Review Detail

I think the original Transformers was pretty good. It had atmosphere, heart, action, humor, it felt like it had everything. I enjoyed the original film, and was pleased with what Michael Bay was able to come up with - most of the time.

I also had several complaints about the film though. The objectification of women (like Mikaela), all the dumb sexual humor, and the swearing made it almost intolerable to watch at times and taught me to skip a couple of scenes on repeat viewing. I really value good, clean entertainment, and while I also really like Transformers, all the iffy stuff in it made it so I didn't want to recommend the movie to anybody I knew.

So then, having seen a couple of fan edits and having developed curiosity, I decided to look online to see if anyone had been able to remove some of those elements previously described from the film. There were a few good options out there, but none of them really fit my personal standard as well as I would like. But then I found this edit - Transformers: Definitive Edition. I liked the look of a lot of the edits that had been made, and was impressed by the creator's great efforts taken to remove all the unnecessary things. If you've ever watched Transformers, then you know what I'm talking about; a lot of the "humor" and "charm" in the film is really just... plain stupid.

After watching this edit though, I'm very impressed! The editing job is incredibly smooth and very well done. Nothing is particularly confusing, messy, or jarring. If you hadn't seen the original film you'd never be able to tell that any edits had been made at all, actually. And the edits lived up to my expectations too - all the garbage in the film was simply and cleanly removed. Almost everything I hated about the original film is gone from this version. Of course, not everything I disliked was removed (like all the swearing or Sam and Mikaela making out at the end), but I understand that some edits would be nearly impossible to make and could be potentially confusing to people, so I won't complain.

My only real complaint is that I don't think the Scorponok battle scene should have been removed - It was one of my favorite parts and gave the military guys some good character moments, in my opinion. But I also understand wanting to streamline the plot a little bit, so the scene isn't missed too much.

But this edit is still great fun, even more so than the original film in fact! I'd highly recommend it to anyone who's interested in a better, cleaner version of this early 2000's classic. Thanks OlivusPrime for helping me get a file download, it's very much appreciated!