Josh Cooley’s Transformers One is a non-stop funfair ride that by the time you leave the theatre – if you don’t by then, have a headache or motion sickness – you go home feeling good about world that you left behind for just a hundred minutes.

Four years in the making, Transformers One is actually outside of the Michael Bay franchise that currently boasts seven feature films (8 if you include Bumblebee). Transformers One is a fully Computer Generated animated film that has a captivating comic book look and feel.

Cooley’s film, written by Andrew Barrer and Gabriel Ferrari is actually a prequel to the John Rogers, Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman’s story simply called Transformers. It explores the origins of Cybertron and primarily focuses on the early friendship of Orion Pax and D-16 before becoming mortal enemies. They are given voices by Chris Hemsworth and Brian Tyree Henry respectively. While these two autobots are equipped with human personas, there are numerous other characters with individual egos: Scarlett Johansson provides the voice of Elita, a feisty supervisor in pink armour, Jon Hamm is unconcernedly evil as Sentinel Prime.

My favourite character is the fascinating Airachnid, Sentinel Prime’s menacing sidekick who is a kind of giant robotic spider. She is given voice by Milton, Ontario native Vanessa Liguori.

Transformers One is perhaps not ideal for a date night, but it is loads of fun and very watchable.

© 2024 John Anthony Jane