I didn’t believe the hype. It’s the best Transformers film yet is what all of my friends (and critics) said about Bumblebee. I was burned once too often by a Transformers movie that promised entertainment; but instead delivered robot mayhem that made the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers television show seem like high theater. Now that we’ve seen Bumblebee, we can attest that the word is correct and this film quickly leaves all of the other films by its namesake in its rear view mirror.
Why was Bumblebee so entertaining? The film takes place in 1987 and certainly benefits from some of the time warp gags that the 80’s can bring, but that’s not the main reason. The lead character is Charlie, played by Haliee Steinfeld, but the movie doesn’t succeed solely because the lead character is gender swapped, a la Ghostbusters 2016.* The soundtrack in Bumblebee is great, even if you’re not an 80’s aficionado.
Nay, the reason why Bumblebee is great is because of the one thing that people who had seen the previous films in the Transformers universe seem to have forgotten, the importance of plot and character development. Early in the Transformers’ films history we were hypnotized by huge robots, excising damage to cities and feigning some human drama in hopes of making the plot stick. After two films the produces were simply trying in vain to get Megan Fox to sign back on in hopes of bringing the teen boys back to the theater.
Because Bumblebee takes place in 1987 it doesn’t have that baggage of needing to acknowledge any of the other films. That is one of the film’s biggest blessings. Pardon the pun, but this is a fresh, fun and unexpected vehicle that will exceed your expectations.
Our 9 year-old saw Bumblebee and absolutely loved it. One of his friends, who had seen some of the other Transformers films, was restless and wanted more chaos (see: stupidity). Bumblebee has lots of action, but it also takes its time setting up the large action sequences with characters that you actually want to see. It’s a film that is able to cross over to those action movie fans, but were scared of the cheese that the previous films in the Transformers universe put forth. It’s a much of a paradigm shift for the Fast and the Furious series when The Rock joined them and catapulted them to the billion dollar level. Bumblebee saves the franchise from going down the gorgonzola highway, now if the next movies can follow suit we’ll readily encourage his younger brother to seek them out.
We were also sent a handful of Transformers toys to play and with and (spoiler alert) the kids loved them. The younger one already knew Transformers, but hasn’t seen any of the films. He had read some of the comic books, like the Star Trek Vs. Transformers series (that was fabulous!), but it’s the toys that have carried these characters from the 80’s to where they are now. All of them were durable, very well constructed and simple for a 7 year-old, who isn’t quite old enough to see the films yet, to use on their own.
*which was horrible
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