Movie Review: Transformers 3--For Kids?

My first inclination is to say, no. However, I went with 6 kids from 8 to 10 years old and they all said they liked it.

One ten-year-old said he liked it, but it was a little violent. This was the boy who had no problems with the first Transformers movie when he was 6 or the second one when he was 8. See my post from two years ago.

The problem with Transformers 3 was with was the way in which they depicted the violence.

I never knew one of the criticisms of the first two movies was that the violence needed to be more graphic, more visceral, because these two elements were definitely heightened.

There was no torture this time, and the first half of the movie was clean enough - actually I enjoyed it and the premise; it was the second half of the movie that ruined it for kids' parents:

-Suddenly, the robots bled red lubricant. If one got shot, lubricant went flying. When one got punched in the face, red lubricant poured out of its mouth. In the previous movies, it would be a few machine parts.
-Humans were literally blown apart. As in, let's watch one leg go this way and the other go that way. And when I say humans, it wasn’t just soldiers, but civilians (lots of them).
-There were a couple of graphic scenes of human corpses.
-Also, in the first movie, when Megaton ripped Jazz apart depicting how ruthless he was as the bad guy, it was shocking. Here the Autobots do it with relish to the Decepticons. Don’t get me wrong, the bad guys deserved bad things to happen to them, but suddenly there was no difference in the way either side fought-without remorse, hesitation, or mercy. Tearing an enemy limb from limb is tough to watch, and still wrong, whether it’s the good guys or bad guys doing it.

When I walked out of the theater and saw a little kid, no older than 6, in an Optimus Prime costume, and all the other young kids in line, I felt bad for their parents as they had no idea what they were about to have their children watch.

And before you say, “Hey, come on, it was rated PG-13, parents should know better,” walk into any Toys R Us or Target, and their shelves are filled with Transformers toys and clothing. Are you really saying all this merchandise is targeted to 13 year olds? The other two movies were also PG-13 and neither rose to quite this level of graphic violence.

Really, flying red lubricant? Come on.

Would I take my boys to see the movie again knowing what I know now? My ten year old yes, and probably my eight, because what 8- or 10-year-old boy isn’t dying to see it.

For some reason sequels tend to be darker, look at Harry Potter, it’s just a real bummer that Transformers 3 had to be like this.

(As an aside, the editing for THE BATTLE, basically the entire second half of the movie was horrible, with people, Autobots, and Decepticons popping up out of nowhere, then disappearing, and then finding themselves in unexplained situations. It seemed liked the editors had so much footage, they didn’t know what to stick in and cut out, and then stayed on some scenes way too long and others way too little. Really annoying. In my opinion this was the worst Transformers’ movie by far for even more reasons than I've explained already, but I can’t say more without being a spoiler.)

Book Review: Blood Oath

Three short sentences on the front cover prompted me to pick up Blood Oath by Christopher Farnsworth: The Ultimate Secret. The Ultimate Agent. The President’s Vampire. I knew I’d buy the book after I read the first page. It didn't hurt that I have an interest in the Balkans. But aside from that, I really liked how chapter one used a secondary character’s reaction to the vampire to introduce him.

Farnsworth used many different perspectives to tell the story and I liked how he let the reader know the antagonists and significant secondary characters’ goals, fears, and wants.

Most of the action scenes were done well. However, there were some grisly parts.

My primary critique is that the human protagonist was introduced as a complainer which tainted my view of him through the rest of the novel.

Blood Oath is a good, imaginative book.

Historical Novel Society 2011 Convention

I had the great opportunity to attend the Historical Novel Society Conference in San Diego last weekend.

While the panels were interesting, what made the experience so fabulous was everyone being so friendly. No matter where I was, sitting at a meal, walking down a hallway or waiting outside the agent's pitching room, everyone was eager to engage in conversation. I heard fascinating stories about outlaws, princesses, kings, nuns, the arts, adventures, mysteries, romances, the Civil War, The War of the Roses, Ancient Egypt, Ancient Rome, the American West and so many more.

I also learned a lot about the business side of writing--especially the significant and unknown effect of e-books on the writing industry. Even though Bookscan isn't tallying e-book sales yet, there are indications that e-books now make up 30% of the market for books sold and for fiction up to 50%. During the final breakfast, I also had the opportunity to meet fellow members of the Los Angeles Chapter of the Historical Novel Society. And even though I had signed up late to the conference, meaning I had no scheduled agent pitch sessions, Kris did an amazing job in managing the no-shows allowing me to meet with three wonderful agents.

Thank you HNS for holding such a fun and interesting event.