Hollywood Product: Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen

GENRE: Rock ’em, sock ’em robots

THE PITCH: The Autobots, those heroic space robots, must protect Sam Witwicky (Shia LeBeouf) from the evil Decepticons when the all-American teen journeys from college campus to Egyptian desert to find an Earth-shaking artifact called the Matrix of Leadership. No, really.

MONEY SHOTS: Cool robot shapes include a mechanical tiger; a parasitical satellite; a flat, origami-like thief; and the giant Devastator made of multiple pieces of construction equipment. Decepticons rain from the sky and destroy an aircraft carrier. Some of the battles are great in theory — like Autobot leader Optimus Prime brawling with three Decepticons in a forest — but the robots have so many moving parts, and there’s so much editing and camera movement that watching the fight scenes is like trying to watch rollercoasters screw.

WORST LINE: “You’ll always be my first car,” Sam tells the Camaro-robot Bumblebee in a dopey semi-break-up scene that is, nonetheless, less boring than a subplot over whether Sam will say “I love you” to his mechanically inclined girlfriend Mikaela (Megan Fox).

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(Photo courtesy Paramount Pictures)