Transformers: Age of Extinction 2014

Christy Lemire, ChristyLemire.com: Long before Optimus Prime hoists his hulking metal frame onto the back of a giant robot dinosaur, wields his mighty sword and rides valiantly away to save the planet once more, Transformers: Age of Extinction plays like a parody ... Read more

David Edelstein, New York Magazine/Vulture: Transformers: Age of Extinction is nearly three %$^&%!!# hours, and they're brain-freezing. Read more

Wesley Morris, Grantland: It barely matters whether this movie is good or bad. Bay is now the sort of filmmaker -- the only one, perhaps -- whose moviemaking goes beyond such binary banality. Read more

Kyle Smith, New York Post: Loud, ridiculous and nonsensical - even for a Transformers movie ... Read more

Soren Anderson, Seattle Times: Hello, police? I'd like to report an assault. Read more

Richard Corliss, TIME Magazine: Nothing coheres. Movies usually try to come together at the end; this one falls apart. If that's Bay intention, then cinema has finally entered its Age of Extinction. Read more

Maggie Lee, Variety: Who cares if the human characters are even more dispensable and the plot even more scattershot than usual? Read more

Ignatiy Vishnevetsky, AV Club: Bay seems to have exhausted himself. The fourth, longest, and flimsiest entry in the director's signature franchise finds Bay mostly in cruise control ... Read more

Bill Goodykoontz, Arizona Republic: If you like ear-piercing explosions and bizarre spaceships and wooden dialogue that serves simply to get from one action scene to another, "Transformers: Age of Extinction" delivers on all fronts. Read more

Peter Keough, Boston Globe: One thing you have to give Bay credit for: He has a knack for bringing A-list talent down to his level. Read more

Ben Sachs, Chicago Reader: In the end, though, this is still a movie about giant robots fighting each other, which is to say it's nearly impossible to take seriously on a narrative level. Read more

Christopher Borrelli, Chicago Tribune: It is scattered, weightless, impossible to get hold of, and somehow, after seven years and more than 10 hours of screen time, I could not tell you what these films are about. Read more

Peter Rainer, Christian Science Monitor: Reviewing a Transformers movie is a bit like reviewing a toy. In fact, it's exactly like reviewing a toy. Read more

Jocelyn Noveck, Associated Press: The final confrontation alone lasts close to an hour, and at some point, you may find yourself simply in a daze, unable to absorb any further action into your brain. Read more

Tom Long, Detroit News: Seriously, the next movie should just be called "Transformers: Hammer to the Skull." Read more

Cary Darling, Fort Worth Star-Telegram/DFW.com: There's only one thing anyone really needs to know about [this] exercise in robot-on-robot violence: at nearly three hours, it's the longest "Transformers" yet. Any mention of the leaden dialogue [and] wooden acting...would just be piling on. Read more

Chris Nashawaty, Entertainment Weekly: Bay has said that this film will kick off a second trilogy of Transformers movies - and I think he's serious. That means there will be (at least) two more of these things. God help us all. Read more

Jordan Hoffman, Film.com: There are few pleasures in life like having your seat vibrate with the deep, resonant tones of Peter Cullen's Optimus Prime. Read more

Clarence Tsui, Hollywood Reporter: The bloat of this latest entry -- at 165 minutes, the longest of the lot -- suggests that Michael Bay and his team are struggling to rejuvenate the whole premise. Read more

Betsy Sharkey, Los Angeles Times: It's still not a great movie, but it is, most definitely, full-metal Bay. Read more

Amy Nicholson, L.A. Weekly: The movie's crammed with useless nuts and bolts, the storytelling equivalent of a mechanic who lifts the hood of your car and says, "That's everything, fix it yourself." Read more

Rene Rodriguez, Miami Herald: To say that Age of Extinction is the best installment in the money-minting Transformers franchise is like saying the best episode of The Love Boat was the one that had Charo in it: The praise is so faint, it's close to meaningless. Read more

Rafer Guzman, Newsday: Like a nuclear arsenal launched by an insane despot, Michael Bay's "Transformers: Age of Extinction" aims for a million different targets and incinerates them beyond recognition. Read more

Richard Brody, New Yorker: The few authentic inspirations to be found in the movie's hundred and sixty-five roiling minutes involve gigantic science-fiction contrivances. Read more

Stephen Whitty, Newark Star-Ledger: One-hundred-and-sixty-five minutes. Think about that. Read more

Joe Neumaier, New York Daily News: If the "human scenes" all reek of adolescent dialogue and dopey snark masquerading as character development, it's a toss-up if that's better or worse than seeing clattering collections of caliginous junk ... Read more

A.O. Scott, New York Times: The story is scaffolding for the action, and like every other standing structure it is wrecked in a thunderous shower of metal, glass, masonry and earth. Read more

David Hiltbrand, Philadelphia Inquirer: Go if you must, but bring earplugs. Read more

James Berardinelli, ReelViews: This is as excruciating a movie as is likely to be experienced by anyone, anywhere. Read more

Richard Roeper, Richard Roeper.com: It is one of the most relentless movies I have ever seen. It just refuses to end. Read more

Peter Travers, Rolling Stone: Michael Bay has done the impossible. With Transformers: Age of Extinction, the start of a - everyone duck! - second trilogy in his metalhead franchise, the Bay-man has made the worst and most worthless Transformers movie yet. Read more

Andrew O'Hehir, Salon.com: Inflated, interminable and incoherent ... Read more

Peter Hartlaub, San Francisco Chronicle: Imagine if instead of creating new music, a recording artist kept putting out the exact same album, just playing the songs a little louder each time. That's what it feels like watching "Transformers: Age of Extinction." Read more

Forrest Wickman, Slate: I sincerely enjoyed the Transformer who was literally branded by Oreo.‪ Read more

Colin Covert, Minneapolis Star Tribune: Michael Bay outdoes himself here, creating the biggest, bloatiest, Michael Bay-est film ever. There is scarcely a moment in its 165 minutes that does not involve frenzied screaming, smashing or shooting. Read more

Joe Williams, St. Louis Post-Dispatch: In an homage to such "cinema of cruelty" classics as Andy Warhol's real-time "Sleep," Bay allows the film to run for almost three hours and abandons all pretense of a plot. Read more

Christopher Orr, The Atlantic: If it truly takes this long to save the world from the depredations of robots that turn into muscle cars, it may be that the world is no longer worth saving. Read more

Dave McGinn, Globe and Mail: Well before it finished I was numb from its bludgeoning excess. Read more

Peter Howell, Toronto Star: It's long, it's loud and it's really stupid. Read more

Alonso Duralde, TheWrap: Feels less like a movie than a product of the cinema-industrial complex. Read more

Joshua Rothkopf, Time Out: You're either awestruck, dumbstruck or just plain struck in the face. Read more

Scott Bowles, USA Today: The Transformers are brilliant, brave, world-conquering space travelers. Time to morph into something entertaining. Read more

Stephanie Merry, Washington Post: There are so many action sequences related to so many story lines, that midway through an epic fight, you might find yourself wondering what exactly started this particular battle and what the objective is other than destruction for the sake of it. Read more