Michael Bay Wants Less Action in Transformers 3
After watching the visual cancer that was Transformers Revenge of the Fallen, it’s easy to wonder where it all went wrong. The first film was pretty decent, and had the central story of a boy and his car, the sequel centered on…what? That’s the question a lot of people left the theater wondering, what was it all about? Director Michael Bay must have taken the complaints to heart, because in the third film he wants less action and more story.
Transformers 2 was just released on DVD and within the extras was a segment entitled “The All Spark Experiment.” In it, Bay discusses some of his ideas for the next film and declares that, “Transformers 3, it can’t get bigger. We’ve gotta figure out a way to go sideways.” His first plan of action includes having Hasbro send him loads of Transformers lore so he can submerge himself in more of the properties history.
After reading through all of the literature, he states that he’ll have to let it “simmer” in his head for a while. That’s not exactly a vote of confidence, but we’ll see where he goes with that. Another tidbit he’s thought out is the use of Bumblebee in the third film. He says, there has to be more of the yellow robot in the new movie, which I find interesting because isn’t Optimus Prime supposed to be the star of this outfit? What’s his obsession with Bumblebee?
He also says that the scale of ROTF was so grand that the next film won’t have to be. It can be more emotional and even darker. The funniest and most surprising line from the director’s interview is when he says the film won’t be just about “action, action, action.” At that point I had to pull back and say, ‘who are you and what have you done with the real Michael Bay?!’
It’s good that Bay recognizes that the excessive use of everything is what made ROTF a large, noisy disaster. The biggest obstacle here is whether or not he’ll follow through on his promises. The next sequel is scheduled to drop in July of 2011, so he’s got about a year and a half to get things in order. Do you think he can do it?
Do you think Michael Bay can reform the Transformers franchise? What was your biggest issue with the last film?
Tuesday, November 3, 2009 10:33PM
Personally, I thought the biggest problem with ROTF was that it was too long, too much toilet humor, and not enough character development in the Robot department. Sure the humans are all fine and dandy, but what about the robots? Decepticon and Autobot alike?
Bay's a good director and a smart one too if he goes back to the original mythos and builds from there.
Micheal Bay, I just hope you can pull this off in time.
Wednesday, November 4, 2009 11:43PM
i had no problem with the movie it was just fine for my family. people dont realize that the robots are the stars not the people
Wednesday, November 4, 2009 5:02PM
it really doesn’t matter about how big the story line is but all these people left the cinema with out a clue what it was about but i give 2 thumbs up to michael bay because he kept really close to the real story line of the cartton show which was the decepticons looking on earth for a energy source.
Thursday, November 5, 2009 5:32PM
I thought ROTF was a fun movie, but to much time was spent at college and hokey relationship issues. More time needs to be spent on the transformers hatred with each other.
Monday, November 16, 2009 12:11PM
Now when ever I think of Michael Bay I think of how South Park spoofed him. Where he was being asked about narrative structure and then broke out in this tirade of describing things exploding and crashing while making crash sounds. Then they are like, "Those aren't ideas, those are special effects!" Bay looks confused and says, "I don't understand the difference?" Haha I think that describes Bay as a director in a nut shell. I think he used to demonstrate some skill with his earlier films like The Rock. However he has become lost with in his own ego and desire to make money. I don't know too many people in their right mind who would describe Bay as a good and smart director AnonFirefly.
Monday, November 16, 2009 7:50AM
I like the 2nd movie, i din't go for a solid plot line, i wanted to see robots fight, thts what i saw. good movie
Tuesday, November 17, 2009 11:53AM
I'm actually going to take my comment back a step. I don't think it's right to say that Bay isn't smart. In order to direct a crew the size of a small army with million upon million of dollars riding on your shoulders, you have to have some intelligence. I do think Bay is probably a smart guy but I don't think that he's necessarily a good director. He is extremely good with visual directing. If you look at the making of Transformers 2 that guy is very specific about how the film looks and sounds. However he loses sight of the most important ingredient to a good film. Video games have good visuals and that's really all they need to have. Movies though are about story telling. With out a good story and well developed characters all of the best effects in the world don't amount to much. Bay needs to put the story and characters first and foremost. If he can find a way to bring the substance of his movies to match his style than he would be a hell of a director.
Tuesday, November 17, 2009 10:40PM
I honestly loved both the first and second Transformers and I am dying to see the third. I really hope they bring in Unicron. He was such a bad@$$ villain in the series. Not to mention, they should bring in Hot Rod/Hot Shot, Elita One and maybe even have Chromia talk or picking fights with Ironhide. And I really hope they bring in Sunstreaker in the next movie. With those two together, Sides and Sunny, it will be just too d*mn hilarious. Especially when they pick on Ironhide and Ratchet a little. Call me weird or something but I would like to see some of the Cybertronian relationships develop. And don't get me wrong. I love the fact that its focusing some of the attention on the humans but Transformers is mostly about the robots and ROTF hasn't really focused much on the Autobots/Decepticons. You don't even hear Jolt talk or hear much of the Arcee Triplets. I kind of wanted to hear them talk, see what they sounded like. I liked Sideswipe's voice though.
So I am definitely looking forward to the next movie.
Friday, November 20, 2009 2:26AM
The first movie didn't show enough of the robots fighting, they'd start and then he'd pan away. There was more fighting in the second, but killing Prime was lame as were the ghettobots. Ironhide, Ratchet and Sideswipe were hardly apart of the story. Although he did develop Megatron and Starscream a bit.
The third needs to focus on the Robots more. I like LeBouf, the military guys, and The Sector 7 guy, but the rest of the humans in ROTF were annoying. Megan Fox looks good, but God help us when she starts speaking. Developing the Robots more and seeing the Robots fight more is where Bay needs to go. He also needs to watch some inconsitencies like the desert in New Jersey and leaving the Smithsonian and walking into the airplane graveyard…hmmm.
However, I really liked both films and can't wait for the third. Let's face it, we're not going to watch Transformers for the story line to be able win an Oscar. We want to see the robots fight, and really how many Oscar winners do we really like anyway.