What I loved most: Great action scenes, interesting characters and a simple plot
What I really hated: The director trying to stuff everything into the original storyline.
First I cannot put to much expectation on this movie after I saw the trailer and after knowing that Stephen Sommers would be directing this movie. However the simple plot is easy to understand especially for the young fans. As for the cast; they put in great performances. I was quite impressed on how the director introduced GI JOE characters such as Duke, Scarlett, Heavy Duty, Rip Cord, Snake Eyes, General Hawk and Breaker. For the COBRA guys; Baroness(Ana), Destro(human form) and Storm Shadow put in great performances. However the introduction of Commander X and the metal faced Destro was weak. Comander X was actually Rex, the crazed scarred doctor, who was a genius inventor and scientist and Baroness (Ana) little brother but the transition in the character transformation was too rushed. Just made his appearance in a small submarine and he was already captured and put into a laser bar prison. Storm Shadow's history with Snake Eyes was unrealistic. The young jealous Shadow decided to kill his shaolin master after that bearded uncle(shaolin master) praised young Snake Eyes excessively thus being mistaken for favouritsm. The weapons were too advanced thus making the movie too futuristic and cartoonish as too many visual effects were used excessively. Weapons such as hover jet planes, ray guns, nanomite warhead were too advanced. I'm sure these weapons will be invented someday but not in nearest 20 years. There are unsignificant appearances of Brendan Fraser. I really like the locations. The design of Underwater Cobra command centre. It's not original at and it performed like the mother ship in Independence Day and Death Star in Star Wars. Storm Shadow and Snake Eyes final battle was also a carbon copy of Star Wars Phantom Menace lightsabre battle where Shadow used a double end blade sword to fight that Ray Park guy(Snake Eyes). Trying to bring in that Darth Maul's lightsabre nostagia was a bad idea. Stephen Sommers could have watched more great war movies such as Black Hawk Down, Body of Lies And Saving Private Ryan for example.
What I really hated: Lack of T600 terminators and brutal battlescenes
First Christian Bale(John Conner)'s acting was quite good but I prefer his performance as Bruce Wayne aka Batman. Anton Yelchin's(Kyle Reese) really looked like Micheal Biehn's version(Kyle Reese in Terminator 1).
I really was not impressed the way McG made the battle scenes. I think the battle scenes should have been more simpler, brutal and realistic. For examples just look at movies like "Saving Private Ryan" and "Black Hawk Down". The creation of big terminator machines(motorcycles, giant harvesters, airplanes, hydrobots) were excessive and unnecessary. So far I could only see few T600s(old version of humanoid terminators), one complete T800(Arnold You-Know-Who) and Sam Worthington's terminator(the one with brains and a heart). These machines also would not hesitate to kill their targets. For example I could see that the termainators hesitated to kill Kyle and John. These terminators will not not wait to either crush their opponents with their bare metallic hands instead of slamming them around. And these terminators could not even fire their guns properly.These metal guys are programmed by Skynet to kill or be killed immediately. The humans portrayed in this movie did not look war victims. Just look at all those refugees in those real war torn countries. Look at how they eat, behave and live. The plot was not really impressive. Luckily I personally watched T1, T2 and T3 movies just to catch up with the storylines.I think the producers should hire Steven Spielberg, James Cameron(best choice but not available) or even Ridley Scott. Maybe my expectation was too high or McG was not a good choice.
I really like the way the characters appeared and introduced themselves in a very spontaneous way. The presence of the giant octopus spoiled the characterization which could have been perfect. The three evil leaders(Napoleon Bonaparte, Ivan The Terrible, Al Capone) actually lightened up the plot.
What I loved most: Optimus Prime, Bumblebee, Megatron, Starscream, Megan Fox
What I really hated: Micheal Bay trying to squeeze in too many decepticons and too many battles till these faults affect
The special and visual effects are superb. The plot was a little confusing. Micheal Bay could have make it simpler. There was no proper introduction of the new robots especially the appearance of the new decepticons. There were too many decepticons and they got killed immediately upon entering the scenes. The human performers(especially Shia and Megan) were overacting unnecessarily. A fighting scene involving Optimus Prime and three other decepticons(including Megatron) is well done. The appearance of a humanoid decepticon is totally unnecessary. The appearance of two autobots(motorcycle disguise) were also unnecessary. The scene where Sam(Shia) was temporarily dead but were brought back to life by Prime decendants(Optimus Prime grandfathers) were also unnecessary. And I really enjoyed the experience.
