Broken Chains

As a transformers fan since the early 1980's, I can say that this movie is leaps and bounds more transformers-ish than most other Bay-verse films. While it doesn't reach Bumblebee levels of G-1 homage, it does some justice to Unicron. With some minor spoilers: My main gripes with the film would be, first and fore-most, Wheeljack. I don't know who that guy is but he ISN'T Wheeljack. I would have been fine had they named it something else. Second, Optimus Prime. While I get that they were aiming for an Optimus that was doubting himself, this guy wasn't the Optimus that he should have been until the end. Also, while not really a complaint, just more of a suggestion for next time... the Maximals really needed more back-story for newer fans. Those of us who watched Beast Wars understood when Airazor said "we're both from your future and your past," anyone else was left in a "say whaaaaa.....?" moment. They did good trying to pay homage to characters in ways they couldn't have otherwise (like showing Mirage as a formula race-car that wouldn't be viable on city streets).

For everyone complaining that this wasn't "He-Man" and we didn't get much He-Man, you're right. It's Masters of the Universe and we got plenty of masters. So, you're complaining about the wrong thing. That being said, the biggest problem with this show was the character lines. It started out really clumsy with all of the attempts to make puns on stuff related to Masters of the Universe. For the good stuff, the artwork was beautiful. The story-line was acceptable if we consider it as it was intended, an extension of the original series. That is, had this series been released as a movie in the 1980's with the original animation, it would have easily fit into that story line, despite its darker tone (although, it seemed as if it drew more on the 2002 series than the 80's...). That darker tone is what's needed for a more modern story. Over all, the series was better than it was worse. I'm rating 4/5 due to some of the questionable scripting choices with regards to the character lines.