Transformers: Dark of the Moon

That's one small step for man. One giant robot leaping over my head.

Don't worry, my twisting of Neil Armstrong's famous proclamation will make sense once you read my review of Transformers: Dark of the Moon. It's the third film for the toy franchise, and the first to be shot largely in 3D.

Without the Decepticons running about, the heroic Autobots devote their time to quashing the schemes of human villains. On a trip to Chernobyl, they find a piece of The Ark, flagship of their former leader Sentinel Prime (Leonard Nimoy). Its arrival on the moon started the space race, especially the Apollo missions. On it is the means to build a "space bridge" between Earth and the Transformers' dead world of Cybertron. To get the bridge going, the Autobots bring the older Prime back to Earth.

Sentinel gets the bridge going all right, but for the Decepticons instead! When it's all said and done, the Autobots will wish they hadn't made Sentinel Prime again. Pun intended.

While the last film Revenge of the Fallen was swamped by too much of a good thing, director Michael Bay balanced everything out this time around. What does that mean? While the franchise's traditional robot smashdowns are present, they won't make the audience beg "enough, OK!" They'll just look at the film's marvelous visual effects and just go "wow, yeah!"

Aside from the effects, the cast gives in some fun performances. Cast newcomer John Malkovich and series veteran John Turturro both steal their scenes with ease. Patrick Dempsey, as the human villain Dylan Gould, makes for a perfectly despicable character. Point being, the cast has kept itself from letting the robots delegate them to background noise.

Instead of letting you decide whether to see it in 3D or on Flatscreen, I'll just say bluntly that Transformers: Dark of the Moon needs to be seen on a big screen first. That's how amazing it is.

Jethro's Note: To describe a few choice visual effects moments would take up too much time. Let's just say there's a lot.