Who's in It: Shia LaBeouf, Tyrese Gibson, Josh Duhamel, Anthony Anderson, Megan Fox, Rachael Taylor, John Turturro, Jon Voight
The Basics: If, like the hosts of the Today show ( I just watched them interview a sort of sheepish, worn-out Duhamel), you don't know that the Autobots are the good robots and the Decepticons are the bad ones, then you are old. I mean, I'm old, too, of course, but for some reason I watched the '80s cartoon version of this show a lot while I was in college. Anyway, they fight — these giant robots. They fight a lot. And it's AWESOME. You will leave smiling like you were seven years old and just managed to throw your toys off a very high place, watching them smash into pieces on the ground.
What's the Deal? Michael "The Touch" Bay, bless his narratively deranged soul, somehow knew that he would be forgiven for tampering somewhat with the "mythology" if he simply made sure that things were constantly exploding and that robots never stopped fighting. So that's what happens. In fact — and this isn't a spoiler — the last 30 to 40 minutes of this long, loud movie (it's almost two and half hours) is all special effects and action. Just battles and blowing stuff up. Headache-prone parents, take note.
Why They Fight: They want this power cube. It's not that important to know really. They were pretty much just born to fight. And that senselessness is also kind of brilliant, because the film is based on a line of Gen Y 1980s toys that had no agenda but to transform and battle. Storylines followed later. And in keeping with that '80s feeling, it's very Reagan-y — gung-ho about stuff like war and the military. It would be annoying if it were even remotely about real life. But it ain't.
Nerds, Rejoice — Well, At Least Rejoice Over This One Thing: They got the original voice of Optimus Prime, Peter Cullen, to come back and do it again. And I just learned that he's also the voice of Eeyore, which is kind of funny.
What About the Humans? What about them? Their job is to react to stuff that's not really there, which I'm sure is hard for an actor. But whatever. More robots fighting!