Transformers: Rise of the Beasts (2023) Review
The last time we had a live-action Transformers movie was the result of a better-than-expected prequel, spinoff and soft reboot titled Bumblebee. It was a good restart, especially after Michael Bay screwed up the franchise big-time in the god-awful Transformers: The Last Knight in 2017. So, over four years have passed (can’t believe it has been this long already) since Bumblebee made its debut in December 2018. Travis Knight, who did a great job directing the prequel sadly declined to return for the sequel. The same also goes for Hailee Steinfeld, who gives Bumblebee a much-needed beating heart to the otherwise typical Transformers movie. She’s nowhere in sight and frankly, she’s sorely missed in Transformers: Rise of the Beasts, even though Christina Hodson’s screenplay wrapped up her character arc just nicely at the end of Bumblebee.
Replacing her in the sequel are Noah Diaz (Anthony Ramos) and Elena Wallace (Dominique Fishback), both new protagonists who find themselves caught in the middle of a war between Autobots and Terrorcons. The latter refers to the robotic antagonists sent by Unicron (voiced by Colman Domingo), a giant planet-like robot that eats planets. The Terrorcons, led by Scrouge (Peter Dinklage) are tasked to get an all-important ancient key, which would open a portal for the long-dormant Unicron to enter the planet Earth.
Now, it’s up to Optimus Prime (Peter Cullen) and his surviving Autobots to save the world from total annihilation. With the help of Noah and Elena, the Autobots need them to get the key. And that is not all, as they also cross paths with their descendants of Autobots called the Maximals (among them include Ron Perlman as Optimus Primal and Michelle Yeoh as Airazor). Fans, of course, will immediately recognise them from the Beast Wars: Transformers animated series in the ’90s. Their introduction is meant to expand the Transformers lore but these Beast Wars characters are nothing more than perfunctory additions, even though we have Ron Perlman and Michelle Yeoh deliver exceptional voice performances as Optimus Primal and Airazor.
The story — credited to an astonishing five screenwriters — sticks to the tried-and-true formula synonymous with the Transformers movies. There’s the usual intergalactic-level save-the-world storyline, complete with a familiar quest of searching for a MacGuffin that echoes the AllSpark seen in the first film in 2007. Not to mention the human characters which remind me of Shia LaBeouf and Megan Fox from the first Transformers. Sure, we don’t get Dominique Fishback showing up all sexy and skimpy like the latter since the story isn’t exactly a direct homage, to begin with. She does a decent job playing a geeky archaeologist intern who works at the museum while Anthony Ramos stands out as Noah Ramos, a tech wiz who used to join the military. His subplot with his frail younger brother (Dean Scott Vazquez) earlier in the movie surprises me with a solid brotherly dynamic between them.
Then, there’s Ramos’s subsequent friendship with Pete Davidson’s Mirage, an Autobot capable of transforming itself into different types of vehicles, namely a Porsche 911. Their interaction evokes the memory of Bumblebee and Charlie in the 2018 prequel. The voice performances are great including Peter Cullen’s iconic Optimus Prime while Peter Dinklage and Colman Domingo give perfectly sinister turns as Scrouge and Unicron. But I didn’t expect I would end up enjoying Davidson’s comic relief as Mirage. He’s funny without getting all crass and juvenile and no doubt he has a field day voicing the character.
Steven Caple Jr. of Creed II fame, who took over Travis Knight, keeps the pace fairly brisk through its (thankfully!) 127-minute runtime. His direction tends to be uneven in places but he still gets the job done handling such a scale of big-budget Hollywood tentpole. The CGI-heavy action may have been inconsistent with some of them looking blurry when I watched this on IMAX and I’m not sure how it fares on the normal screen or other formats. Maybe it has to do with the camerawork panning too fast that it’s hard to appreciate the fight choreography between the Autobots and Terrorcons. The climactic third act, however, redeems itself with an extended, all-hell-breaks-loose moment of an epic battle.
Personally, I prefer Bumblebee more in terms of its storytelling and even the visual spectacle. While Transformers: Rise of the Beasts may feel like an inferior sequel, it remains reasonably fun for a popcorn summer blockbuster.
