History Creator / MichaelBay

Around the time ''Film/{{Armageddon}}'' rolled around he gained a very vocal {{hatedom}}, it seems for mostly the same reasons. The fact that every film has been a substantial hit (although ''Film/TheIsland'' earned somewhat better reviews significantly less than expected) seems to have made the hatedom angrier. If you look over his interviews, especially for ''Transformers'', you'll see that he is more than aware of it, and even makes [[SelfDeprecation fun of]] [[AdamWesting the fact]].

While he may be hated by film critics everywhere, you should always remember one thing: [[WebVideo/YuGiOhTheAbridgedSeries You mess with Michael Bay and you mess with America!]]

He started out directing commercials and music videos (most notably the very first [[AdvertisingCampaigns "Got Milk?"]] ad, and "I Would Do Anything For Love" by Music/{{Meatloaf}}), then Don Simpson and Creator/JerryBruckheimer hired him to direct ''Film/BadBoys''. The film was a modest hit and kicked off Bay's film career. When ''Film/TheRock'' came out it solidified him as someone capable of making energetic, entertaining and profitable action films.

Around the time ''Film/{{Armageddon}}'' rolled around he gained a very vocal {{hatedom}} among film fans, it seems for mostly the same reasons. The fact that every film has been a substantial hit (although ''Film/TheIsland'' earned significantly less than expected) suggests that they might just be a VocalMinority. If you look over his interviews, especially for ''Transformers'', you'll see that he is more than aware of it, and even makes [[SelfDeprecation fun of]] [[AdamWesting the fact]].

* ''Transformers: Age of Extinction'' (2014)

** In fact, Creator/RogerEbert (not usually Bay's biggest fan) said in his review that the main problem with ''The Island'' was that Bay seemed to be PlayingAgainstType trying to make a more cerebral movie and that the movie reflects Bay as not really enjoying it. He essentially admitted that while he might not always like Bay's movies, they at least usually conveyed Bay's own sense of sincerity, fun, and belief in the RuleOfCool.

* HiddenDepths: Bay is a lot more intelligent and observant than people give him credit for. He normally doesn't care much about the critical hatred he gets, but he did once make a poignant observation that movie critics have their own fandom and thus will often say things that would make them popular, and hating Michael Bay is pretty popular.

* ''Transformers 4'' (2014)

He started out directing commercials and music videos. He directed the very first [[AdvertisingCampaigns "Got Milk?"]] ad, and "I Would do Anything for Love" by Music/{{Meatloaf}}.

Then Don Simpson and Creator/JerryBruckheimer hired him to direct ''Film/BadBoys''. The film was a modest hit and kicked off Bay's film career. When ''Film/TheRock'' came out it solidified him as someone capable of making energetic, entertaining and profitable action films.

Bay got interested in action films when [[EstablishingCharacterMoment he set firecrackers on a train set, filmed it with his mom's camera, and got grounded]]. As a teenager he was as a clerk for Lucasfilm in the early '80s, and worked on ''Film/RaidersOfTheLostArk'', and [[ItWillNeverCatchOn thought it would suck]], but ate his words when he saw the final product. That got him interested in directing.

'''Michael Benjamin Bay''' (born February 17, 1965) is an American movie director. He's known for an incredibly energetic direction style that some claim is impossible to follow, while a lot of other filmgoers don't seem to mind.

->''"Why isn't everything exploding?!"''
-->--'''[[NarutoTheAbridgedComedyFandubSpoofSeriesShow Japanese Michael Bay]]'''

-->''[[http://robotchicken.wikia.com/wiki/Michael_Bay_Presents:_Explosions! "Michael Bay Presents: Explosions!!!"]]''

* SelfDeprecation: He's known to poke fun at himself, and contrary to popular belief, his response to Megan Fox comparing him to Hitler was positive, admitting that it was just part of her quirky charm. But, more publically is times he's gone out to make fun of his tendency to blow things up, like in [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lXRCf9LbLM0 this ad]], and also [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pTG0_jEvOnA this one]]. He used seven helicopters!

He started out directing commercials and music videos. He directed the very first [[NotableCommercialCampaigns "Got Milk?"]] ad, and "I Would do Anything for Love" by Music/{{Meatloaf}}.

Around the time ''Film/{{Armageddon}}'' rolled around he gained a very vocal {{hatedom}} among film fans, it seems for mostly the same reasons. The fact that every film has been a substantial hit (although ''TheIsland'' was significantly less than expected) suggests that they might just be a VocalMinority. If you look over his interviews, especially for ''Transformers'', you'll see that he is more than aware of it, and even makes [[SelfDeprecation fun of]] [[AdamWesting the fact]].

* ''TheIsland'' (2005)

* ''[[Film/PainAndGain Pain & Gain]]'' (2013)

-->A prediction of Bay's next movie. Four years old, and it hasn't happened. ''Yet''.

-->A prediction of Bay's next movie. Four years old, and it hasn't yet.

* DoingItForTheArt: He may love is explosions and chase scenes, but he puts the effort in to make them look awesome. He has these stunts done for real, and has commented such stunts wouldn't look as good if he relied on CG or models, and doesn't like bluescreen work. There is footage of the first ''Transformers'' movie where a car was launched into the third story of a building on accident (the resulting scene was Bumblebee's return to the battle in the tow truck). And when it came to making Transformers 3 a [[ThreeDMovie 3-D film]], he refused to work with anyone besides the best. In other words, the same team from ''Film/{{Avatar}}''.

** In fact, RogerEbert (not usually Bay's biggest fan) said in his review that the main problem with ''The Island'' was that Bay seemed to be PlayingAgainstType trying to make a more cerebral movie and that the movie reflects Bay as not really enjoying it. He essentially admitted that while he might not always like Bay's movies, they at least usually conveyed Bay's own sense of sincerity, fun, and belief in the RuleOfCool.

-->-- '''[[NarutoTheAbridgedComedyFandubSpoofSeriesShow Japanese Michael Bay]]'''

--> ''[[http://robotchicken.wikia.com/wiki/Michael_Bay_Presents:_Explosions! "Michael Bay Presents: Explosions!!!"]]''
--> A prediction of Bay's next movie. Four years old, and it hasn't failed yet.

Michael Benjamin Bay (born 1965) is an American movie director. He's known for an incredibly energetic direction style that some claim is impossible to follow, while a lot of other filmgoers don't seem to mind.

Then DonSimpson and JerryBruckheimer hired him to direct ''Film/BadBoys''. The film was a modest hit and kicked off Bay's film career. When ''Film/TheRock'' came out it solidified him as someone capable of making energetic, entertaining and profitable action films.

* DoingItForTheArt: For Michael Bay, explosions and chase scenes are an art. Even in his SFX heavy movies he has these stunts done for real, and has commented such stunts wouldn't look as good if he relied on CG or models. There is footage of the first ''Transformers'' movie where a car was launched into the third story of a building on accident (the resulting scene was Bumblebee's return to the battle in the tow truck). He has stated that he doesn't like blue-screen work. When it came to making Transformers 3 a [[ThreeDMovie 3-D film]], he refused to work with anyone besides the best. In other words, the same team from ''Film/{{Avatar}}''.

** Subverted with ''Armageddon''. In an interview with ''Miami Herald'', he said "I will apologize for Armageddon", and explained how being forced to film the whole in 16 weeks caused the crew's performance to suffer, but later added on his website's forum that his words had been taken out of context and he actually was proud of the movie.

* OldShame: As noted above Michael Bay isn't too fond of Transformers 2. More recently (and surprisingly), Bay has also [[http://www.cinemablend.com/new/Michael-Bay-Apologizes-Armageddon-37102.html apologized]] for {{Armageddon}}, claiming ExecutiveMeddling was responsible for some of the flaws: he only had a limited timeframe to do the special effects and would have had a different third act.

* PetTheDog: Perhaps literally. Bay is an animal-lover, owning two mastiffs (who can occasionally be seen in his films), and [[http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1308458/Michael-Bay-offers-50k-track-girl-filmed-throwing-puppies-river.html offered a $50,000 reward for anyone who had information leading to "the arrest and successful prosecution" of a woman tossing puppies into a fast-moving river.]] He also donated his Bar Mitzvah money to an animal shelter when he was a teenager.

* SelfDeprecation: He's known to poke fun at himself, and contrary to popular belief, but his response to Megan Fox comparing him to Hitler was positive, admitting that it was just part of her quirky charm. But, more publically is times he's gone out to make fun of his tendency to blow things up, like in [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lXRCf9LbLM0 this ad]], and also [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pTG0_jEvOnA this one.]] He used seven helicopters!

* UncleTomfoolery: His use of it in the ''{{Film/Transformers}}'' films was so blatant that it made the relatively more subtle instances in his earlier films stand out far, far more.

** Explosions

* ConceptVideo: His video for "I'd Do Anything For Love (But I Won't Do That)", by MeatLoaf, features Loaf and Dana Patrick as a motorcycle-riding Literature/BeautyAndTheBeast.
* CreatorBacklash: He admitted that ''Revenge of the Fallen'' deserved some of the hate it got.
* CreatorCameo: He's a NASA Scientist in ''Armageddon'', has his car nearly [[FlashedBadgeHijack taken]] in ''Bad Boys II'', and is in the airplane carrying Optimus Prime in ''Revenge of the Fallen''.

[[quoteright:350:[[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lXRCf9LbLM0 http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/MichaelBaycommercial.jpg]]]]

* {{Misblamed}}: A Type 5 very often.
** When he announced he was involved in making a new {{TMNT}} film, he revealed that it would change them to aliens. Naturally, this caused a lot of fan outcry and accusations of raping the Turtles and destroying their childhoods, upto and including some of the voice actors for the original TMNT cartoon (who went on to even claim he's 'sodomizing the Turtles and the childhoods of their fans'). However, what a lot of people failed to note or remember was that Michael Bay is not the director of this project, and he's not involved in the development, he's a producer. He doesn't have nearly as much control and the decision to change them into aliens is directly that of the writing team.
** Even in projects he's directly involved in (arguably ''all'' of them) he receives a lot of unfair flak. This is typically a result of people forgetting that in most cases Bay is merely a ''director'' and not the actual ''writer'' - the vast majority of PlotHole, DarthWiki/WallBanger and FlatCharacter moments in ''Film/PearlHarbor'' and the ''{{Film/Transformers}}'' franchise should be blamed on Randall Wallace and Ehren Kruger (scriptwriters for the two films respectively) instead of Bay. Other creative decisions Bay is commonly blamed for are better attributed to [[ExecutiveMeddling studio executives or producers]].