Bumblebee Movie Review

“The darkest nights produce the brightest stars.” - Memo

Bumblebee is a Transformers prequel about how the Autobot Bumblebee came to Earth in the 1980’s.  Once he lands, he takes the form of a yellow Volkswagen Beetle, and meets a young girl named Charlie, who takes care of him.  The film is directed by Travis Knight, and stars Hailee Steinfeld and John Cena.

I wasn’t expecting to love Bumblebee as much as I did.  When I walked out of theater with my little brother, after thanking me numerous times for taking him to see the film, he told me that it was his new favorite film of all time.  (His previous favorite was the excellent film Radio, followed by the Harry Potter series.) I chuckled at this, and while I definitely didn’t think that it was anywhere near good enough to be my new favorite film of all time, or even my new favorite film of 2018, I still really did love this movie.

Bumblebee is the first modern Transformers film to not be directed by Michael Bay.  I think that that the studio did right by changing up the director to Travis Knight, because unlike all Michael Bay’s Transformers films except the first one, this one is actually good.  The story makes sense, most of the characters are well developed, and there’s no stupid, cringey humor. All of the jokes in this film actually land, and are really funny. The action scenes are extremely well choreographed, and for once, the fight scenes between the Autobots and Decepticons are riveting.  When the transformers fight, we actually get to see it. It isn’t just close-up shots of cgi pieces of metal moving around and pressing against one another in a big mess. The fight scenes are actually coherent, and so is the story. The story is actually understandable; it makes sense. It’s straightforward, and isn’t convoluted, or confusing.  

Hailee Steinfeld gives a good performance as usual, and John Cena isn’t bad either.  There are many great callbacks to the ‘80’s in this movie, and this is yet another piece of entertainment that makes me wish I would have grown up in the ‘80’s or ‘90’s.  Speaking of the ‘80’s, this film is filled with music from that era, which I loved. ‘80’s music is really cool! I’m very thankful that this film understands that, and uses it to their advantage.  

I can’t talk about this film without drawing attention to the title character.  Bumblebee is incredibly cute and adorable, and yet he is also an extremely tough fighting machine too when he needs to be.  He has the power to charm you and make you laugh, but if something ever happens to the ones he cares about, look out, because Bumblebee also has the power to kick butt and take names like no other.  This is probably the best that this character has ever been portrayed on screen.

I only have a few complaints when it comes to this movie, one being the introduction of Memo, a boy who has a crush on Charlie.  He was a cool character, but he just kind of showed up out of nowhere. One minute he wasn’t there, and the next minute he was there.  His arc was rushed, and while I liked him as a character, I didn’t like the way he was introduced. He wasn’t just eased into the story, he was thrown in, and I don’t think that his introduction did justice to his character.  I also thought that the resolution of conflict between Charlie and her family was a tad unrealistic, and unbelievable.

In the end, I thought Bumblebee was a fantastic movie that the whole family can enjoy, and easily the best Transformers movie so far, and by far.  This is Transformers done right, and if you’ve given up on the Transformers franchise because of the quality of the films, please see this movie. Don’t do yourself the disservice of missing the film that die-hard Transformers fans have been waiting for.

Rating: PG-13

Grade: A-