Friday, April 27, 2007

Prime Lips

So, an Aint it Cool reader went to a test screening of Transformers and... Optimus Prime spoke with those lips everybody hates so much. That blows a hole in Michael Bay's lies from earlier in the week.

Bay's obviously phoney claim was that the lips shoot seen in the leaked commercial were the product of some 'tests' being carried out by 'the European studios'. What?!? What was he trying on there? He tried to treat the world as idiots, every last one of us - and, yep, the majority of people swallowed it.

Bay was getting what he wanted, and he was shamed into changing his course. The robots were going to have lips and now they aren't. This will cost. If there were practical lips on the prop bots, they're going to have to be digitally altered, but if not, at the very least, the facial animation for the robots is going to have to be rejigged.

Unless, of course, the cash to do so isn't forthcoming. In that case, the film will be released with lips and everybody will get to see what an absolutely bare-faced liar Bay is.

Foolish. And with winning decisions like these behind him, who knows what else Bay has in store for the tedious talking car-bots?

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Far be it from me to put a dampner on any hatred headed in the direction of Michael Bay, but I think this is a misreading of what is actually going on here. All the rest of the robots will have lips, the only case where this is in question is that of Optimus Prime. Bay and the design team made an early decision to show Prime with lips to make his face "more expressive", but weren't happy with the final results. Recent interviews with Bay and a special effects supervisor alluded to this and stated that Prime's shieldy-mouth thing would be left up, at least for the most part, in the final film, rather than only being shown in action scenes. The fact that this change was not in place at the very first test screening of the film, which came replete with the usual warnings of unfinished CGI, temp score and so on, seems unsurprising. It is of course worth noting that, mouth-guard or no, Optimus Prime is still covered in flames, pointless -and pointy- fussy details, and exists in a film shot from a lousy, hackneyed script and directed by Michael Bay.
As for inconsistencies in press statements by Bay, as I understand it the guy practically lives on cocaine. It's a wonder he can manage to so much as put his stupid aviators on his head of a morning without putting an eye out.

Anonymous said...

That reviewer was a Bay fan, he's biased.

I still hope the film is 89% robot fights, though I bet there will be some unnecessary E.T. "boy and his robot" moments. All I want is robots that transform, fight and the beastie boys as a sound track. There we go.

Brendon said...

Why would any robot need lips?

But then again, why would they robots need to transform into cars with Autobot logos on the middle of their steering wheels?

Logic won't apply here.

So, on that basis, I was as okay with the lips as I am the whole set-up anyway.

As for hoping the film is all fights, or mainly, and not any 'boy and his robot' stuff - well, I don't much care, as long it is good at being whatever it is.

Which I don't really think it will be.

Anonymous said...

Regarding the lips, correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't Megatron have teeth?