Film / Transformers (2007)

Their war. Our world.

Optimus Prime: At the end of this day, one shall stand, one shall fall.
Megatron: You still fight for the weak! That is why YOU LOSE!

Note: This is about the 2007 live action Transformers film. For the 1986 animated Generation One film, see The Transformers: The Movie.

The first in the Transformers Film Series, live-action films based on the long-running Transformers toyline and television series. Produced by Steven Spielberg and directed by Michael Bay.

Our protagonist is teenager Sam Witwicky (Shia LaBeouf). He wants his first car to impress "evil jock concubine" Mikaela (Megan Fox), who turns out to be rather talented with cars. He ends up getting a beat-up yellow Camaro. But it turns out the car chose him; it's one of many sentient alien robots who can "transform" and disguise themselves as human vehicles. His name's Bumblebee, an advance scout for the Autobots, a noble faction from the planet Cybertron whose mission is to protect Sam from another faction, the evil Decepticons.

On another front, a US military base is attacked by agents of the Decepticons, with the sole survivors handling valuable information on whom they are fighting and how they can stand a chance at fighting back. At the same time, a Pentagon analyst finds evidence that there is a Government Conspiracy that knows more of what is going on than anyone else. These plotlines converge as Autobot reinforcements led by Optimus Prime arrive on Earth and tell Sam his family heirloom holds answers to the location of the AllSpark, a powerful artifact responsible for the Transformers' existence and lost for thousands of years. The two factions battle over it: the Autobots want to return life to their dying world, while the Decepticons seek to exterminate their enemies.

The film was announced as a co-production of DreamWorks and Paramount. During pre-production, the latter acquired the former, thus when the third film in the franchise was released in 2011, it was solely a Paramount presentation, a result of DreamWorks being reformed as an independent entity in 2008, with Paramount keeping its library up to that point. Paramount's involvement came in part because they had recently made a deal with Hasbro to distribute home video releases of several animated films and TV series based on Hasbro properties, including Transformers: Energon and Transformers: Cybertron (these rights are now held by Shout! Factory).

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This film provides examples of:

• Accidental Misnaming: Mikaela and Simmons each get Sam's surname wrong when they try to say it. Mikaela says it as "Wilkicky" and Simmons says it as "Wickity", even after Ron corrects him.
• Accidental Truth: When Bobby Bolivia says that at his shop, the car picks the driver and not the other way.
• Action Girl: Mikaela, who even gets to help in the climax.
• Action Film, Quiet Drama Scene: The discussion between the Autobots at the Griffith Observatory.
• Action Survivor: Sam and Mikaela. Until Took a Level in Badass kicks in. Also Maggie and Glenn, to an extent.
• Adaptational Achilles Heel: While Transformers are shown to have various weaknesses that vary depending on the universe, vulnerability to cold is one of the less common ones. Megatron being frozen in the Arctic is in line with prior stories (Skyfire had a similar fate), but more unique to this film is the depiction of cold as one of the main weaknesses of Transformers, with Sector Seven disabling Bumblebee by freezing him.
• Adaptational Protagonist: The first three films (Transformers, Transformers: Revenge of The Fallen and Transformers: Dark of the Moon) have Sam Witwicky as the protagonist. He stumbles upon and befriends the Autobots and then gets help from the human government when they are to face the Decepticons. Sam is a version of Spike Witwicky, who in The Transformers was the primary human ally of the Autobots and a significant supporting character (even getting a few A Day in the Limelight episodes), while his The Transformers (Marvel) self would become the Headmaster partner of Fortress Maximus. An offhand comment in Transformers: The Last Knight suggest that Sam died or was killed in the intervening years.
• Alliterative Name: Three. Bobby Bolivia, Maggie Madsen and Seymour Simmons.
• AM/FM Characterization: Bumblebee, the first Transformer our protagonist meets, actually has no real voice capabilities (this was caused by battle damage affecting his vocal processors), and instead does all of his vocalizations through playing songs on his stereo. At the end of the film, his voice is restored.
• Amazingly Embarrassing Parents: When Sam is hiding in his room with Mikaela after bringing the Autobots home, his parents believe he's acting cagey because he's hiding porn, and talk to him about masturbation in front of Mikaela. When Mikaela reveals herself, they then assume he's trying to have sex and awkwardly see themselves out.
• Amusing Injuries: When Sam first encounters Barricade, Barricade's door flies open and hits Sam, knocking him on his face.
• Animating Artifact: The AllSpark gave life and sapience to both the Autobots and the Decepticons, but was lost during a battle between the two factions. It just happens to be on Earth, where efforts to keep it away from Megatron inadvertently bring the AllSpark near a vending machine, then an Xbox game console. Both inert devices suddenly sprout limbs and blades and start attacking people.
• Anyone Can Die: Unlike most Transformers media, named major characters do die (Jazz and Megatron, mainly). We also see humans getting wounded or killed by the robots.
• Arbitrary Skepticism: One of Lennox’s team claims there’s no such thing as invisible force fields except in comic books, even though they had survived an attack by a shapeshifting robot the night before.
• Artistic License – History: Simmons claims that most of the technological advancements of the 20th century came from reverse-engineering Megatron. He includes cars on the list. The first internal combustion engine was patented by Karl Benz in 1879, a full eighteen years before Megatron was discovered in the Arctic.
• Artistic License – Cars: Bumblebee's second vehicle mode is a fifth generation Chevy Camaro, a car that wasn't even on the market when the movie came out, as production started in 2009. Somehow, 'Bee is able to find one driving on the street and scan it.
• Badass Creed: The Witwicky Family Motto: "No sacrifice, no victory."
• Be Careful What You Wish For: Throughout the film, it's mentioned and later shown that Megatron desires nothing but to have the AllSpark in his possession. He does end up getting it during the end...by having it shoved into the spark in his chest, causing it to disintegrate and killing Megatron in the process.
• Big "SHUT UP!":
  • Glenn tries to tell his grandmother to shut up while trying to welcome Maggie to his house to discuss the situation with the information concerning Cybertronian language.
  • Maggie tells Glenn to "SHUT UP" in the interrogation room when Glenn protests his innocence and blames Maggie for their arrest. Glenn responds by also saying "SHUT UP!", before realising his mistake moments later.
• Big "YES!": Two.
  • Sam at the beginning after he successfully convinces Hosney to up his grade.
  • Glenn lets out a quiet one (but with the same impact) when Maggie tells him the information she's about to show him is so classified she would go to prison for life for showing him.
• Bookends: The film starts and ends with a voiceover by Optimus Prime. Also, Lennox remarks in his first scene that he wants to get home so he can hold his baby girl for the first time. At the end of the film we see him doing just that, in silhouette.
• Bittersweet Ending: The Autobots technically win the battle as in they vanquished Megatron and his sternest soldiers minus Starscream and Barricade, but Jazz is dead, and the AllSpark is destroyed, meaning the Autobots are now stuck on Earth.
• Brake Angrily: When Mikaela asks why Bumblebee turns back into a "Piece of crap Camaro." It seems that Bumblebee does this in retaliation with Sam thinking it's this trope. However it becomes subverted when he was just leaving them so he could find a better form to turn into.
• Bros Before Hoes: Inverted; Sam's friend reminds him of the trope, but he's kicked to the curb so Sam can go after Mikaela.
• Butt-Monkey:
  • Bumblebee seems to get the short end of the stick of being with humans, such as when he's captured by Sector Seven and chained up in their secret base under the Hoover Dam.
  • Sam does not get off easily, either. The majority of the film’s humor revolves around humiliating him or getting hurt.
• Car Fu:
  • A rather different case than usual — most of the Autobots turn into cars, who apparently know Kung Fu. For the first movie, in fact, Michael Bay instructed the animators to watch Kung Fu movies to get a feel for how they should move. According to the DVD extras, he even had martial artists on wire rigs filmed to visualize the combat movements of the Transformers in hand-to-hand combat.
  • A more traditional case was Bumblebee's slide/drift in vehicle mode to knock down Barricade while rescuing Sam and Mikaela.
• Car Skiing: Bumblebee does this to scan and transform into the 2007 version of the Camaro.
• Chase-Scene Obstacle Course: During the Car Chase with Barricade the heroes end up in an Abandoned Warehouse crashing into a stack of what looks like cardboard boxes for effect.
• Chekhov's Boomerang: Captain Witwicky's glasses. Sam first tries to sell them on eBay, and Barricade implies their importance when he demands to know where they are. Optimus confirms this by revealing the coordinates to the AllSpark's location on Earth is imprinted on the lenses. Optimus then uses the glasses to determine the AllSpark's location. It's the Hoover Dam, which, ironically, was built around it to prevent it from being found.
• Chekhov's Gun:
  • During the attack on Qatar at the beginning of the film, Blackout no-sells gunfire from the military, but is dazed by a grenade launcher to the chest. This is what gets him killed during the climax courtesy of Lennox.
  • Early in the film, it's revealed that Sam tried out for the football team the year prior, only to be rejected. He gets to put his football skills to use during the climax when he's tasked with hauling the AllSpark while being chased by Megatron.
  • Optimus outlines a plan that the only way to destroy the AllSpark is by merging it with his own spark in his chest. The idea was that eliminating the AllSpark and Optimus along with it is preferable to Megatron getting it. Sam managing to execute that plan on Megatron was definitely seen as a Million to One Chance.
• Chekhov's Gunman:
  • As Blackout is attacking the SOCCENT airbase at the start of the film, a second robot is shown being released down into the sand. This turns out to be Scorponok, who later goes after Lennox's small band of survivors.
  • Glenn. He appears early on as a guy whose computer skills are important to Maggie to interpret the intrusion signal. Then, towards the climax, his computer skills come in very handy when the global power cut/power outage means computer skills are needed to contact the Air Force.
• Chekhov's Hobby: Right after it is revealed that Mikaela's father committed grand theft auto, she mentions that sometimes she would come along too. Simmons then states that Mikaela has her own juvenile record. Any car-theft delinquent would most likely know how to break into a parked car AND hot-wire it, which is exactly Mikaela does to a tow truck in the climax.
• Chest Blaster: Blackout's chest cannon, Frenzy's CD blade launcher.
• Composite Character: Bumblebee has the friendliness of the classic G1 Bumblebee but combines the visual "door wings" of Prowl and the frontline soldier role of Sideswipe.
• Cool Car: The car forms of Barricade (a Saleen S281, a variant of the Mustang), Bumblebee (his 2009 Camaro form, which was custom-built for the film two years before its official debut), and Jazz (a Pontiac Solstice).
• Decomposite Character: The role of Soundwave as the Hypercompetent Sidekick to Megatron was split between Barricade (the cop car) and especially Blackout (the helicopter), including their use of deployable minions of Scorponok and Frenzy. He was in earlier scripts, but the demands against Mass Shifting led to the role being split up and, eventually, leaving him out altogether because it wouldn't have done the character justice.
• Depleted Phlebotinum Shells: The entire role of Lennox and Epps in the story was figuring out the most effective way of fighting against the Decepticons. They come to the conclusion that HEAT sabot rounds ^note  High Explosive Anti Tank do the most damage (besides heavy artillery from a gunship), although it's still Death of a Thousand Cuts from regular infantry.
• Destroy the Product Placement:
  • Zigzagged with the licensed vehicle modes never getting destroyed (with the exception of Sideways in the second movie), with the destruction/killing occurring only when they're in robot mode;
  • Inverted with the AllSpark animating a Mountain Dew vending machine and an Xbox 360, both of which start attacking bystanders.
• Donut Mess with a Cop: The FBI agents bring some donuts in for interrogating Maggie and Glen. Subverted, as Glen starts eating the donuts, then tells Maggie that the donuts are the tactic being used for interrogation, the assumption being that not touching them would make the agents assume the interrogation subjects were guilty.
• Dressing as the Enemy: To aid in their invasion, the Decepticons disguise themselves as various kinds of military and law enforcement vehicles used by the US government. The effectiveness of this varies — Blackout infiltrates a military base in Qatar as a Sikorsky MH-53 helicopter, but a handful of soldiers realize something's amiss after noticing his tail number, which belonged to a helicopter that was confirmed destroyed days prior and Sam is quickly able to recognize something's up with the police Mustang that keeps tailing him. Starscream, meanwhile manages to evade notice as an F-22 Raptor fighter jet — when several actual F-22 pilots come to fight the Decepticons in Mission City, Starscream momentarily blends in with the squadron, giving them mere moments to spot the imposter before he takes out half of them.
• Dropped a Bridge on Him: Sgt. Donnelly, a major supporting character in Lennox's storyline up to this point, is abruptly impaled by Scorponok and dragged under the sand, never to be mentioned again.
• Dude, Not Funny!: Sam has this reaction to Ron driving him to a Porsche dealership, only to tell him he's not getting one. We even hear him say, "It's not a funny joke."
• Embarrassing Cover Up: When the Autobots are hiding in the Witwickys' back yard and Sam's parents barge into his bedroom, with his mom assuming he was jerking off, Mikaela emerges from her hiding spot to give the impression that he had brought a girl home. Subverted when the parents are impressed by this.
• E.T. Gave Us Wi-Fi: The Decepticons' ability to infiltrate Earth technology is Hand Waved by stating that all modern tech was reverse-engineered from the captured Megatron, which would also explain why the AllSpark could be used to transform Earth's tech.
• Everything's Sparkly with Jewelry: Mojo's collar.
  Mrs. Witwicky: That's his bling!
• Evil Is Bigger: The realistic outcome happens as most of the Decepticons have alternate modes that include fighter jets, military helicopters, a battle tank, and a mine clearing truck; which are vastly larger than any car. Aside from Barricade, they often tower over the Autobots, with the exception of Optimus Prime.
• Exact Words: Sam instructs Mikaela to look over a section of his bedroom for the glasses that carry the coordinates for the MacGuffin, but quickly states that he means anywhere but his 'treasure chest' after he thinks she's going to look in the said container.
• Expy: Sgt. Donnelly is an Expy of Private Hudson. Both of them are experienced, wisecracking soldiers who panic after encountering and being repeatedly attacked by an alien enemy that ultimately kills them while they fight back.
• Explosion Propulsion: Ironhide uses his cannons to blast himself into a vault to dodge Brawl's missiles.
• Expositing the Masquerade: It turns out that the government has been studying Transformers for decades in a secret base under the Hoover Dam, and that most modern technology is actually the product of their reverse-engineering efforts.
• Eye Scream: While fending off Bonecrusher, Optimus Prime punches him hard enough to cause one of his eyes to pop out of its socket.
• Facepalm: Optimus Prime does this at one point while convening with Sam in his house.
• Faking Engine Trouble: Bumblebee (who is the car) fakes engine problems to try and bring Sam and Mikaela together.
• Family-Unfriendly Death: The film had its fair share of gruesome deaths.
  • Bonecrusher and Frenzy both get beheaded (in Frenzy's case, by his own weapon), and just look at the mess of what was formerly Megatron's chest after the AllSpark is rammed directly into his spark.
  • How 'bout that soldier in Lennox's squad who got impaled in his chest by Scorponok?
  • And Jazz's death.
    Jazz: You want a piece of me? You want a piece?!
    Megatron: No! I want— [tears Jazz in half] TWO!
• Flipping the Bird:
  • Bobby Bolivia's mammy does it to him.
  • Frenzy flips off security forces, after Air Force One lands and he “covertly” sneaks past all the guards where he rendezvous with Barricade.
• Foreshadowing:
  • Captain Witwicky, according to Sam in his genealogy report, kept babbling, in his last years of life, about a "giant iceman" he thought he'd discovered. Said "giant iceman" turned out to be Megatron embedded in the ice after a crash landing.
  • The final line of Optimus Prime's opening monologue: "But we were already too late." This is because the Decepticons are already on Earth and the Autobots (save for Bumblebee)don't make it there until later.
  • Barricade demands to know from Sam where Captain Witwicky's glasses are. This is because, as Optimus Prime reveals later, the coordinates to the Cube's location on Earth are imprinted on the lenses.
  • Ratchet says in the alleyway scene that the Cube's power could be used to transform Earth's machines. In the climax, Sam, while running with the Cube, runs into a Cadillac Escalade and its power brings the steering wheel to life, as well as doing the same to an Xbox and a vending machine.
• Freeze-Frame Bonus:
  • When he tries to attack Sam, Barricade disguises itself as a police car, with "To Punish And Enslave" written at the side (instead of "To Protect And To Serve" that is the real life motto of the Los Angeles Police Department).
  • During the climactic fight in the city, after Blackout transforms and begins walking toward the battle, he starts spinning his tail rotor in his right hand, which chops a "No Parking" sign to pieces as it spins up.
• Freudian Slip: When Sam is offering to drive Mikaela home, he initially asks if he could 'ride [her] home' instead of 'drive [her] home'. 'Ride' sometimes has sexual implications, which might have been what some girls would have interpreted the words as meaning.
• Generic Cop Badges: In a clever usage and in keeping with series tradition, the department emblem on Barricade's police car form is actually a Decepticon crest. Also, the motto on his side reads "To punish and enslave".
• Giant Robot Hands Save Lives: When Optimus catches Sam as he's falling from the skyscraper.
• Godzilla Threshold: The military plan to hide the AllSpark in Mission City.
• Good All Along: Simmons. He seemed like a bad guy when he took Sam and Mikaela away and when Bumblebee got captured, but is still on the side of the good guys and does yield Sam's demands at the Hoover Dam, namely that Sector 7 release Bumblebee and erase Mikaela's juvie record.
• Good Is Not Soft: The Autobots are heroic good guys, but are not afraid of intimidation tactics against Sector Seven or brutal violence against the Decepticons. Optimus in particular is quite stern with Simmons, ripping the roof off their van and barking orders.
• Heroic Sacrifice: Optimus is willing to attempt one in the climax. He tells the other Autobots that he would unite the AllSpark with the spark in his chest to destroy it. Ratchet tells him it would be suicide to do so. In the climax, Optimus tells Sam to do this if he cannot defeat Megatron. Luckily, Sam unites the AllSpark with Megatron's spark, killing him.
• Hidden in Plain Sight: Parodied when Sam asked the Autobots to back off from the house while he searched for the glasses. The Autobots transform into their vehicle modes... and sit right there in the back yard. Sam screams at them that it's not a truck-stop, and they have to actually go somewhere else and hide. Optimus later invokes the trope in his message before the credits.
• Hoist by His Own Petard: Frenzy is killed by one of his own discs slicing his head in half.
• Hollywood Hacking: The entirety of the slightly-less-than-awesome "signal processing" subplot.
• Humans Are Bastards:
  • The capture of Bumblebee by Sector 7, which, coupled with them repeatedly blasting him with freezing chemical during and after the capture, has a definite feeling of torture. When Bumblebee almost shoots the engineers after they release him, it's hard to blame him.
  • Some of this is even intercut with the rest of the Autobots questioning Optimus over why they should save us from the Decepticons, given how primitive and violent we are as a race. Optimus Prime reminds them that at one time, Cybertronians were not so different from us.
• I'll Kill You!:
  Megatron: I'll kill you! Mine! AllSpark!
• Imposter Forgot One Detail: While the Transformers can fool normal people with their disguises, the U.S. Army base in Qatar is immediately suspicious of an unannounced helicopter arriving into their base, and that is before they realize the same chopper was destroyed some months earlier.
• Invisible President: Played with. We get an out-of-focus blink-and-miss-it glimpse of the President's face on Air Force One, then a shot where his face is hidden by his big red socks.
• Jerk Jock: Trent, especially towards Sam.
• Just Plane Wrong: During the battle in Qatar, one of the government officials states that they're tracking an AWAC. As the name of the aeroplane in question is an acronym (for "Airborne Weapon And Control System"), the "s" is not there to pluralise it.
• Kill It with Fire: Agent Simmons tries to kill Frenzy this way. It doesn't work.
  Simmons: BURN SUCKER! BUURRRRRRNN!!
• Large Ham: Glenn and Agent Simmons are extremely dramatic in their actions and dialogue.
• Last Day of Normalcy: In the Mid-East, William Lenox and his Special forces squad enjoy some time off on their base, and on the other side of Earth, Sam Withwicky worked hard to get good grades so his dad could help buy him a car. They're then thrown into the middle of an interplanetary war between the Autobots and the Decepticons when Lenox's base is leveled by the Decepticon Blackout, while Sam discovers his new car is the Autobot Bumblebee, who was sent to protect him.
• Leave No Witnesses: Blackout goes to great effort to invoke this with his attack on the military base, taking great care to not just attack the humans, but also destroy as many vehicles (especially planes) that he can to prevent anyone from escaping to warn the military and sending out Scorponok to hunt down anyone who actually got away. It works in that at first the US couldn't find anyone alive at the base, and it's only through luck that Lennox's squad survives the attack by Scorponok long enough to make contact with the military.
• Lightning Bruiser: As a whole, Transformers are not incredibly fast in their robot modes, but can cover distances quickly and have enough firepower to go toe to toe with a US army garrison by themselves.
• The Load: Attempted aversion with Sam Witwicky, with the location of the AllSpark imprinted on his great-grandfather's glasses, and the fact that he is ultimately the one to kill Megatron.
• MacGuffin: The AllSpark.
• Magical Negro: Used car salesman Bobby Bolivia attempts to act like this as a sales pitch.
• Magnetism Manipulation: Jazz seems to have magnetic powers, pulling the firearms of soldiers away from them. Blackout also has an EMP weapon.
• The Matchmaker: Bumblebee on trying to hook Sam up wiht Mikaela.
• Meaningful Echo: "No sacrifice, no victory."
• Men Can't Keep House: Sam's room, with his suggested Porn Stash.
• The Men in Black: Sector Seven. Provides a nasty Threat Backfire in the third act when Lennox and his men get into a Mexican Standoff with Simmons and his men and Simmons' attempt at pulling authority is answered with "we don't take orders from men who don't exist".
• Men of Sherwood: Lennox and his band of soldiers, who are the only survivors of the airbase attack by Blackout. Donnelly is killed by Scorponok and when that battle is over, Fig needs medical attention after being wounded, but Lennox, Epps and the rest of them fit the trope pretty well.
• Meta Origin: The AllSpark is written to be described enough to explain their origins but vague enough to not answer everything.
• Midair Collision: Starscream shoots up a squadron of F-22's, causing one of them to spin out of control and crash into another one.
• Mighty Glacier:
  • Ratchet is one of the physically strongest Autobots. He's also one of the slowest.
  • Ironhide even more so, especially due to the cannons mounted on his arms.
• Ms. Fanservice: Mikaela Baines is heavily used for fanservice, given she's played by 2000s sex symbol Megan Fox. This includes shots of Mikaela's rear and exposed midriff as she checks on Bumblebee's engine and lots of low cut shirts.
• Mistaken for Masturbating: Sam Witwicky's parents notice that he's hiding something from them. Sam's mother outright asks if he's masturbating, and his parents proceed to try to give him space.
• Mistaken for Quake: When Ratchet walks into power lines and crashes to the ground hard enough to incite a tremor, Ron Witwicky runs under the table screaming that it's an earthquake. And later when the Autobots hiding in Ron's own backyard cause another tremor, Ron assumes it's an aftershock.
• Moment Killer: Invoked by Mikaela. Sam's parents were questioning Sam's nervous and twitchy behavior (due to the Autobots hanging out in the backyard) after coming into his room, with her trying to hide. To end the conversation Mikaela presents herself, making it seem that Sam was acting that way because they interrupted an intimate moment. Rather than being upset, Mom and Dad Witwicky are thrilled for Sam.
  Judy Witwicky: Oh my gosh you're gorgeous! I'm sorry you had to hear our little "family discussion."
• The Mountains of Illinois: It seems Michael Bay mistook Qatar for Afghanistan, since you can clearly see hills and even mountains in some background shots.The highest point in Qatar is only 338 ft (103 m) above sea level.
• Multi-Track Drifting: When the Autobots meet up with the Sector Seven convoy heading to Mission City, Optimus pulls a pretty impressive 180. The skidmarks are still at the filming location over a decade later.
• My Sensors Indicate You Want to Tap That:
  • Ratchet's introductory comment: "The boy's pheromone levels suggest that he wants to mate with the female."
  • Earlier, when Bumblebee pretends to cut out at a local make-out point, his radio starts playing Marvin Gaye's "Sexual Healing".
• Mythology Gag:
  • The franchise's signature transformation sound is heard a few times throughout the movie:
    • The sound can be heard at the beginning of the film during Blackout's first transformation.
    • It can also be heard when a cell phone transforms after being exposed to the AllSpark's energy.
  • At the used car lot, next to Bumblebee is a yellow Volkswagen Beetle, which was the character's alternate mode in Transformers Generation 1.
  • A possibly unintentional one, but Ironhide and Ratchet's faces resemble the "faces" from their original 1984 toys. ^note The original toys used for Ratchet and Ironhide in G1 did not have heads, as they originated from the Takara toyline, "Diaclone," in which the robots were piloted mechas. In an effort to compensate for this, Hasbro plastered stickers with a robot face on the pilot's seat of the toys.
  • At one point in the film, Optimus says "Freedom is the right of all sentient beings." This was the motto on packaging for the original toy for the character back in 1984.
• Never Trust a Trailer: Towards the end of the first theatrical trailer, a Cybertronian protoform that climbs out of the pool as a little girl watches is seen with red optics, indicating it to be a Decepticon. In the actual film, the protoform has blue optics, indicating it to be an Autobot (more specifically, Ironhide).
• No Conservation of Mass: Mostly averted, since care was taken so that the Transformers had the same amount of mass in vehicle and robot form. However, the Cube can apparently go from house-sized to basketball-sized with no release of energy. That said, the Cube is a magical MacGuffin responsible for the creation of not just a race of transforming giant sentient machines but their entire world as well so it gets a little leeway.
• "Not Making This Up" Disclaimer: Michael Bay mentioned in the DVD Commentary that the sequence where Lennox had to deal with an obnoxious telephone operator to get a call transferred to the Pentagon while under fire was taken from a Real Life incident he heard about while talking with some military personnel.
• "Not So Different" Remark: Ironhide complains to Optimus Prime for his affinity for humans and insists that humans are violent, primitive brutes. Optimus asks, "Were we so different?"
• Not This One, That One: Invoked by Sam's dad. When taking him to get his new car, he drives Sam through the parking lot of a Porsche dealer, waiting until Sam says in disbelief and excitement, "You are not getting me a Porsche!" to which Dad replies, "You're right. You're not getting a Porsche," and drives into a used car lot.
• No, You: When Maggie and Glen are arguing while in FBI custody:
  Maggie: Glen, shut up!
  Glen: No, you shut up!! DON'T TALK TO ME, CRIMINAL!
• Oh, Crap!:
  • Colonel Sharp when the 4500X copter transforms into Blackout and starts attacking the SOCCENT base.
  • Epps's "WHOA!" when he sees Scorponok's pincer right behind an unaware Lennox.
  • All the fleeing soldiers have an Oh, Crap! as Scorponok bursts out of the sand behind them. Those were real reactions to the explosion effects caused by Enforced Method Acting.
  • Sam has one when Barricade converts into his robot form in front of him.
  • Omar and Glenn when the FBI invade his home to arrest Glenn and Maggie.
  • Sam when, while talking to Ron, sees Optimus in his robot form climbing into the yard.
  • Simmons when Frenzy is attack to attack him, Keller, Maggie and Glenn from the airduct he's hiding in, saying, "This is not good."
  • Frenzy, moments before his death. Understandable, considering he'd just lost most of his head.
  • In the climax, Lennox, after being told Devastator is getting back up, and then when he sees Megatron on top of a building nearby, and lampshades it with this: "We're so dead."
  • Understandably, the woman driving the Cadillac Escalade in the climax when, thanks to the AllSpark, the steering wheel comes to life.
  • Bonecrusher tries to attack the Autobot-human convoy, and finds himself locked in a one-on-one fight with Optimus Prime. The second he realizes he's about to lose, he frantically calls out to fellow Decepticon Blockade for backup before being dispatched by Optimus.
    Bonecrusher: "Blockade! Help! BLOCK-" *decapped by Optimus*
• Ominous Cube: The AllSpark, the source of all life on Cybertron, instantly transforms any mechanical device that it comes into direct contact with into a sapient entity with its own transforming abilities. The AllSpark itself is also a Sizeshifter, starting off larger than Bumblebee, who is already enormous, then compacting itself to be small enough for a human to carry.
• One-Steve Limit: Averted, with Robert Epps and Bobby Bolivia.
• Online Alias: Sam's eBay username of LadiesMan217 attempts to suggest he's more popular with women than he actually is^note Various adaptations and foreign dubs of the film change the term "ladies' man" to various phrases with similar connotations, such as "playboy217", "DonJuan217" (after the famed Spanish womanizer), and "hotstud217". When the Decepticons find a listing of Sam's with an item containing directions to the film's MacGuffin and track him down, Barricade ends up addressing Sam by his alias because they don't know his real name.
  "Are you username LadiesMan217?!?"
• Only One Name: Averted with Lennox, his wife calls him Will at the beginning before the connection between them freezes. Epps's first name is revealed to be Robert, as Fig calls him Bobby in their opening scene.
• Operator from India: Lennox attempts to call Pentagon in Qatar when his squad is attacked by Scorponok, but his call is redirected to a disinterested Indian operator. According to Michael Bay, this was based on a true story, presumably minus the giant robot attack.
  Lennox: This is an emergency Pentagon call! The Pentagon, do you understand—?
  [the window behind him explodes]
  Lennox: I DON'T HAVE A CREDIT CARD!
  Operator: [bored] Sir, the attitude is not going to speed things up any bit at all. I'm going to ask you to speak very clearly into the mouthpiece...
  Lennox: I'm in the middle of a war! This is FRIGGIN' RIDICULOUS!!
• Over-the-Top Secret: Sector 7 classified footage obtained from Beagle 2 landing as "Above Top Secret", as well as the existence of Megatron and the AllSpark.
• Palette Swap: When the Autobots arrive on Earth we see Ironhide, Optimus and Jazz in their "protoforms," silvery skeletal modes they transform into after crashing in their comet re-entry modes. Because of how briefly each one is seen they are the exact same model, just resized (and different body movement) according to the character.
• Papa Wolf: Ron tells Simmons this when he comes for Sam: "You're not taking my son." Optimus as well: "Taking the children was a bad move."
• Porn Stash: Sam is implied to have one in his room when Mikaela almost comes across it. His copy of Busty Beauties that he got from his Uncle Charles is likely part of it.
• Pre Ass Kicking One Liner: "Join them in EXTINCTION!" *blam*
• Precision F-Strike: Frenzy's demise when his head is sliced in half with his own weapon.
  Frenzy: Oh, shit!
• Pyrrhic Victory: The Autobots win the battle of Mission City, but they don't celebrate due to the heavy losses. Jazz was sacrificed and the AllSpark is destroyed so they can't return to Cybertron.
• Rapid-Fire "No!":
  • Sam, multiple times.
  • Also Simmons, after being told they can't contact the Air Force without mics.
• "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Megatron to Optimus:
  Megatron: You still fight for the weak! That is why you lose!
• Rule of Cool: Giant robots... Giant robots. The advertising campaign amounted to, "Look at all the cool shit they can do!"
• Rule of Pool: Omar, Glenn's cousin, is tackled into the pool when the FBI break in to take Glenn and Maggie into custody.
• Sci-Fi Writers Have No Sense of Scale: Sam's body reads on a Geiger counter at 14 rads when Simmons scans him. In the few days that he's spent with Bumblebee, Sam has incurred a minimum of 47 times his annual dose of naturally occurring radiation, enough to measurably increase his lifetime cancer risk if this wasn't a silly movie about giant robots trying to kill each other.
• Screams Like a Little Girl: Glenn during his Oh, Crap! moment.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Starscream ups and flees the battle at the end, and a mid-credits scene shows him flying off into space.
• Sealed Evil in a Can: Megatron is kept on ice inside the Hoover Dam, and is pretty angry upon thawing out.
• Screaming Woman: A slow-motion shot of one in Mission City as Ironhide leaps over her to avoid missiles fired by Devastator/Brawl. The scream is partly muted, but the effect is much the same.
• Self-Deprecation:
  • On the part of director Michael Bay:
    Nerd with camera: This is easily, a hundred times cooler than Armageddon, I swear to God!!
  • And the very famous commercial where he goes around blowing stuff up demanding that everything be awesome, including a to-scale Bumblebee statue behind him.
  • The human that Megatron flicked was... Michael Bay himself.
• Sharp-Dressed Man: Simmons is suited when we first see him.
• Shout-Out:
  • At the site where one of the Autobots crashed, we see a nerdy guy screaming "This is a hundred times cooler than Armageddon!"
  • The scene where Captain Lennox and his team are pinned down, need to call the Pentagon over a phone and need a credit card to pay for the call is almost identical to a scene in the film Heartbreak Ridge.
• Skewed Priorities: The driver of the Cadillac Escalade in the climax is more concerned with Sam hitting her car that the battle unfolding before her eyes that involve giant alien robots. Then the car's steering wheel (brought to life by the Cube and Sam's impact with the vehicle) starts attacking her.
• Standard Hollywood Strafing Procedure: The A-10's that attack Scorponok are shown shredding the ground in plenty of space before and after his spot.
• Standard Police Motto: Parodied. Barricade's alt-mode is a police car mode with the phrase "To punish and enslave."
• Staring Kid: Several, one notable one is the girl who has a transformer land in her pool.
• The Stinger:
  • First, Sam's parents vehemently (and poorly) trying to deny the existence of aliens to reporters.
  • Then, Starscream retreating to space.
• Surprisingly Realistic Outcome:
  • Pinned down, Lennox tells Sam to take the cube to the roof of an abandoned building nearby and wait for a chopper to extract them both. The already desperate plan utterly falls apart, as the building is old enough that Megatron can tear through it like tissue paper, three of the Decepticons can fly and Starscream has absolutely no problems taking out the chopper before Sam can drop off his cargo^note In fact, he shows up early and seems to actually be waiting for the thing to arrive, before shooting it down just as Sam tries to complete his mission - it's completely possible he was waiting for him to climb in before simply taking out both Sam and the heli with one hit and in the end Sam ends up being trapped between an angry giant robot and a massive, obviously lethal fall to the street. Sure, if the opponents were humans the plan probably would have worked, but with giant robots who can turn into military vehicles it's not quite as effective.
  • One of the snipers in Lennox's platoon attempts to snipe Blackout's weapon using a Laser Sight. Unfortunately, the weapon is in use and is therefore in the Decepticon's plain line of sight, and seeing the impossible-to-miss green flash of light on his arm Blackout instantly turns towards the sniper (and the viewers). As a result, all the sniper accomplished was tipping off the mechanical giant that he's got puny fleshlings literally aiming at him. Real-life laser sights are best used at night, where non-visible ones can be seen and traced with night-vision goggles. Using a visible laser in broad daylight will only tell the enemy where the shooters are and are aiming at them.
• Take That!: The Invisible President (meant to be ) is portrayed as an oblivious moron who sits around and asks for snack cakes while alien robots hack the US Military.
• Took a Level in Badass: Sam and Mikaela. Both start out as just Ordinary High School Students, then end up actively taking part in the climax with the Autobots and soldiers against the Decepticons.
• Under the Truck: Captain Lennox grabs an abandoned motorcycle, drives it straight at Blackout, and puts it in a powerslide right between Blackout's legs, firing his assault rifle and Grenade Launcher straight into him (while at the same time, F-22's are shooting him with missiles), apparently killing him.
• Urine Trouble:
  • Mojo urinates on Ironhide's foot during the backyard scene.
    Sam: Mojo! Mojo, off the robot!
  • Also Bumblebee lubricating on Simmons is very reminiscent of this.
• Vengeful Vending Machine: The power of the Cube animates a soda machine, which sprouts limbs and goes berserk.
• Watching the Sunset: The film ends with Optimus staring at a sunset.
• What Measure Is a Mook?: While he probably expected to die in the process, Jazz's attempt to slow down Megatron ends up just like you expect the fight between a tiny Autobot and the three-times-as-large Decepticon leader to go - a Curb-Stomp Battle where Jazz is literally torn into pieces, followed by Megatron noticing Optimus, off-handedly tossing away the remains of now-dead Autobot, and resuming the battle with no worse for wear.
• Willfully Weak: Deconstructed. Optimus Prime deliberately holds himself back in his Final Battle with Megatron to avoid collateral damage, which leads to Megatron quickly curb-stomping the Prime and nearly claiming the AllSpark. It takes an airstrike and quick thinking on Sam Witwicky's part to kill Megatron and save Optimus's life.
• You All Share My Story: The three separate subplots involving Lennox's team, the NSA hackers, and Sam and Mikaela converge when all three are assembled at the Hoover Dam for the final battle.
• You Can't Go Home Again: At the very end after Sam rams the AllSpark right into Megatron's chest thus killing the tyrant for good and leaving the Decepticons without a reason to continue the war anymore, Optimus plucks the last remaining shard of the cube out of Megatron's corpse and holds it in despair. They needed the cube to restore their home planet Cybertron. The Autobots are left stranded on Earth for the remainder of the film series.

---

"With the AllSpark gone, we cannot return life to our planet. And fate has yielded its reward: a new world to call home. We live among its people now, hiding in plain sight, but watching over them in secret, waiting, protecting. I have witnessed their capacity for courage, and though we are worlds apart, like us, there's more to them than meets the eye. I am Optimus Prime, and I send this message to any surviving Autobots taking refuge among the stars: We are here. We are waiting." ^note WHAT I'VE DOOOOOOOOOOOONE!