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Alan, I hate to disappoint you, but I agree with you 100%.  You said exactly what I was thinking sitting through this movie.  Great CGI, cool effects, poor planning and story. 

 I was particularly blown away by your comment about their being too much in this movie.  I said the same thing to my wife when I got home.  The first thing I said to Jenn was actually “He [Bay] should have split this up into 2 movies.  There was too much going on, so much that he could never focus on any one specific thing long enough for you to get any form of attachment to anything”. 

One of the few things I liked was that Starscream and Megatron had their classic personalities and dynamic going on.  And Soundwave, who couldn’t love that guy.  I just wish we got a bit more of him. 

Things I hated:
Sideswipe:  All flash without an ounce of personality.   Uttering “I’m the shit yo” (or whatever the hell he said) after slicing Sideways in half within the first 2 minutes of the film doesn’t constitute character development. 
The Twins:  They had personality, but it was unbearable.  They were ignorant, annoying, offensive, and completely superfluous.  They didn’t add to the story in the least.  I found myself hoping that Devastator was going to eat both of them.
The Language:  You’re marketing a movie that’s based on toys FOR KIDS and a cartoon that’s shown TO KIDS about giant robots who interact with ….wait for it….KIDS, and you insert so much vulgarity and sexual overtones that no one in their right mind would bring their kid to see this movie.  The Derosby boys aren’t prudes.  We’re actually pretty vulgar and sarcastic most of the time, but I don’t swear in front of my kids.  And if I had to watch one more thing dry-humping another, I was going to walk out.  Could have done without seeing Devastator’s wrecking ballsack too.  Not necessary and only funny in an uncomfortable “what the f%^k…” kind of way.

The Plot:  Could we have an actual writer work on the next script please?  I know you spent a lot of money on CGI and marquee actors, but hiring a class of 5th graders to write the script for your summer blockbuster is the wrong way to try to come in under budget.  The studio will understand if you’re a few dollars over when the movie is raking in billions.  Please?  It never ceases to amaze me the poor quality of writing the major studios are willing to entertain in their summer blockbusters no less.   These writers don’t even seem to understand the basics of writing:  plot, character development, climax, resolution, some sense of continuity and structure.  Sometimes I think we Derosby brothers pursued the wrong career paths.

Megan Fox/Arcee:  You’ve created a “tough girl” character who could kick Sam’s ass 7 ways to Sunday.  Why is she being pulled along through this movie by the hand like a damsel in distress?  Same goes for Arcee and the Blachearts, the all-girl Autobot motorcycle rock band.  Perfect opportunity to show some female heroics.  In a movie flaunting two ignorant, offensive gangsta-stereotypes, the ladies could have had it worse I guess.

Continuity:  Maybe I’m mistaken, but I couldn’t wrap my mind around the fact that the construction vehicles that made up Devastator combined in one scene, then transformed into robots and followed Megatron on his siege of the dig site/village surrounding the Giza pyramids.  I hate to sound like a broken record, but one movie to tell the story of Megatron coming back, introducing Devastator, and the fall of Prime at the end would have been great.  The next movie could have continued with Devastator’s story and the quest for the matrix to wake up Optimus.

All in all, I walked away torn.  I love the Transformers (like you can’t tell from my previous posts on the subject) and was dazzled by some parts of this movie.  There was just too much bad outweighing the good.  Sorry folks.  It’s just my opinion, however.  I encourage you all to go out and see the movie and form your own opinions.  Thanks for letting me rant.

-CWD

I generally try to be a positive person so I’ll look at the positive aspects of this film to begin.

I think that this is an entertaining action film, with many explosions and quick camera cuts along with tremendous CGI. I really liked that Bay worked more on developing the personalities of some of the characters (Starscream, Megatron, and even Jet-fire to some degree). I liked that in a way there were more Transformers than can be explained…the thing to remember is that this is an entire civilization and to expect to be familiar with every single being is just not realistic. If this contained all humans would we expect a full background on each of them? Probably not so I am completely fine with not knowing all the intimate details of all the Transformers, and for the record many of them get their due diligence in prequel books and comics.
I also really liked what Bay did with Ravage, his beast form was well done and I was glad he never took another form. I also liked that Soundwave stayed in orbit, he’s a communication device not a warrior and as such he served a great purpose and got more face time than many people stated in their postings.

For the negative, let me just say that I am in no way a prude but the language and crude humor was a tad excessive. Bay did try to fit too much into a 2.5 hour movie and this is a common mistake made with sequels…this would be a time when bigger is not always better. I think some personalities got too much time (The Twins) although Bay did recognize that there’s a population that he is bringing into the Transformers fan club and he needs to connect to them…which he did apparently since my 13 year old nephew really liked them so mission accomplished. I just thought with those two, less would have been more (but they’re still not in Jar-Jar’s territory of annoyance’s). The story line and plot was thin and had some good origin pieces but was left to be told in bits throughout the movie. There were some aspects of the story that I thought could have used some more work, like the origin of the primes and what-not.

Anyway…these are just a few thoughts of my take. I’ve only seen it once so that makes a full review difficult. I hope my brothers post their thoughts too.

All in all an great theatre movie but not much more.