Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Hailee Steinfeld, John Cena, Jorge Lendeborg Jr, John Ortiz, Jason Drucker, Pamela Adion, Stephen Schneider, Len Cariou, Dylan O’Brien, Peter Cullen, Angela Bassett, Justin Theroux, David Sobolov, Lenny Jacobson.

You cannot blame a film studio for keeping a franchise going when it remarkably continues to have fans clamouring, almost chomping at the bit to revel in its storylines and desiring to learn more about the possibilities of other worlds. You cannot fault business for delivering what the public wants, it is when the film studio brings to the screen the unexpected that is when you have to praise them for their sense of direction, for the understanding that when you have a formula that works, you don’t let it fade, you don’t let it become stale.

The biggest problem with franchises lays with the unarguable thought that it suffocates new ideas from across other genres, that the audience won’t find ways in which to enjoy and talk about more expansive ideas; it also thrusts into view the ugliness of expressing a view in which the studio ultimately sees the film goer as more than even a consumer, they become an oil well willing to become tapped continuously, dangerously overfilled, guzzled down on the franchise’s selling points till the well becomes unstable, till it catches fire and combusts.

The time comes for any film franchise to withdraw from the public gaze, to regroup a decade down the line later if the technology or the stories are there to be reenergised, and yet for the Transformers series there is still life  in which to be found, to explore and to be found a willing partner to engage with, a series that has found a new footing with the surprisingly cool origin story of Bumblebee.

The film works due to the many factors at play, the focus primarily on only one of the autobots, the tie into the original cartoon series which had a generation of kids enthralled and which set the scene for the future admiration, and the emphasis on the main human character Charlie Watson, played with incredible screen presence by Hailee Steinfeld. It is a film that sets out to show that we are all in some ways damaged, alone, that what we care for can be snatched away from us in a moment, it is a film that asks pertinently if we are willing to fight for our soul and belief if it means we can be whole again.

A film that touches upon many 80s inspired tropes, but which is willing to push against the accepted norm of what it means to be a young female left devastated by the events that surround her. In this Ms. Steinfeld captures a wave of optimism which is endearing and fruitful.

Bumblebee is the Transformers film you didn’t know you wanted but in which you will be delighted to see appear.

Ian D. Hall