Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2014)

There were several rumors going on about this movie. One was involving that they were aliens, brought down to defeat Shredder and all that. Well, ill just start my reveiw...

Cast-
Ms. Fox as April... Mistake... BIG MISTAKE. Most of her lines sounded forced, and totally scripted. The way she was explaining information to her throw-away character buddy made her sound like a raving lunatic. Now, I saw it twice to be sure about my review. Fox as April was a huge mistake. I forget other names, the Dude who played Sacks (huh huh, Sacks...) looked pretty weird when shooting all angry and stuff. Like a penguin with a sling-shot. It was annoying, really. Shredder was cool. Wasn't a fan of the costume at first, but then I saw what it could do... I was won over. I liked shredder. Knoxville As Leo threw me off, but I couldn't tell it was him until he was off screen.
Mikey, to me was a borderline creeper. But he was still the fun-loving goofball we have grown to love. I would have to say I was satisfied with the rest of the cast other than that. Fox, and the Sacks guy's angry gun moves were the only cast complaints I have. Rest was at least acceptable.

Writing-
I was waiting for the action. I knew they were coming, I didn't want to wait. So, a little slow to get the ball rolling. I never read the comics, so I'm fuzzy on the actual history of the turtles... But the back story they used to explain how they came to be, and why April was important other than being nosey left a bitter taste in my mouth. Or maybe it was the un-buttered stale popcorn. Either way, it wasn't my cup of tea. If i were a writer for this one, I wouldn't have had it like that, but stay more true to the original movie, or even the cartoon. And it didn't seem to give a lot of screen time to Don, Leo and Splinter, which was a little disappointing because they seemed like they were well written characters.

Effects-
This movie was very effects-heavy, because of the turtles. (seems to be another Bay trademark) The turtles looked a little funny, Splinter didn't look to realistic to me, but i still liked them all. The ninjas' movements looked really cool, excellent perspectives. I liked the effects overall.

SWEET BEEF:
As I stated before, the back story change threw me off, and it was slow to get moving, but when it did and the story began to unfold, it was an entertaining movie.

I suppose if you are like me, and don't like much change, or would prefer to see something more true to the comics, It probably wouldn't be your cup of tea. But as a new perspective to the consumer, a cooler, more bad ass ninja team... It is entertaining.
7.5 of 10

Transformers 4: Age of Extinction

When I first heard about a 4^th TF movie, I couldn’t help but to think: “Another one? Aren’t they out of ideas for decepticons yet?” Apparently not. I will try to keep it brief and leave out spoilers, but if you’d rather be safe, ill understand, go to the VERY end.

So, as far as the cast would go,

Mark Wahlberg was the only name I have heard of (until later) Which the role he played didn’t seem to fit the movie at all, really. He didn’t look the age to support having a 17 year old daughter… Or the techy-type.
In the beginning, there was a character that I couldn’t have cared less for. No connection to this person in any way. He looked like a knock-off of “The Big Lebowsky”  During the first bit of the film, It was apparent to me this Robe-wearer was a “throw-away character”, so when his exit came, I wasn’t all “NOOOOO!!!” about it. Only one character even cared what happened to him, and it was for about 10 seconds. Throughout the rest of it, there was this bad guy trying to look like a badass with a walkie-talkie, who, in my opinion, should have been re-casted. Maybe it’s just me, but every character felt written to stand out in some way. Which if everyone stands out, no one does.

Over all acting of it I would have to say could have been better. MUCH better.

Story of it all… Ugh.
It from the start, drops us in the middle of some nonsense… I was confused until like ten minutes in. The story that lasted 2 and a half hours, seemed to skew off to me. I saw some character arcs, but it was more of an incline than anything. There was an old rival re-incarnated (high-five if you guess right) and a new one, both with very cool abilities.  I’m still unsure what was happening. I lost interest to be honest. But when I woke up from my brief naps (yes, plural) the auto bots were riding on transforming dinosaurs. At least I was able to keep my eyes open for the climax of it. Which… never mind.

So, the story, to me, was not very good at all.

Product placement/props?
I know Budweiser had something to do with this movie. Product placement was nuts. To be specific, a BUD truck gets knocked over, spilling the many, many, MANY shiny blue bottles clearly marked “Budweiser”, and our main man gets one, and opens it on a dude’s car, and drinks it. “So, it’s a two and a half hour Budweiser commercial! No wonder the story doesn’t make sense!”
The Props? I saw a robot sword that shoots lasers…. And it looked plastic to me. So, it probably was.

Effects, which is basically 85% of the movie anyway looked pretty good to me. Some of the coloring seemed a little off in some scenes, and a reflective surface didn’t reflect a character walking by it, and under it, but held the reflection of a spaceship just fine. THAT looked digital to me, because I do not recall a person not casting a reflection on a reflective surface… Much less one that I don’t recall casting a shadow.
Enemies abilities effects looked fake, but still in a cool kind of way. The abilities I saw of the new rivals made my jaw drop. It was cool. But lets also not forget about the multiple sun-blinding shots. One time is enough. Unless you want to blind your audience, and blind them again when their eyes finally re-adjust. And on the credits, looked like someone tried to pull a “JJ Abrams on them.” Which, in an off-topic comment I’d like to make would be that Bay and Abrams Should make a movie together involving Aliens in space ships. Not like Star Trek, or another transformers, but something stand alone. They can argue about weather a lens flare should be in total darkness, or a fiery explosion happens in a no-oxygen environment. OR A lens flare on an explosion, and explosion on a lens flare! I think it would be a mess worth watching.(anyway) At the end of it, our Heroine, (if you want to call her that) is already an attractive young lady, but never knew her eyes were green until then. NOTICALBY green. Like, ‘Why didn’t I catch that within the first 2h 30m in??’ I swear,  I haven’t seen effects like THAT done on any actor before. She was probably upset thinking that they felt they had to try making her more attractive digitally. Talk about a low-blow to her ego.

My only Audio beefs would be ADR. (Automated Dialogue Replacement). In one scene, I noticed it right away. I laughed. It took me a second to catch it in other places, but it wasn’t near as obvious, so good job, ADR tech. The music choices felt to match the scene, but not near as good as Linkin Park did for the other TF movies. I suppose that is just a personal opinion, but the volume of the music was to loud, drowning out anything else happening.

Sweet beefs:

Okay, I really only have one sweet beef with this movie, and the reason I’m calling it that is because it sucked, but was awesome at the same time. And This could be a tiny little spoiler too. Prime was ragged, banged up, and what’s-his-name fixes something on him, but he’s still all kinds of messed up. Story happens, and they leave the location. Prime scans another truck and transforms into his former red-and-blue glorious self, when the Autobots insignia appears on him, the classic “Transforming” sound plays. I swear, it sent chills down my spine.

So, with all that I’d say it was a 6 of 10.