I liked Transformers. Quite a bit. It’s no work of great art, but it’s filled with verve and inventive madness; sure, there are lots of problems with the movie and I would never argue for its greatness or put it on my top 100 films of 2007 list or anything, but it’s a film that operates almost completely without pretense as to why you’re in the seat and why it’s playing on screen. Don’t get me wrong – I’m not saying you have to be a Schiavo to like Transformers – it’s big, dumb, fun but it’s exuberant and extraordinarily well-crafted big, dumb fun.
So that means I’m looking forward to Transformers 2, which I’m hoping has more of a Michael Bay touch on it – ie, that it’s incoherent, aggressive and possibly morally depraved. If this can up the ante like Bad Boys 2 upped the ante on Bad Boys… well, if that’s the case, 2010 has a big winner already.
A couple of weeks back I broke the news that Tyrese would be returning for the sequel; now The Hollywood Reporter is running that Josh Duhamel, Megan Fox and John Turturro (surely the guy who most understood the movie he was making and most reveled in it) will also be back for a second go-round. These names were revealed in an aside in a story about Rainn Wilson from The Office getting a small role (which has been covered on the web already… way to be late, Hollywood Reporter). There’s no mention of Jon Voight, though; when I spoke to Tyrese he said he had just left a phone message for Voight, which I took to mean that he’ll be back. It’s possible that Voight’s return is a fait accomplis, but that the deals aren’t quite signed enough to put it in the trades.
Transformers 2 is actually already filming. The stuff I’ve heard about the plot gets me very excited, even with Ehren Kruger writing the script.