I know that going into Transformers: Dark of the Moon that I wasn’t going to be seeing an Oscar-winning movie filled with Oscar-winning performances but a part of me was foolishly hoping that the third Transformers movie would be better than the previous two entries.

However, I knew it was going to be crap and crap it was. I had such high hopes for a live-action Transformers movie when the first one came out in 2007. As a child, I was a tomboy and loved the cartoon Transformers, had most of the toys and even enjoyed the 1986 animated Transformers the Movie.

Alas, Transfomers, as envisioned by Michael Bay, was disappointing. I didn’t want to see the second one, Revenge of the Fallen, but the promise of Soundwave and the Constructicons lured me to see it.

So when I heard that there was going to be the inevitable third movie, I said no way am I going to see this but then I heard the villain was going to be Shockwave, who was one of my favourite Decepticon toys I had. As well, it had a promising story line of how the space race was really about retrieving or investigating an Autobot ship that had crashed on the moon. So I decided to see it.

What we ended up is an overbloated, convoluted plot. While the initial plot line of the space race was intriguing, Bay decided not really pursue that any further or make much of it. And Shockwave gets introduced at the beginning but then it takes almost two hours before we see him again. Plus, I have no clue what purpose Shockwave played in this film. In the cartoon, he was like a right hand man for Megatron but here no idea. As well, when he transformed, he was some weird Basilik thing. At least he retained his one eye.

And yes, this movie is way too long. It clocks in at 2 hours and 37 minutes. Even with all the explosions and action going on screen, I actually was falling asleep.

I am not even going to bother with the rest of plot as I am still confused as to what I saw on screen.

What I found extremely annoying was Shia LaBeouf. He was so whiny in this film, it was like he was channeling Luke and Anakin Skywalker. The dialogue too was so silly and stupid. There were moments that I laughed out loud at stuff you weren’t suppose to laugh at.

One change that happened in this film is that LaBeouf’s character, Sam, gets a new girlfriend. Out is Megan Fox and in is Victoria Secret model Rosie Huntingdon-Whitely. Basically, she added nothing to the film and you can tell that they cut and replaced Fox’s character’s name for Huntingdon-Whitely’s with some minor tweaks to account for the new girlfriend. She ends up working for McDreamy (Patrick Dempsey), I never bothered to learn his character’s name, as someone who helps run his car museum, which based on that you can tell that job was meant for Fox’s character.

Speaking of change, Soundwave, who was a space satellite in the second movie, has become a Mercedes Benz in this movie. At least we got Lasebeak.

The second Transformers featured a pair of Mini Coops that were as annoying as Jar-Jar Binks but they were cut in this film only to be replaced by a pair of the same type of characters in mini Transformers. What really bothered me about the Autobots is a lot of their voices or characters were caricatures and were quite over the top. They had a Wheeljack type character that looked like a mad inventor, which I did not like. The only really Autobot and that was the same from the cartoons was Optimus Prime.

And I can’t believe that they wasted Oscar-nominee John Malkovitch in this movie as Sam’s new boss. What a waste. If he was suppose to be comedic relief, it wasn’t that good and besides you have Sam’s mom (Julie White) and John Turturro to play that part.

I also kept asking myself why would Frances McDormand be in this movie. Yes, her part is fairly important but come on you are an Oscar-winning, Tony-winning actress. Sometimes, I really wonder why actors of her caliber would do a paycheck movie.

Don’t bother seeing the film in 3D so not worth it and blame James Cameron for starting this wave. I have not seen any movie in 3D where I thought it was worth it.

I really hope there isn’t another Transformers movie as it seems to have wrapped nicely but you never know. But I hope not.