Review: Bumblebee

Bumblebee is coming to Earth and the 80s will never be the same.

Let’s see… Transformers: Rise of the Beasts premiers next month… I’ve done two Beast Wars posts… but I only ever covered Age of Extinction of the live action films. Probably should rectify that. So we’re doing Bumblebee. Why am I not going all the way back to Transformers 1? Because I don’t want to torture myself by watching that schlock again. Besides, Bumblebee was a soft reboot, so nothing else really matters anymore in terms of canon. Burn in Hell Michael Bay! Okay, let’s get to it.

 

The film opens with an all-out brawl on Cybertron. The forces of the heroic Autobots and the villainous Decepticons are trying to obliterate each other. We get visual cameos from a ton of Transformers; Wheeljack, Arcee, Brawn, Starscream, Soundwave, Shockwave, most of the Seekers, it’s a colorful bunch. Optimus is leading a push to get his people to evacuate the planet. He’s looking particularly for a well-respected young scout, B-127, a yellow racer. He, B-127 and the other Autobots are able to hold off the Decepticons long enough to get B-127 to an escape vehicle. Optimus charges him with going to their evacuation site, Earth, and to do his best to hold that metaphorical beach head for the rest of the Autobots. B-127’s ship takes off as the port gets destroyed, flying into the black void of space.

 

Sometime later, B-127 crash lands on Earth, disturbing a training exercise by Sector 7 operative (this was a prequel turned into soft reboot, so there were a few references to the Bay series that they couldn’t cut completely) Jack Burns. B-127 tries to talk, but the military assumes giant alien robot = bad. B-127 does his best to dodge Sector 7, using his scanners to take on the form of a jeep to try to blend in with their military vehicles. He gets corned, though, and things go from bad to worse when a jet flies in. It's revealed to be a Decepticon, credited as Blitzwing. He was either already stationed on Earth or must have chased B-127’s pod specifically. The two battle, but Blitzwing gets him in a chokehold and demands to know where Optimus Prime is. B-127 says he’ll never talk, and Blitzwing, being a sadist, decides to make that a prediction not hyperbole. He rips B-127’s voice box out, and does some damage to his head, effecting his memory. B-127 rips out one of Blitzwing’s missiles and kills him with it. Severely damaged, exhausted, and his brain fried, B-127 transforms into the last vehicle he saw, a Volkswagen Beetle, and basically falls into a coma.

 

We cut to the film’s human, Charlie Watson in Brighton Falls. She’s dealing with some pretty serious depression following the death of her father some time ago from an unknown reason and is feeling flustered at how easily her mother seems to be moving on with her new boyfriend Ron. Her day isn’t great as she’s humiliated by some bullies at her work at the local pier. To help her get her mind off things, she hits up “Hank’s Marine Repair and Parts” to get a few parts for repairing her dad’s corvette. After bantering with the Hank, an old friend of her dad’s, she starts searching. She knocks over a few boats and pulls the dust cover off an old but familiar VW Bug. We see that some bees have set up shop under his hood, ya know, in case you don’t do subtlety. Charlie tries to start the Bug, which doesn’t but make B-127 send out a signal.

 

We cut to one of Saturn’s moons. Our villains of the evening, Shatter and Dropkick, are there and are torturing Autobot Cliffjumper. He tries to hold them off, but it’s two on one. He refuses to answer any of their questions. They all get the signal, and the Decepticons decide to execute Cliffjumper and decide to go to Earth to find B-127. They cross the cosmic void in a few hours, landing in Texas. They murder this dude who is in the middle of a messy break up with his wife before taking on vehicle modes and driving off.

 

Charlie, meanwhile, has a mini-breakdown when she can’t get the corvette started, and then has to deal with a practical but stylistically awful helmet from her mother, Sally, and a legitimately bad gift in the form of a book about smiling more from mom’s boyfriend Ron, storms off in a huff. She heads over to Hank’s and tries to negotiate for extra shop work to get the Beetle. He gives it to her for free, as a birthday present, provided she can start it. She does and drives off with B-127.

 

So… is he doing the Transformers equivalent of sleep walking?

 

She gets the Beetle home but is surprised when a part falls out from under it. She goes down to inspect and is even more shocked to discover a face within the machinery. This seems to wake B-127 up and he transforms into Robot mode. She’s terrified for a second, but then notices that B-127 is just as terrified of her as she is of him. They greet each other as best they can, as B-127 1. Has amnesia from the head blows he took, and 2. Can only communicate in clicks, beeps, and buzzes. She dubs him Bumblebee, as his noises sound like bees to her. I will note, Bumblebee is the ONLY Transformer that needed an origin for his name. Shatter, Dropkick, Cliffjumper, Blitzwing, these are all perfectly acceptable giant robot names, but not Bumblebee. Whatever.

 

Meanwhile, Sector 7 has detected the Decepticon’s arrival on earth and Burns heads out to intercept them along with a young Agent Simmons from the previous films.

 

The next day, Charlie goes to check on Bee, only to find that he’s gone. She’s worried that he left or was kidnapped or something, but she finally asks her brother Otis, who reveals Sally took it because their dog Conan needed to go to the vet, but Ron needed the station wagon. Folks, I’m not a parent, but taking your kid’s car without even saying a word to them feels like a parent fail. She chases after Sally with her moped, making her pull over and pretending she was concerned about Conan, when really she was worried that Bee would blow his cover. Which he almost did when he partially transformed to wave at her. After taking care of the dog, she takes Bee to a secluded beach and tries to train him to always go into vehicle mode if any human besides Charlie sees him.

 

I kind of love this joke that Bumblebee, a Robot in Disguises, is so laughably bad at hiding.

 

Burns’ team intercepts the two Decepticons in Texas. He has the help of a a Sector 7 scientist named Powell. The Decepticons take the liberty to scan a copter and jet Burns brought along, becoming the series’ first official triple-changers. Dropkick wants to kill them now, but Shatter is in charge and wants to work smarter, not harder. She tells Burns that they’re a “Peacekeeping Decepticon patrol” and they’re looking for an escaped criminal named B-127, using a hologram of Bee from Cybertron. Say, Shatter, maybe change your team name from the obvious villain name. Just saying. Burns is suspicious as hell, but Dr. Powell is ecstatic at first contact with an alien species.

 

Bee and Charlie bond in a forest, but Bee’s chest starts sparking. He’s been hit… a lot recently, so I’m shocked he is just now having issues. Charlie tries to fix him, but only activates the holographic message that Bee has of Prime telling him his mission. The message is garbled, but it’s enough to jog a little more of Bumblebee’s memory. He remembers Optimus valiantly taking on a huge squad of Decepticons to get Bee time to escape. He fights one of Soundwave’s eject-able minions, Ravage, and then Soundwave, Shockwave, Starscream, and a few seekers too. Bumblebee watches in horror as his escape pod leaves.

 

Realizing that Bee is also dealing with some trauma, and seeing that Bee’s radio is broken, Charlie attempts to fix it. She replaces his radio with the one from the corvette and goes about showing Bee Earth music. We get a little more background on Charlie as she works, namely that she was an award-winning diver but lost interest after her father’s death. He’d died of a heart attack, it seems, and she’s still working on the car to keep his memory alive.

 

At Sector 7, Burns’ superior General Whalen is told about what is going on. Powell is enthusiastic in getting the Decepticon’s help, while Burns has healthy skepticism of the two guys who have DECEPTION in their team name. It basically comes down to the decision of, either they help the Decepticons and reap the rewards or don’t and the Soviets help them instead. It’s weird to remember that the Cold War was still a thing at this point. They tell Shatter and Dropkick are shown Sector 7’s computer system, but they’re more interested in the telephone network.

 

Meanwhile, Charlie’s neighbor, Memo, learns about Bumblebee when he goes into the garage to ask Charlie out on a date. Not having any real option, Charlie pulls a Hiccup from How To Train Your Dragon, and tries to charm Memo into not saying a damn thing about her robot car. It works well, since, ya know, Memo was already interested in getting to know Charlie better.

 

Back at Sector 7, the Decepticons invent the internet and use it to track Energon signatures. They haven’t picked up Bee’s signature yet, but they’re closing in. Powell is ecstatic at how much they’re learning from the evil robots, but Burns is skeptical.

 

I’m always confused when the scientist is apparently dumber than the military guy, just saying.

 

The teens realize that Bee is constantly changing his radio stations to learn to use it to communicate. Ya know, his main method of communicating from the Bay films. They end up at a cliff party where a popular boy tries to egg Charlie on to dive off the cliff, but she just can’t and the bully from earlier mocks her for her dead dad. Charlie wants to just try to forget, Memo and Bee are for revenge. That knight, they go to toilet paper and egg the bully’s house. This is complicated by their naïve giant robot, who lobs the toilet paper over the house, and does egg the car, before getting too excited and destroying it. They race off, just barely escaping the cops. They head home and part ways for the night.

 

The next day, Charlie heads out to work, but tells Bumblebee to stay in the garage for a few days until the heat goes off. This goes well for a little bit, but eventually Bee follows the dog Conan back into the house. Bumblebee is curious but still not completely aware of his own strength, ends up breaking things all around the house. He crushes the couch, breaks the TV, and ultimately plugs himself into a wall socket, causing a surge of electricity and Energon that let the Decepticons find him. The Decepticons and Sector 7 head out to capture him. Memo sees the commotion going on in the house and calls Charlie. She races home.

 

She gets home and sees everything wrecked. She does her best to not to explode at him but is frazzled. She does her best to clean up just a little before her mom and Otis arrive. Charlie tries to take responsibility for what happened without explaining what happened, frustrating Sally and the two finally have an argument that’s been building for a while. Sally: “Why are you acting so depressed and rebellious? We all miss your dad, but you can’t let it go,” Charlie: “My dad died, and I can’t let it go. I’m sorry that’s a bummer,” before storming off.

 

Charlie, Memo, and Bee go for a drive, but are cornered by Sector 7. They do their best to evade Sector Seven, but Shatter and Dropkick arrive and attempt to interrogate Bee but can’t get anything out of him, for obvious reasons. Burns has his men take Bee down with taser guns, and Charlie is knocked out in the scuffle. Charlie wakes up in her bed to Burns “explaining” the situation to her mom and Ron. Charlie tries to plead her case, but she’s sent to her room while the grown ups handle it. She immediately leaves, her brother almost ratting her out when she goes to get Memo, but she recruits Otis to hide her running away from Sally and Ron. They saw a new report about a “military drill” happening at McKinnon Air base and assume that’s where they’re holding Bee and head there.

 

At the base, Powell watches the Decepticons interrogate Bee. The kids arrive as the Decepticons trigger Optimus’ recording. They openly discuss basically destroying the planet when the Autobots arrive, Powell overhears and warns Burns about their betrayal before he’s turned into goo. Shatter discovers a communication tower nearby that they can supercharge to call in the Decepticon army, and Dropkick blasts Bee to execute him. They leave and Charlie and Memo rush to try to save him. She’s able to revive him after several taser gun shots and reboots his memory. She and Bee race off to stop the Decepticons while Memo stays back to delay sector 7. Want to see how it ends? See the movie to find out.

 

The good first, as per usual. I loved the amount of Transforming in this movie. Bay’s films have one, maybe two really cool transformation shots per movie. This one really showcased the shape changing abilities of Cybertronians. Bee is constantly partially transforming, swapping forms, and the like to get out of messes or make shots more interesting. I liked one detail where Bee’s form remains pretty static, but the hood of his vehicle mode that makes up his chest morphs to match his car mode. The fact that this is Bumblebee’s movie, he got a lot of characterization. I’d say more that he got since the first film. Bay’s movies aren’t great for character development. I liked seeing how Bee learned to speak through the Radio… even though I’m not a huge fan of him being mute. Sorry, the fact that a character who’s whole thing was being a wisecracking wiseass can’t speak is just an odd choice to me. I liked Charlie, she’s one off the better human partners in these movies. This was right around where Hailee Steinfeld’s career really started taking off, it was neat seeing this phenomenal actor in an inarguably simple action movie. I think keeping the villains also down to two was good. Shatter and Dropkick aren’t exactly complicated villains, but having the “Boss” and the “muscle” makes them feel more fleshed out than the dozens of generic baddie soldiers with iconic Transformer names in previous movies. John Cena is fine too. He’s a pretty generic soldier type, but he has a few good lines thrown in that foreshadow his Peacemaker glory. And speaking off, I liked that there was less… Army-ganda in this film. Every single one of Bay’s films had the US Military play a huge role in stopping the Decepticons. I’m sorry, but if one of your villains has a gun that turns people into goo, your regular soldiers or even the most advanced human drones are just going to annoy the giant robots. Burns gets a moment where he gets to distract Shatter in the finale, but that seemed to be more her keeping him from breaking her delicate communication device than fear of her own body.

 

The bad is minimal but there. The parents are just insufferable in this. Like, they don’t act like Sally is a particularly bad parent, but she does NOTHING to talk to her daughter who is clearly still going through some stuff. She just seems to expect Charlie to stop being depressed because it’s been a year or two since her dad’s death. The whole bit from Ron giving her a book telling her to “just be happy” sets my teeth on edge as a natural pessimist. And they’re… incredibly heavy handed in how Charlie resolves her issues. The end of the film has her literally diving into a pool to “save” Bumblebee in the finale. Like… wow, there’s no subtlety in that whatsoever.

 

Overall, I really liked this movie. It’s easily the best Transformer’s film. The human character was interesting, the action was consistently good, and the movie seems to excise the worst Bay-isms from this franchise that I love. Minor issues still plague it, but they’re as much modern movie issues as they are just Transformers issues. I’m super hopeful that Rise of the Beasts will be on par with this at the very least. It’ll be interesting to see how this new franchise handles a bigger cast, as we’re going from just Bumblebee, Dropkick and Shatter, to, at minimum, Bumblebee, Optimus, Wheeljack, Arcee, Mirage, Optimus Primal, Rhinox, Airrazor, Cheetor, and Scourge. Lots more characters this go round. So yea, hopefully optimistic. I’ll see you later. 

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