TransFormers: Bumblebee - Proof that it can be done well?

While the Bumblebee movie isn't on general release until after Christmas over here, my best mate let me know it was being 'previewed' this weekend at a cinema convenient to both of us, so we booked tickets and had a quick look.

Briefly, it's very good - far better than any of the movies helmed by Michael Bay - and, despite being essentially a retread of the first movie (but "a girl gets her first car" rather than "a boy gets his first car"), still featuring humans rather too much, and borrowing heavily from The Iron Giant, it's enough of a TransFormers movie that I'm more hopeful for the continuation of the franchise.

More specifics? There will be a few spoilers ahead... You have been warned.

Seriously, do not read further if you don't want to see spoilers.

The film opens on a fully CGI Cybertron, amidst a battle the Autobots are losing. Optimus Prime is awaiting the arrival of our hero, at this point referred to only as B-127, and goes into full-on arse-kicking mode to thin out the Decepticon ranks. There are several visual beats taken directly from the 1986 animated movie (not least Prime leaping through an explosion, gun at the ready), and we get a good look at a whole bunch of very unique-looking Autobots and Decepticons - none of the metal shard monsters that became all too prevalent in the earlier movies. Once B-127 arrives, Prime calls a retreat (actually more of an 'abandon ship' as other Autobots are seen boarding escape pods) and instructs the little yellow Autobot to head to Earth and lie low till the rest join him - apparently Earth has been tagged as a suitable place for a new base of operations and Bumblebee is tasked with keeping it safe. Prime is staying behind to buy the escapees some time but, as B-127 rockets off, the launch tower is seen to fall, Prime seemingly with it...

I have to admit that the CGI still seemed far too much like something from a videogame. All of the robots - both Autobot and Decepticon - were brightly coloured and easily identified... but I actually prefer the less G1-derived look of the Autobots from the Bay movies, and something seemed really weird about Shockwave's thighs. The seekers looked awesome (and, yes, some of the 'background' seekers who were named by fans are seen... and mostly wrecked in battle), and I loved the menacing tones of the score that announced Soundwave's arrival on the battleground. Ravage looked more like a wolf than a cat, but moved well... My only objection would be that Ravage is supposed to be a spy, not (ahem) an attack dog. Having him tackle Optimus Prime unaided doesn't seem like something Soundwave would do. Rumble, Frenzy or Buzzsaw, maybe... but I'd have thought Ravage too valuable to risk in battle like that.

Bumblebee's arrival on Earth comes in the midst of a Sector 7 training exercise and causes a few injuries. Assuming this giant robot - who came down as a ball of fire - to be a threat, they give chase and eventually corner him... But, just as the robot announces he means them no harm, a jet flies in. He tries to warn them to run, that it's not the Air Force, but the jet opens fire... then transforms and attacks. Now, I may be wrong, but I believe this character actually goes unnamed. We know from various announcements and toy reveals that he's Blitzwing but, in the film, he's just an anonymous, single-minded and vicious robot,  and you're left wondering if he even noticed the humans, let alone cared about them, when he attacked. He interrogates B-127 for information about the Autobots (not just Optimus Prime, per the trailer) and when the Autobot bravely says "I'll never talk", Blitzwing replies "Let's make it official, then" and calmly removes his speech synthesiser. This actually sets the tone for a lot of what happens during the course of the movie: the Decepticons live up to their name (John Cena's character - not Calhoun Burns, it seems, so perhaps not such a direct link to a MASK movie as I'd hoped - actually asks at one point if that name is a red flag to anyone else at Sector 7), killing with impunity and tricking Sector 7 into helping them "track down a dangerous criminal". They're visually distinct at all times, while retaining the base aesthetic of the Bay movies. Also, I cannot praise Angela Basset's performance as Shatter enough. While the robot isn't as sexualised as the likes of Airachnid, she's similarly silver-tongued and provides an excellent counterpoint to her brutal, laconic partner, Dropkick. There's quite a long battle between Blitzwing and Bumblebee, ending with the destruction of the Decepticon, and the mortally wounded Autobot shuffling off and shutting down, observed by Agent Burns, who's pinned inside his vehicle, possibly the only human survivor of this giant robot brawl.

The story proper kicks off with the introduction of our human protagonist, Charlie Watson. About to turn 18, she works in a food stand at a sea-front funfair, there's a subtle implication that her boss likes to abuse his authority. The local 'mean girls' (all of whom are listed as such in the credits!) like to pick on her because of her lowly job, and happily flaunt their flashy clothes, cars and boyfriends. Charlie, we learn, used to be in her high school's diving team, but gave up after the untimely death of her father. Family life is difficult, not least because her mother has moved on and has a new boyfriend/husband who has been fully accepted by Charlie's younger brother, Otis, but, to Charlie herself, he's still an outsider. In her spare time, she's trying to restore an old Chevy the she and her father used to work on together, and gathers spare parts from a local scrapyard. It's on one such scavenging mission that she uncovers a yellow VW Beetle which has become home for a colony of bees and, while checking it over, accidentally triggers some sort of signal that allows Shatter and Dropkick to track him to Earth after failing to glean any information during their interrogation of Cliffjumper on, I think, one of Saturn's moons.

Being a grumpy, middle-aged man, I'm not entirely keen on the 'misfit teenager coming-of-age' clichés, but have to admit that Hailee Steinfeld's Charlie remains likeable even at her brattiest, because you can see and understand why she's angry. Her father seems to have been the only one who really believed in her, while her mother, Sally - a nurse (reference to June Darby in TF:Prime?) - coddles and controls her to an embarrassing degree (which, itself, is understandable given that she lost her husband, the father of her two children), and her mother's new partner, Roy, is trying but failing to connect with the teen. One really odd parallel between this film and the 2007 blockbuster is that Charlie asks, at one point, for $500 dollars so she can buy her own car... while Sam Witwicky needed $500 and three A-grades at school to convince his father he was ready for his first car. Same amount, but 30-odd years apart seems to ignore inflation... but I think the implication was that Sam's father would also put some money toward the car if he got the three A-grades. Either way, it's a small nit-pick, considering how well the family dynamic is set up. Charlie isn't rebellious, she's just lost her connection to her family and now aches to become her own person - a situation many will identify with.

Once B-127 reveals himself, and both have overcome their initial fear and distrust of the other (and you can clearly see that the large robot is fearful of the small human after his previous run-in - all of the robots emote very well, despite their facial designs not being too different from those of the Bay movies), Charlie names her new friend 'Bumblebee' because of the mournful buzzing he makes in lieu of speech. That he understands English is clearly demonstrated, but never explained - no "We have learned Earth's languages through the World Wide Web", because that sort of thing is just plain unnecessary. He was able to speak English to his Sector 7 pursuers before having his voicebox torn out, after all. In any Sci-Fi property where the language barrier is bypassed, it never needs to be explained.

What follows is, at times, a little too close to a re-telling of The Iron Giant - particularly a scene where Bumblebee goes into full-on, red-eyed assault mode on the Sector 7 troops, after his memory is somehow restored, and the way he's brought back to himself by Charlie jumping into the line of fire. I don't feel that sequence was entirely necessary, but it does serve Agent Burns' character arc: seemingly confirming his belief that Bumblebee is an alien war machine, just like the Decepticons.

Memo is an interesting character - right from the start, it's clear he's attracted to Charlie and has probably been trying to introduce himself for ages. He lives just down the road from her, and works in a churros kiosk right near her corndog kiosk in the funfair. He seems to think he's too nerdy for her (quite why that was his assumption, given her love of cars and her dress sense, I don't understand), but eventually plucks up the courage to visit her in her garage one evening, while she's hanging out with Bumblebee. He's on hand to encourage her when she's feeling down (not always successfully, but they barely know each other) and quickly becomes her partner in all the hi-jinks that ensue... He's not entirely relevant to the plot, but I guess he does play a part in Charlie becoming who she is at the end of the film. Just like Charlie, he accepts Bumblebee's existence pretty easily (mostly because Charlie is so comfortable with him). He's not much use when things get hectic - in fact, there's a large portion of the climax, after he's told Charlie he'll create a diversion for the Decepticons, where he's basically not in the story at all... But then, Shatter and Dropkick were supposedly on their way back to where Bumblebee had been held, yet they're right back at the antenna moments later, as if they'd never left... so either there's a huge continuity goof, or I misinterpreted who was "coming back", and it was actually more Sector 7 troops... Memo's arc is easily the lightest of the lot, but also the one with the least satisfactory conclusion. Honestly, I like the way things end up between him and Charlie - it's far more realistic than most action movie romances.

There's also a bit of a McGuffin at play, with the Decepticons - who apparently created the internet for us after being granted access to Earth's satellite network and telephone lines - heading off to a tower which Shatter deems suitable for relaying a signal to Cybertron. The camera frequently lingers on this glowing green thing which the Decepticons attach to the tower, and Charlie tries to remove it before the signal can be transmitted (with the stereotypical percentage progress bar steadily climbing on a screen) while Bumblee engages in giant robot fisticuffs with Dropkick. It's been made abundantly clear throughout that the Decepticon outclasses Bumblebee in every way, so Dropkick's defeat feels a little cheap and unlikely, while Shatter's relies on the old 'shooting a different target' trick to get Bumblebee out of danger by means of a broken dam and a convenient tanker ship.

Earlier on in the film, there's a scene in which Charlie is goaded into diving off a cliff, but panics when she looks over the edge and backs out. Her act of redemption - where she comes fully back to herself - comes in the form of diving off a crane into the water below to rescue Bumblebee. This is swiftly followed by redemption for Agent Burns, who allows Bumblebee to escape with Charlie, warning that his friends will be looking for him.

The end comes in several separate parts, with Bumblebee adopting his familiar '76 Camaro form (and there's a brilliant callback to the first film, in which Mikaela describes Bumblebee's disguise as a "piece of crap Camaro"), drives off across the Golden Gate Bridge and meets up with a familiar-looking red Freightliner truck. There's another part, in which Charlie gets home, properly reconnects with her family and meets back up with her neighbour, Memo, who's been following her around like a smitten puppy for most of the movie. There's another part in which Bumblebee is walking through a forest with Optimus Prime, who still refers to him as B-127, so Bumblebee uses his radio-speech trick to correct him "My name is Bumblebee" - the last word discernible as a recording of Charlie's voice - before the camera swoops up to show a bunch of fireballs raining down - hopefully a few more Autobots. As movie climaxes go, it's not as protracted as, say, the Lord of the Rings trilogy, but it feels as though they couldn't decide which ending to go for, so they put all of them in, rather than trying to work any of them into the story more completely.

I really enjoyed the film, and have only a few nit-picking complaints. The CGI is familiar, but Travis Knight is clearly better acquainted with the requirements of CGI-intensive scenes so the action is never confused by ridiculously tight camerawork the likes of which plagued Bay's movies. Furthermore, every character is distinct so that, even in the fight scenes, you can always identify who's punching who. Some of the CGI - particularly Optimus Prime - is a bit too G1 for my tastes, and seems a little unbelievable... But I can't deny it was nice to be able to instantly recognise so many Autobots and Decepticons in the Cybertron sequences.

Every character is also distinct in that they have character. Shatter is the con-artist, easily able to charm the humans into giving them access to their entire communications network by being polite and reasonable to be point of almost being obsequious. Dropkick generally keeps quiet, except for muttering threats, preferring to let his fists, feet and weapons do the talking. He questions Shatter's approach, preferring the idea of taking what they need by force, but she's able to convince him, too. Charlie and her family are convincingly drawn and, while there are a few cringy moments, it's cringy in a relatable way, rather than the heightened, toe-curling 'humor' of the Witwickys. The closest this film gets to that is at the end of a high-speed chase, where Roy's reckless driving (moments after Sally makes a comment about getting seatbelts fitted to the car) helps Charlie, Memo and Bumblebee escape, but leads to Charlie's younger brother, Otis, throwing up from the back seat. That, or the whole 'domestic misadventures of Bumblebee' scene... which is substantially less funny in the film having featured so prominently in the trailer.

There are a couple of points where scale seems inconsistent. Bumblebee is able to stand erect inside Charlie's garage but, in the scene on the beach, when she's teaching him to stay hidden, he seems colossal, and the Beetle's headlights are far too big compared to Charlie's head. Likewise, when Bumblebee is fighting Dropkick, with Charlie running around underfoot, both robots seem massive. The Decepticons' triple-changing presents an additional scale problem, as the cars are far, far smaller than the jet and helicopter they turn into. Mass shifting can be inferred, but the way it's presented in the film suggests the vehicles are more similar in size than they can possibly be. Just to clarify, though, they're technically not triple-changers... they simply scan multiple disguises and use them at will... suggesting that, if he ever wanted to, Bumblebee could become a Beetle again.

A scene where Bumblebee, Charlie and Memo are pursued by a police car - only because they were speeding - seems out of place, in that it doesn't really go anywhere, there are no apparent consequences, and the police officer was put in quite some danger by Bumblebee, who's clearly just showing off. He also comes across as either naive to the point of being infant-like, or just plain mean-spirited, when the trio get their revenge on the leader of the cadre of mean girls from the waterfront.

Other than that, there's a lot to like about Bumblebee - the character - and I particularly appreciated the way he seemed surprised the first few times his battlemask deployed. It was clear from his eyes alone that it was unexpected, and he seemed almost panicked in his attempts to lift it away. It's also really charming how he's trying to teach himself to speak via his radio as soon as he comes back online, but only has any success after Charlie replaces the faulty unit with a new model, complete with cassette player. Nevertheless, it's clear from his first appearance, back on Cybertron, that this Bumblebee is closer to the TF:Animated daredevil than the G1 spy... and it's not made especially clear, at that point, why anyone's waiting for him - he's not carrying 'vital information' or anything like that, it's just that Prime wants to send him to a specific location, Earth.

Probably the most uneven character in this story is Sector 7's Agent Burns, who starts out quite cocky and light-hearted (repeatedly shooting a trainee with a paintball gun, at first taking responsibility, then blaming various malfunctions), then becoming very bitter (understandable if he was the only survivor of Blitzwing's attack) and treating Bumblebee with as much suspicion as he does the Decepticons, despite being vocally more suspicious of their intentions, only to do a dramatic about-face when Bumblebee's full-on assault against his troops at one point is conveniently forgotten after he catches Burns' crashing helicopter. It makes sense... but it all seems a little abrupt.

The soundtrack - both the score and the mix of 80s pop - are fantastic, with Charlie's theme (of which there are several versions played throughout) being a particular highlight. Dino Marianelli has done a fine job, and I hope his score is made available to buy. I'd half expected the 'Rickrolling' from the trailer to have been specific to the trailer, but it is actually in the movie, and just as funny in the full context (it follows a similar thing happening with one of Charlie's tapes of The Smiths). One snippet of music that's bound to be popular is the use of Stan Bush's 'The Touch' when Bumblebee tries to encourage Charlie at one point.

I was intrigued that the name 'Megatron' was never even mentioned in passing. Shockwave appeared to be in command of the Decepticons on Cybertron, and neither Shatter nor Dropkick appeared to be concerned about the Decepticon leader's absence from the story. Whether the intention was to hold him back for a dramatic reveal in a later film, or to tie Bumblebee to the Bay pentalogy (in which Megatron is already on Earth, frozen, and in the custody of Sector 7) there was no clear indication...

...Which brings us neatly to the question of whether this is a straight prequel or a reboot. Funnily enough, it could easily work either way. Bumblebee's solo movie has enough callbacks to the existing films in the franchise that it could easily tie in to the first three, at least (though the retconning between each of those makes it steadily more complicated to fit). However, it's different enough in tone and look that, should Paramount wish, they could simply use this as the starting point of a new TransFormers franchise, which could become the first installment of Hasbro/Paramount's own cinematic universe. What Sector 7 learn from the defeated Decepticons could lead to the creation of the Mobile Armoured Strike Kommand - probably the easiest and most obvious toy property, aside from GI Joe, to cross over with TransFormers - and having it as an offshoot of Sector 7 would make far more sense than KSI's cloud-forming drones from Age of Extinction.

Personally, I hope they take the opportunity to distance themselves from the juvenile, inconsistent and shoddy Bay movies... and, while I'd rather they didn't launch straight back into that style of blockbuster, I don't think that solo movies like this one are necessarily the way forward. It worked for Marvel because their established comics universe is already a massive crossover filled with strong individual heroes and villains. Now that the existence of Cybertron, and Optimus Prime's presence on Earth, has been established, the next movie would necessarily have to be more of an ensemble movie. Greater focus on the robots, rather than humans, and keeping to the idea that they are 'Robots In Disguise' on Earth, would be much appreciated... but I honestly don't expect Paramount to exercise that much restraint, or Hasbro to exercise that much creative control. Bumblebee, I suspect, will be a happy oddity in the franchise - well-written (Christina Hodson has only a couple of previous credits, both seeming to be fairly pedestrian thrillers, but she's going on to write two movies in the DC Universe), very well made (sadly Travis Knight expects not to return for the next TransFormers movie) and with an excellent cast (Hailee Steinfeld is a far better actor than Shia LaBeouf will ever be, John Cena was believable if a little underutilised, Jorge Lendeborg Jr. was thoroughly charming throughout), it deserves to be kept separate from the increasingly cynical blockbusters of the franchise's past... And, frankly, I think the franchise deserves the opportunity of starting afresh, from this far superior springboard.

And the strangest thing about it all is that I now want to know what happened to Charlie next. What happens between her and Memo? Does she find peace with the loss of her father, and accept Roy as her mother's new partner? Does she ever interact with any other Cybertronians? I'm really not sure I should be asking these questions at the end of a TransFormers movie... but it just goes to show that it is possible to write humans into a TransFormers story and have them be likeable to the point where you know you're going to miss them in future.