Call me a traitor to my generation, but whenever I see a trailer for a new entry in the Transformers franchise, I sigh and roll my eyes.  Because of my love for the Saturday morning cartoon that sparked (slight pun intended) these films, I was excited when the first live-action Transformers came out in 2007.  I do not recall being thrilled by it.  It was with trepidation that I went to see its sequel, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (2009).  I almost lost friends over that one.  After that, I gave up until Transformers: Rise of the Beasts (2023).  You see, I have this blog here called The Legionnairein which I review movies for you in order to give you a Catholic perspective on them.  This involves going to the cinema once a week, at least, to give you one of the latest Hollywood productions.  I have not addressed any of the four installments between Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen and Transformers: Rise of the Beasts.  This is mainly due to the fact that I did not start The Legionnaire until January of 2019.  Since then, if it is a new release, it will likely be covered.  In the meantime, perhaps I will come back to the earlier iterations if for no other reason than to practice Christian charity.  Let us see if I can do so with the most recent release, Transformers One.

While they raced through some kind of creation myth at the beginning of Transformers One, my Catholic brain noted many similarities between it and what is found in the Bible.  Then again, that is Western culture for you.  At any rate, it pertains to the race of sentient robots that live on the planet Cybertron.  There were a group of leaders known as “Primes” that sacrificed themselves so that the rest of their, er . . . people could live in safety beneath the surface in a city called Iacon.  With the Primes laying down their lives, the MacGuffin . . . I mean, the Matrix of Leadership disappeared, and the rivers of Energon ceased to flow.  The last remaining Prime, Sentinel Prime (voiced by Jon Hamm), took over as head of Iacon.  This is the essential story that Orion Pax (voiced by Chris Hemsworth) learns from his sneaking into city archives, and he dreams of finding the Matrix of Leadership.  On this latest attempt, he is spotted and has to evade authorities.  His escape attempt is aided by his best friend, D-16 (voiced by Bryan Tyree Henry).  This escapade is only the latest in a string of “fine messes” into which Orion Pax gets D-16.  When they are not causing trouble, they are working is miners harvesting remaining sources of Energon.  Their manager, Elita-1 (voiced by Scarlett Johansson), has her perfect mining record disrupted when an accident causes a shaft to collapse.  Instead of following protocol, Orion Pax, with D-16’s help, save a fellow worker, Jazz (voiced by Evan Michael Lee).  Their actions lead to Elita-1 being fired, but the entire labor force being given a day off by Sentinel Prime.  No only do they get this reward, but he also announces the running of the Iacon 5000.  I do not think I need to describe it any detail for you to know by looking at the name that it is a race.  Seeing it as an opportunity to show they are more than mere diggers, Orion Pax tricks D-16 into participating, which is supposed to be not only dangerous but impossible for people of their caste.  For a moment, once D-16 has recovered from his annoyance, it looks like they might win.  Even though they are passed at the last moment, it brings them praise from Sentinel Prime, who says he has something special in store for the two rebels.  Before D-16 and Orion Pax get to learn what that is, they are caught by one of the guards who had been after Orion Pax for breaking into the archives, and they are sent to the lowest reaches of Iacon society: the garbage pit.  There they meet the bizarre and talkative B-127 (voiced by Keegan-Michael Key).  I use the former descriptor because he has created three inanimate robots from scrap and speaks to them.  From the one he calls Steve, a map spills out that points the way to the final location of the Primes.  Hoping to locate the Matrix of Leadership and restore their prestige in Sentinel Prime’s eyes, B-127 shows them a way to the surface towards which the map is directing them.  Elita-1 reluctantly gets swept up with them as she loads the train that will take them where they need to go.  With some near misses with the invasive Quintessons that drove them underground, they manage to locate the Primes.  They are all dead save for Alpha Trion (voiced by Laurence Fishburne).  This ancient being gives the four newcomers the truth about Cybertron and Sentinel Prime.  Their so-called leader betrayed his people in order to gain power from the Quintessons, which B-127, D-16, Elita-1, and Orion Pax witness when they see Sentinel Prime delivering Energon cubes to their sworn enemies.  D-16 is enraged by this development, vowing to kill Sentinel Prime.  Orion Pax wants only to expose the treachery.  At any rate, before they go they are each given gears by Alpha Trion that allow them to transform like others higher up in their society.  As they make their way to Iacon, they encounter the exiled High Guards of Cyberton, led by Starscream (voiced by Steve Buscemi).  D-16 appeals to their desire for revenge, but before they can unleash their fury, they are attacked by Sentinel Prime’s forces.  Elita-1 and D-16 are the only ones left of the four friends, and they gather the rest of the High Guards and head to Iacon.  While Orion Pax rallies those at the bottom of society, D-16 comes to and defies Sentinel Prime.  The long and short of this is that Sentinel Prime’s rule comes to an end, particularly as B-127 is able to broadcast evidence of their former leader’s treachery to all of Iacon.  Orion Pax attempts to stop D-16 from murdering Sentinel Prime, but takes a blast through the shoulder for his troubles.  He then falls through to the center of Cybertron where for his heroics he is given the Matrix of Leadership and dubbed Optimus Prime.  He then goes back to defeat D-16 and become the new robot in charge, banishing D-16 and his followers.

I suppose I should mention that at the end of Transformers One, D-16 officially gives himself the moniker with which fans of the series are familiar, Megatron.  It is important to keep those aficionados in mind if you see this movie.  From the trailers and now that I have seen it, I get the sense that those who made it had a healthy dose of nostalgia.  Actually, if you manage to catch the film in the theater, you will see Hemsworth, Henry, and Key thanking you before it begins for coming to the cinema, referencing how happy they were to voice some of the most beloved characters in recent cultural history.  Add to this the fact that Hollywood, with ticket sales generally down aside from a few notable exceptions, is reticent to do anything original.  This explains the plethora of entries in this franchise, not to mention all of Marvel.  As a Christian, I would encourage the movie industry to be bolder and more original.  This is not entirely a knock against this film specifically.  It is okay, nothing spectacular.  There is also a concerted effort at humor in it, which is mostly welcome.  The problem is that nostalgia is about living in the past.  Taking risks and coming up with new, hopefully compelling, material requires putting your trust in God.  Early Church History is full of people who, at least on the surface, failed.  I say this at least bodily speaking since many of them were martyred.  Yet, like the characters in the movie if not those creating them, they had a belief in something bigger than themselves that would reward them for their actions.  The witness of the Saints and the Catholic Church testify to this fact.  As for cinema, there have been many films that were criticized at the time of their release, but went on to become classics.  Hence, let us please stop making Transformers flicks.

While I will continue to wonder why we cannot get something different on the silver screen than Transformers One, I can at least acknowledge the aspects of it that intersect with Faith.  The logical place to begin would be with the creation myth mentioned in the beginning.  Part of me wants to recoil at what is shown, wishing that people could take the Bible version as seriously as some might this story.  On the other hand, and as already discussed, it is an indication of how deeply rooted Christianity is in society.  There is a Person, rather than these fictional Primes, who laid down His life for the sake of all humanity throughout time, and that is Jesus.  From here, the similarities become a little more nuanced.  The voice of wisdom in this regard is Alpha Trion.  When he tells his four visitors that they have the ability to change the world, they respond that they lack the gear that allows them to transform.  In other words, they are fixated on their lack of physical attributes instead of looking to their intrinsic abilities with which they are all created, which he refers to as a “spark.”  What he might as well say the soul that is within us and specifically given by God, which speaks to something bigger and eternal.  It drives us to do good for those around us and in society, and suppressing it leads to sin.  Some of the humblest looking people in Church History have known this fact and used everything God gave them inside the apparently weakest of frames to accomplish remarkable things.  I could give you an exhaustive list of such holy men and women, but I will stop at just one: St. Teresa of Calcutta, known more familiarly as Mother Teresa.  At barely five feet tall, and suffering from a long spell of spiritual darkness in her soul, she nonetheless did the extraordinary and transformed how the world looks upon the poorest of the poor.  These are the Church’s true treasures, an idea that goes all the way back to the third century when St. Lawrence presented the destitute as Catholicism’s most valuable asset.  It is the forgotten and unnoticed ones in the film that Orion Pax appeals to when he leads the uprising against Sentinel Prime.  Revolutions, though, can be messy, and let us pray that we find our way without violence.

Have you ever wondered about the origin story for Megatron and Optimus Prime?  Well, Transformers One is banking on that describing you.  If it does, I will say there is nothing objectionable about it, though I was surprised that a kid’s film would reference the middle finger.  Otherwise, it is an unremarkable pile of nonsense that will probably recede from your memory just as quickly as you see it.