Aim! Shoot!! Duck!!!

Guess it’s time for me to put a quick review of the movie that forms the conclusion of the trilogy & the last Transformers live action movie by Michael Bay.

The Good Stuff:

1) Amazing action/battle scenes!!! You really have to give it to Bay for being able to envision & pull off the amazing action/battles sequences in this movie. Everyone’s favourite is the highway battle ending in a showdown.  Great stuff!!!

2) Lots of Transformers G1 throwbacks. If you grew up watching Transformers G1 you’ll recognise these. Heck even the main plot is based on a few episodes from G1.

3) The special effects!!! The robots and Chicago in ruins are really the highlight of the special effects. They look so real you can’t tell at all it’s fake. No they didn’t destroy Chicago while filming but it certainly felt like that in the movie.

4) No dorky comedy, annoying robots and bad acting.  Couldn’t stand the type of humor & annoying twins in the 2nd movie? They are all gone. The comedy is good & everyone had a good laugh when it happens. Also, the new girl is good, didn’t do badly or amazingly. I really enjoyed the story arc of Dylan Gould, played very well by Patrick Dempsey. That was perhaps the most satisfying story arc in the whole movie to me.

The Bad Stuff:

1)  The storyline. It’s not well connected & feels hastily strung together. But then again, you’re not watching this for the story right?

2) New characters that were little used. Though there’s a few new characters plucked from Transformers G1 that were fan favorites, they were hardly developed & little used, including a very hyped up villain. Very disappointing.

3) The 3D. Well, it’s not that it’s bad, it’s just pretty non-existent to me. The only time i noticed it was during the Birdmen scenes, where soldiers jumped out of planes in wingsuits & fly around buildings with Decepticons shooting at them. Perhaps this has more to do with our local cinemas than with the 3D as in the USA, people have been reporting very impressive 3D. Oh well….

The Conclusion:

Go watch the movie!!! The special effects & actions sequences are more than enough to warrant watching this. Just remember to leave your brain & Transformers G1 expectations at the entrance & you’ll enjoy this spectacular Bayham movie at it’s best.

Transformers Dark of The Moon

3D movies have been pretty much a failure & a waste of money to me. Ever since watching Avatar in 3D (I’ve watched both the normal & special editions in 3D), no movie has come remotely close to what was achieved in Avatar. OK, I know some people will make a case for Resident Evil: Afterlife which I admit is one of the better 3D movies (in terms of technical use of 3D, not plot wise ), it still felt more like trying to show off 3D instead of being a natural fit. The movie environment was in a lot of dark confined spaces which doesn’t show off 3D well so the filmmakers resorted to an overuse of slow motion.

Michael Bay wasn’t a believer in 3D as well. He called it a gimmick & said he would never consider it when he took on the task of making the 3rd live action Transformers movie. I agree with him. But right before shooting started for the movie, something changed his mind. We found out why recently. The secret weapon the studios used to convince Michael Bay to make the movie in 3D is James Cameron, the director of Avatar movie, the man who dropped my jaw for redefining how a 3D movie should be experienced.

The Hollywood Reporter

Here’s the article that was published on www.michaelbay.com - Hollywood Reporter: Michael Bay Reveals James Cameron’s Secret Role in the Making of ‘Transformers’. It’s a very interesting read especially after I’ve watched the interview myself but couldn’t quite catch all of the conversations. Here’s the original interview done with Michael Bay & James Cameron, be warned though, it’s over 13 minutes long.

Some of you may have seen the 3D trailer for Transformers Dark of The Moon in theaters if you were watching any 3D movies recently (I haven’t). This trailer has some new scenes not included in the original official trailer. For those who didn’t manage to catch it (me!! )  or wants to have a second look, here it is below.

I have to say I’m far more enthusiastic to watch this movie in 3D now. If James Cameron is impressed with the 3D, I don’t think I can ask for more . Transformers Dark of The Moon opens in Malaysian theaters on June 29, 2011.

Transformers Dark of The Moon

After using Borderlinx for over a year now, I guess it’s time to follow up on my previous post about it. So has my experience & recommendation changed since? Kind of. 

Now Borderlinx as a service is great & really gives people like me an opportunity to buy things from USA or UK where previously I would have not been able to. Unfortunately, Malaysian Customs & DHL makes it impossible for them to keep their promises.

Malaysian Customs needs no introduction. Any M’sian who have dealt with them knows they are incredibly inconsistent. Tax & duty is supposed to have been calculated by Borderlinx so Malaysian Customs should not be charging me again, but of course this rarely happens. I’ve only paid once, the rest of the time I managed to get off the hook after having a few chats with the Malaysian Customs supervisor in charge. The next issue I have with Malaysian Customs is their habit of ripping open my stuff for checking. Out of 10 times my stuff will get ‘inspected’ 8 times & often results in sealed packaging being opened even though the item is in clear view. This pisses me off the most as it’s hard enough to find Mint in Sealed Box items that I want, then having Malaysian Customs help me ‘officiate’ it is really heartbreaking. This also resulted in a few items I wanted to keep sealed being opened as well, completely ruining the value of the item.

Next is DHL. The issue? Their speed. It takes around 1 week or more to deliver my package from USA. This is not helped of course by Malaysian Customs holding my package as well. But what disappointed me the most is that DHL didn’t seem to have any urgency to get the package cleared from Malaysian Customs, instead opting to just wait for Malaysian Customs to get back to them. This has resulted in my package being stuck in Malaysian Customs for up to 3 days & if not for me calling DHL twice a day, it might have got stuck longer. Then of course I have to settle with Malaysian Customs so it drags on. So much for using courier service.

After running into these issues, I’ve decided to give USPS Postal service a try. USPS Priority International service is actually just slightly cheaper than using Borderlinx but it all depends on your package since USPS charges by weight while Borderlinx is by volumetric weight vs dead weight, whichever is larger. Overall I find it cheaper to use USPS Priority International when you have more than 2 items to send back at the same time. Surprisingly, it’s fast too! In fact it reaches in the same time period as using Borderlinx! An added bonus is that I have yet to have any of my packages ‘inspected’ by Malaysian Customs. * Touch Wood!!! * Overall a very good experience so far.

So does that mean I won’t use Borderlinx anymore? No, I’ll still use it as there are a lot of sellers on eBay that won’t ship internationally so for these cases I will still use Borderlinx. But of course it’s a second option now, first being to ship using USPS Priority International. Also, I try my best not to ship anything Mint in Sealed Box using Borderlinx now to avoid getting a heart attack when I receive the package.