What I found disturbing about Transformers 4: Age of Extinction

This week I saw Transformers: Age of Extinction, the fourth installment in the blockbuster live action remake of the animated TV show. It was exactly what I expected from Michael Bay: loud pretty explosions, staged tableaux with uplifting music, the suspension of the laws of physics, incoherent story lines, and the destruction of one or more major cities somewhere in the world. I knew what I was getting into when I agreed to see it and was happy to support a film whose proceeds end up funding smaller Hollywood projects.

There are some minor spoilers ahead that won’t ruin what little plot there is, but will be glaring once they are pointed out.

The movie fell apart for me during a short scene somewhere near the beginning of this meandering film involving Cade Yeager played by Mark Wahlberg, Tessa Yeager played by Nicola Peltz, and Shane Dyson played by Jack Reynor. This scene takes place after an extended chase scene where the Yeagers and Shane have just escaped from Cemetery Wind, a clandestine organization that is hunting Transformers. For the moment the trio has taken refuge in an abandoned building and Cade is angry about the recently revealed secret relationship between his daughter and Shane. The whole situation gets weirder when Cade finds out that Shane is twenty while Tessa is seventeen. Cade then threatens to report Shane to the police (after just being chased by a clandestine US government agency bent on capturing him for harboring a Transformer). Cade responds by pulling out a laminated copy of the Texas Romeo and Juliette law, complete with statue number, out of his wallet.

What I found creepy about the whole thing was not the relationship (that I found to be pretty normal), but the forethought it took for Shane to track down that particular law, copy it, print it, laminate it, and then store it in his wallet. The detail plays into his character; at best Shane is really in love with Tessa and is ready for the awkward conversation with her father or at worst he is a predator using the gaps in the law to take advantage of her. I think it may be the former since Jack spends most of the movie either being an obnoxious adolescent or a coward. It begs the question though: who else was that prop prepared for? Regardless of Shane’s flawed intentions, in real life a faceless government agency would be the least of the little bastard’s problems when he pulls a prop like that out and waves it in a father’s face.

It’s a tasteless moment in a movie that was just under three hours long. A moment one that could have been cut to make room to explain what happens to Darcy Tirrel, played by Sophia Myles, who gets  Mandyed after telling Stanley Tucci’s character “You go with her, I will create a diversion.” (which we never see). Initially Darcy was set up to be the love interest for the Joshua Joyces character, but that falls apart after they go to China and  meet Su Yueming, played by Bingbing li.

Finally I think the majority of the population that inhabits this version of Earth have been lobotomized. While the Transformers are cavorting through Chicago and Beijing destroying everything they come in contact with, much of the population are behaving as if nothing is happing. For example we come across a family calmly watching TV in their apartment when Mark Whalberg and Titus Welliver breaking in to have fist fight while several Transformers have a gun battle outside. You can ask the same questions about the commuters in Chicago who are going about their lives despite the thirty foot robots shooting at each other on Lake Shore Drive and a massive spaceship floating overhead. Everyone only seems to evacuate or panic when they comes into direct contact with the robots. Then again, this is the fourth installment of the franchise and it’s possible the films unwashed masses are as unimpressed by the sudden appearance of Transformers as ours.