Three-headed metal dragons and an all-out assault on Hong Kong!
These high-octane robo-brawls transform the series into something great.
The first scene of Transformer action in the series is also one of the best.
It has to be — it's the moment in 2007's "Transformers" that the Decepticons decide
the importance of finding the All-Spark outweighs the costs of remaining hidden.
It's also the first time that humans become aware of robots in disguise among us.
“You can call us autobots for short.”
“Autobots.”
“What’s crackin’, little b–tches?”
What starts out as a stressful but believably human encounter between the U.S. military
and an unidentified helicopter quickly turns into a huge battle between the service members
of a Qatar base and the Decepticon Blackout.
There's heavy gunfire, rockets, and an alien concussion weapon that sends a shockwave through
the entire base, smashing glass and sending soldiers flying.
"Revenge of the Fallen" introduces a number of new Autobots and Decepticons over the course
of the movie, and this major battle shows them go head to head with one another.
But what's most exciting about this action sequence is the smaller-scale battle within
a battle that Bumblebee has with Decepticons Rampage and Ravage.
Bumblebee is protecting Shia LaBeouf's Sam, Megan Fox's Mikaela, and Sam's parents from
an attack by Rampage.
Meanwhile, Ravage — who's taken the form of a big cat — attempts a sneak attack.
But Bumblebee is too quick and literally rips the smaller robot's spine out.
"Revenge of the Fallen" opens with NEST and the Autobots traveling to Shanghai to find
Decepticons hiding out on Earth.
Demolisher, a giant Transformer, comes to life and immediately begins to destroy everything
it can reach.
Optimus Prime is dropped from a carrier plane and attacks just as Demolisher destroys an overpass.
Optimus easily brings down the giant Decepticon, but its destructive run has already taken
a toll on the city, while offering fans one of the most exciting action scenes in the franchise.
This sequence starts off on the top floor of a skyscraper — one being toppled by the
invading Decepticons.
Unfortunately, our human heroes are at the very top, and the real excitement comes when
they decide it's time to escape from an armed robot.
They leap out of the windows of the leaning skyscraper and begin to slide down the edge
of the building at breakneck speed.
Tyrese Gibson's Sergeant Epps has the idea to shoot out the glass of the windows the
heroes are sliding down so that they can re-enter the building, but when they fall back inside,
they just start sliding across the floor in the opposite direction as the building's lean
turns more into a full-on fall.
The characters desperately grab at whatever is around, all while avoiding falling office
objects, and while most survive, some plummet to their death.
This "Revenge of the Fallen" scene begins when a group of trucks and construction vehicles
converge on a sandpit, with human characters Simmons and Leo watching nervously.
The multiple vehicles begin to transform, with these Decepticons, known as the "Constructicons,"
beginning to form one gigantic Transformer.
The kaiju-sized Devastator doesn't even allow Simmons and Leo to be scared of how big it
is before it begins its first attack.
"Mean robot suck!"
It creates an extremely powerful vacuum in its mouth that draws sand from the desert
and every nearby vehicle into its gaping maw.
And when the cars enter its mouth, they're crushed and explode out of Devastator's back
in a plume of fire and smoke.
Towards the end of "Transformer's" climactic battle in Mission City, Bumblebee has been
seriously wounded and has lost his legs.
But Mikaela is quick to act and hooks his torso up to a tow truck and gets them both
to safety in an alley.
But that safety only lasts a moment as Mikaela kicks the tow truck into high gear and speeds
back out into the fray, only stopping for a quick moment to turn back to Bumblebee and say:
"I'll drive, you shoot!"
It's one of the best lines in the franchise, and it leads into one of the best human-Transformer
action moments in all of the movies.
Mikaela drives backwards so that Bumblebee can face his enemies, and together, the two
rush a Decepticon the human soldiers are unable to bring down.
As they drive, Bumblebee unloads almost the entire arsenal of his weapons.
But more than that, he has to move the destroyed cars in the street out of their way, leading
to some classic Michael Bay car flips that are such a small part of the larger action
here they just feel like grace notes.
In "Age of Extinction," entrepreneur Stanley Tucci's Joshua Joyce discovers "transformium"
can be programmed.
Not only that, after mapping its genome, it can be given instruction by humans.
The first action scene we get to see with the newly human-programmed Transformers, Galvatron
and Stinger, is a massive highway chase.
Galvatron and Stinger are sent after the Autobots by Joyce and his company, but they soon begin
to act on their own and destroy cars driven by innocent civilians for fun while engaging
the Autobots.
But the real excitement is the way the transformium allows these new robots to transform and re-form.
Their transformations are fluid, almost as if they turn into a metallic liquid made up
of tiny shards between vehicle and robot form.
When Bumblebee fires a series of shots that perfectly connect with Galvatron, the transformium
robot explodes into bits of metal before simply reforming as a vehicle behind Bumblebee.
Early in "The Last Knight," Mark Wahlberg's Cade Yeager searches the ruins of the aftermath
of the battle of Chicago for any Autobot survivors and is attacked by the newly formed Transformers
Reaction Force, aka TRF.
They have him surrounded, and things don't look good.
But Bumblebee comes rushing onto the scene in car form, leaps over a hail of bullet fire
from the TRF members, transforms ... and falls apart.
He lands on the ground in the middle of the TRF soldiers in several pieces.
But it only takes a second before he goes on the offensive with those disparate limbs,
almost every single part of his disarticulated body attacking individually at the same time.
He begins to reassemble all the while.
It's a great sequence that adds a new attack option for one of the most beloved Autobots.
“Bumblebee, we only met when I was a little boy in short pants.
I must’ve been that tall, maybe taller.”
In "Age of Extinction," as a battle rages in Hong Kong, Optimus decides that they need reinforcements.
He goes to the ship that contains some legendary warriors, the Dinobots, and wakes them up
in hopes that they will join the fight for the Autobots.
But they don't immediately jump at the chance to serve as allies, and instead, Optimus takes
them on, proving that he can beat them and is a leader worthy of their allegiance.
It's an incredible fight scene, not only because we get to finally see the Dinobots in action
in both dinosaur and robot form but also because their scale is astounding.
Optimus, a very large robot by most measurements, is a fraction of the size of these legendary Transformers.
After the Hong Kong battle turns the Autobots' way, there's a brief moment for celebration,
but then Lockdown arrives.
The bounty hunter's massive ship opens a strange looking weapon that begins to draw all metal
objects towards it.
But it's not just small metal objects — it's literally everything, from the beams within
buildings to entire cars and boats.
The giant magnet leads to a widespread destruction that's only made worse when the heroes realize
that it's not just picking up all the metal in the city.
It's alternating between lifting and dropping these objects, causing massive shipping boats
to rain from the sky.
During all this chaos, the movie focuses on our human heroes who are in a car, attempting
to not get sucked up into the magnet.
It's a sort of chase sequence, but instead of being chased by another vehicle or even
a Transformer, our lead characters are trying to escape death and destruction by magnet.
The "Transformers" franchise isn't known for its emotional heft.
But sometimes, those over-the-top action scenes can hit you in the feels, such as the fight
between Nemesis Prime and Bumblebee in "The Last Knight."
Optimus has been brainwashed by the powerful Transformer Quintessa and renamed Nemesis
Prime as he serves her wishes.
At one point, Bumblebee pursues his former leader and engages him in a fight on a resurfacing
ship in the middle of the ocean.
The fight between Bumblebee and Nemesis is simultaneously thrilling and heartbreaking,
as we know these two have great love for one another and shouldn't be set against each other.
Their fight is brutal, and the sequence is only made more exciting and emotionally difficult
to watch as Cade places himself in the middle of the fight and attempts to draw out the
real Optimus, who would never fight his old friend.
"I am bumblebee.
Your oldest friend."
After our heroes make that skyscraper jump in "Dark of the Moon," Decepticon Shockwave
notices that there are still survivors in the skyscraper.
So he calls on his trusted enforcer Driller to take down the rest of the building.
Driller is a huge snake-like Decepticon with one massive cylindrical central body and several
tendrils that it uses to break things apart in its path.
Driller immediately gets to work tearing through the lower levels of the building.
It looks as if it's swimming like a flying fish, coming up and down through the glass
of the building.
But soon it begins to change its approach and starts to ensnare the building in a massive
constriction at the point where it was already beginning to lean.
The constriction breaks the final hold of the building and brings it perpendicular with
itself before Driller makes a final attack on the building.
After Cemetery Wind attacks Cade's family farm while searching for Optimus, Cade, his
daughter Tess, their friend Lucas, and Tess' secret boyfriend, Shane, try to escape while
being pursued by military-grade vehicles.
The chase takes them through cornfields, backyards, a small nearby town, and finally an abandoned
factory lot at extreme speeds.
Along with the requisite car flips and a thrilling high-speed leap from an upper story of the
factory onto a ramp below, the final moments of the chase are paralleled by a fight between
Optimus Prime and Lockdown.
The fight takes them over the rooftops of the factory lot and includes Optimus making
use of a crane to ensnare and hang Lockdown.
But perhaps the most visually exciting moment comes when Optimus blocks our human heroes
from their pursuers by essentially barrel-rolling over the Cemetery Wind cars.
"The Last Knight" opens with a medieval battle that we learn Transformers assisted in, and
the story centers on finding a wizard's staff so that the world can be saved.
“Let those who exist long after us know, that this, was our finest hour.”
Perhaps the most exciting part of the more fantasy-leaning "Last Knight," visually at
least, is the inclusion of Dragonstorm.
Dragonstorm is a huge three-headed metal dragon formed by the combining of the Knights of
Iacon, guardian knights of the staff of Merlin.
The knights form into this glorious dragon form in the finale of the "The Last Knight"
to participate in the aerial battle that takes place over, under, and between the colliding
Cybertron and Earth planets.
The fight between Optimus Prime, Sentinel Prime, and Megatron in the final moments of
"Dark of the Moon" remains the most brutal fight in the entire series.
The sequence begins with a thrilling fight between Optimus and Sentinel, who's betrayed
his Autobot comrades to work with the Decepticons.
But just when things look most bleak for Optimus and Sentinel is about to strike a killing
blow, Megatron opens fire on Sentinel.
As Megatron beats Sentinel, Optimus returns to his feet, and when Megatron suggests a
truce, Optimus rips his head and spinal cord from the rest of his body using his ax.
As Megatron's parts disconnect, there's a spray of sparks and fluid that's essentially Transformer blood.
But that's not the end of the scene, as Optimus then turns his attention to Sentinel and quite
literally kills him execution style with a shotgun blast to the head.