Quick note: Sam was NOT in the original TV cartoon. The Sam character was made for these movies. Yes, he was GOING to be Spike (ACTUAL teen boy from cartoon) but they changed it. The other boy from series was Daniel, who was featured in the animated movie. Let's get some facts straight.

Also, I have 2 questions: Whatever happened to the Lennox's (Duhamel) wife and daughter? They are never mentioned passed the first movie. Not that it's relevant. Also, when the Transformers came to Earth, they had to take on the appearance of machines here on Earth to blend in. How is it when they discovered Sentinel Prime, he was already in the appearance of a truck? I mean, he crash landed thousands of years ago. I'm sure there were no trucks around. I'm also sure that one of you can offer some kind of strange explanation for it as well. lol

mharsha, Sam's last name was Witwicky. Spike's last name was Witwicky. They are the same character. The chief difference is in the 80's cartoon, they were construction workers. In the movies, they are there for the audience to "connect to."

Also, since there weren't any special features to review, a movie review was quite appropriate.

I rarely buy dvd's nowadays, this would've been one but I'll wait for the next edition with all the extras

Yes, the job finding sub-plot was unecessar,y but the movie wasn't that bad and the action sequences were what blu-ray was made for. How can you make a movie about giant transforming robots that good anyway?

I guess Spike isn't a cool nickname any more so they decided to call the character Sam instead.  Good decision if you ask me.

When Lennox was stationed in the Middle East he had to see his family by video uplink.  Now that he's based in the states I imagine he sees them every night at dinner so no need to constantly talk about it.  Also, in the first film they were trying to humanize the soldier characters.  They talked about family and baseball and other human stuff.  It was an attempt to make you care about them before the giant robots stepped on them like ants.  I guess by the third film Bay assumed that you already cared about Lennox and crew (perhaps a bad assumption) and he didn't need to wave their humanity in your face any more. 

Myself, I would have preferred to spend more time with the soldiers and less time watching Sam whine.  Kick ass soldiers who can stare down an angry Decepticon and jump out of planes in wing suits to defend Chicago are much more interesting than petulant twenty somethings.  The deal between the Autobots and the US Government in the second film, where the Autobots protect the Earth from Decepticons in exchange for a place to live, was far more interesting than the actual plot of the second film.  It would have been a more interesting film if Bay had made a movie about that and left Sam in college.

As far as comic relief goes, I'll take the silly little robots over Sam's parents and Agent Simmons any day.

Why do people always think reviewers have some ulterior motive or are "haters" because we give films bad reviews.  I have been a Transformers fan since say one...I have seen every animated series including the Japanese series'.  I've been a transformers collector for 15 years.  I love Transformers and wanted nothing but success for the films.  But I'm also not going to let my love for them blind me to bad filmmaking.

Sam was originally supposed to be Spike, but they decided the name didn't fit the character, so they changed it to Sam. Just because they have the same last name doesn't mean they are the same person. In that logic, the father and son are the same character because they have the same last name. They are connected BEHIND the scenes basically, but not the same character.

Heh, if they had tried to call the character Spike, Spike Lee would have  sued them like he did with Spike TV.  Why put up with that when it's so easy to avoid?

so, the movie went from a 'C' rating when in theaters to a 'D ' on blu-ray....



and I'm sorry, I don't know if it's me, but this guy seems like he's trying to sound hipper and cooler than he is, which seems to be kind of douchebag-y.

Anyone else get that vibe?