the authorities. It just didn’t make any sense to me.

The movie has flaws, but I still genuinely enjoyed it due how developed some of the characters are and the excellent action scenes. This easily the best Transformers film. I know that’s not saying much, but it’s definitely a good film. WAY better than the absolutely atrocious movie I saw this weekend which I will talk about later on. So yeah, Bumblebee is definitely worthi watching.

Score: 7/10

Comments

Will probably see in 2019 - iliekpiez (12/25/2018)

I would probably upgrade the score to 8 after seeing it. I thought it was very good and Travis Knight made another good film. - iliekpiez (2/2/2019)

Honestly the 2nd good Transformers movie since Shia Lebeouf - TristGamer (4/5/2019)