Film Review - Transformers: Rise of the Beasts (2023)

Transformers Rise of the Beasts is the follow on from 2018’s Bumblebee and sees the Autobots led by Optimus Prime (Peter Cullen) in 1994 where the Terracon Scourge (Peter Dinklage) is after the Transwarp Key that will summon his master Unicron (Colman Domingo) to Earth but Prime will need the help of Optimus Primal (Ron Perlman) and his Maximals to Roll Out and save the world so all are one and free.

Rise of the Beasts isn’t as good a movie as Bumblebee was (having Kelly Fremon Craig rewrite your script uncredited does help) but it is a solid follow up that for the most part I enjoyed watching and firstly the use of 1994 and its hip hop culture was very nice and it didn’t feel too much like window dressing for the most part so we can have our cast dress up in mid 90s fashions and we can play mid 90s hip hop and other songs of that era on the soundtrack.

Also while before heading into the film I felt the addition of the Beast Wars spinoff characters (Beast Wars was a spinoff Transformers series from the 1990s made by the same team that also made the breakout CG cartoon Reboot about life inside a computer) was Paramount pressing the panic button to generate interest in a new Transformers film again they do work fairly well for the most part and hearing Perlman and Cullen play off each other was pretty cool especially in the third act.

And lastly Anthony Ramos from In the Heights is so so so much better than Shia “Nononononononono OPTIMUS!!!!” LaBeouf it isn’t even a contest here he actually plays a character instead of a panicky screaming plot device with a girlfriend and is very appealing as the human lead as is Dominique Flashback as Elena an archaeologist in training who finds a clue to the Transwarp Key and her and Ramos do have good chemistry together.

And so that was Transformers Rise of the Beasts and it along with Bumblebee are easily the only 2 live action Transformers movies that you should bother watching as their well made, have endearing human characters while using the Transformers characters well and giving you good action that doesn’t give you a migraine in return, I hope this group of films gets a third entry and Megatron returns because I want him back to face Prime one last time before either Peter Cullen or Frank Welker pass away, 3 out of 5.