The Autobots learn of a Cybertronian spacecraft hidden on the Moon, and race against the Decepticons to reach it and to learn its secrets.
A largely linear plot and some ingenious appropriation of 20th century history helps T3 correct most of T2’s deficiencies without really matching T1’s superior entertainment value and element of surprise.
An improvement on Transformers 2, but then what isn’t? To paraphrase the Bard, it’s a tale, full of sound and fury and extremely stupid dialogue and nonsensical plotting and preposterous stunts and robots punching each other’s heads off, signifying nothing. Needless to say, it’s going to be huge.
There’s nothing wrong with a dumb, fun movie now and then. It just depends how far you can dial down your brain function before the dark of the cinema allows a sensory overload so relentless that it’s as subtle as giving a five-year-old his first acid trip before setting him loose on a rollercoaster.
Whizz, bang, boom, snore. Same Bay, same shit.
The story is insane, the dialogue could have been written by an alien, the comedy is horribly clunky – but hey, the special effects are a sight to see.
There’s no critically sound way to defend Dark of the Moon as anything other than brayingly crass and soulless 3D spectacle with absurdly well-executed digital effects. There’s also no need: you can hate Bay’s job, but, on this occasion, he’s actually doing it.
A graceless, grinding, exploding cacophony of computer-generated metal and noise.
Well, no one could deny the bangs-per-buck factor of that final battle, but it's just so chaotic and dull and long.
Toy Story 3, it ain't.
Phew, it's over and--whisper it--it's not that bad.
In which director Michael Bay perpetrates another junkyard fiasco that turns the volume up to 11 and the IQ to -1.
Bay has said Dark Of The Moon will be the last in the series. For the sake of eardrums - and brain cells - around the world, let's hope so.
Trouble is, it just goes on and on, to the point where it becomes impossible to distinguish who or what anyone is, why it's happening and why we should even care about what the outcome. It's war porn for kids and after stimulating the senses it eventually just numbs them.
I'm not saying you should go to see it, but if you do want to watch a Transformers film, this is the first one that does what it's supposed to.
I'd even go so far as to say that some of it is entertaining and thrilling. But are there any ideas here? Other than to make more than $1.5bn, what is the point of a Michael Bay movie?
Michael Bay hits back at 'insulting' Transformers critics
General release. Check local listings for show times.