Monday, December 29, 2008

Empire, USA Today TF2 Articles (Updated)

As promised, articles are now online from USA Today and Empire magazine about Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. USA Today's articles (here and here) have no pictures and provides less spoiler information and more confirmation of a few rumors that have leaked over the few months. Empire Online teases their magazine article while providing the dynamic but spoiler free images in this post. To summarize:

- As a picture below shows, confirmation that Shia's hand injury was written into the movie.
- Story plot is for the Decepticons to capture Sam due to information he "learned about the origins of the Transformers and their ancient history of Earth."
- To counter Decepticon goes, "the US military and an international coalition has united with the good-guy Autobots." (This explains Matthew Marsden's role in the movie).
- Decepticon Soundwave is the "fearsome communications expert." (Nothing about alt mode).
- "...Devastator, whose arms and legs are built out of other Transformers." (This appears to confirm the gestalt rumor, but no details on how many TFs it takes to form him)
- "...Jetfire, a villain whose age and broken-down physicality leads him to help the Autobots." (Verifies that he will follow the G1 arc of joining the good guys and that he will likely have a crutch of sorts).
- New Mexico filming was for a plot point about running from "ancient temple while villainous Decepticons stomp and crush their way through a village in pursuit" and into a "line of tanks and soldiers blasting guns at the giant robots above and behind them."
- "Not that we don't trust (special effects coordinator James D.) Schwalm and the boys," he adds. "But even an eyelash flying at you at 700 miles an hour will cut you. You're running past them, and your clearance is only about 10 feet. These dudes are moving, and if one trips or falls and we run into the muzzle of a blank, that could blow your chest open or burn you."
- "The U.S. Department of Defense gave its official stamp of approval to the Michael Bay-directed film, not only allowing production amid the pristine dunes of the Army's New Mexico [White Sands] missile range, but also letting filmmakers follow jets and fighter planes through the sky from nearby Holloman Air Force Base. More scenes were shot on the Navy's aircraft carrier USS John C. Stennis, and Marines fill the ranks of the strike team battling the invading Transformers."
- "The film's Army liaison, Lt. Col. Gregory Bishop, notes: "As far as I know, this is the biggest joint military operation movie ever made, in terms of Army, Air Force, Navy and Marines. I can't think of one that's bigger."
- "Among the equipment the movie is using in this desert sequence alone: two A-10 Thunderbolt II "Warthog" tank-killing jets; six F-16 Fighting Falcons; 10 armored Humvees; the Army's Golden Knights parachute team; two Abrams tanks; two Bradley tanks; two missile-launcher vehicles; two armored personnel carriers; and a quarter-mile of the missile testing range, cleared of unexploded ordnance and built into an Egyptian town and temple. (Signs warn not to cross a perimeter just over the gypsum dunes, because live bombs could be hidden in the sand.)"
- Off-duty enlisted where used as pay extra for many scenes shot with the military's assistance.
- "The final battle the military is helping Bay create is supposed to be an enormous firefight in Egypt, but much of it is being shot in the White Sands dunes in a town built over the roughly quarter-mile cleared span."
- "After completing work in New Mexico, the cast and crew moved to Giza for scenes at the actual pyramids, getting first-time access to the 5,000-year-old site from the Egyptian government. "It plays a big plot point," Bay says, noting that they were allowed to shoot on the pyramids — not just around them."
- "The studio has to reimburse the U.S. Treasury for live munitions and other requests for troops or equipment that unit commanders don't consider to be valid battle simulation or part of military training, Bishop says."
- "During this shoot, an F-22 Raptor [Starscream] roars by like a mechanical arrowhead, blasting the earth with the banshee scream of its engines. It circles the set dozens of times before heading off to complete its scheduled training."

Overall not as much information as hoped. Hopefully once the Empire Magazine hits newsstands (not sure when) that will provide more details and context for the below pictures. Thanks to Rich and April for the links.



Update: USA Today has posted a six picture photo gallery (3 above, 3 new below) related to their articles. The Optimus Prime picture is the same as the Empire image just without all the text to covering it.

27 comments:

  1. seems like bay will show more effects this time around but the plot seems weaker/predictable than the last movie. so the good points are for more robots more effects the bad points are for cheap plot to have both humans and robots in the same movie.

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  2. i think it's kinda early to say the movie will have a weak plot. granted, you may very well be right but for me i'm reserving judgment. i thought the first one was going to suck big balls but damn i was wrong. i'm really looking forward to seeing how the gestalt bot will look and what role it'll play. and personally, a weak, old jetfire sucks. i know, its true to the g1 but i'm hoping or a jetfire vs starscream scene

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  3. i can't wait to see sideswipe kickass on this film...

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  4. kinda upset bout jetfire being old... but hope he looks awesome on screen. and devastator BETTER be awesome! lolz... hope the plot's ok... kinda worried it'll be cliche...

    ps:gotta love the pic of Megan grabbing her boob (looks like it even tho it might not be the case)

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  5. Why is Jetfire old? That just does not make sense. Ditto on the wanting to see a Starscream vs. Jetfire moment. Well... maybe that will happen just not as badass as we thought.

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  6. Go to USA Today. There is a few good pics. Wonder waht the blue thing is in the tube in the center of the room on the last pic. Very interesting.

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  7. Three more pics:

    http://img519.imageshack.us/img519/6436/transformerspic2ig0.jpg
    http://img519.imageshack.us/img519/4416/transformerspic3xx3.jpg
    http://img519.imageshack.us/img519/8792/trasnsformerspic1oc5.jpg

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  8. From Empire:

    *The Transformers visited ancient Egypt before the pyramids were built.
    *Ancient hieroglyphics of helicopters and the other stuff archaeologists and conspiracy theorists scratch their heads over are actually our favourite race of alien robots.
    *The Fallen was described by Bay as "apocalyptic".
    *Bay claims Megs isn't in the film, he said the tank mode is just a new toy made by Hasbro.
    *Forty robots.
    *Budget is $200 million.

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  9. wow...optimus looks like if he'll get a good ass whoppin in this one

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  10. The first Empire pic looks like everyone's being 'blown away' by Soundwave's attack. If the script treatment leaked a year back is any indication, I'd say the glowy thing in the blue tube is the allspark.

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  11. How is that the Allspark? That was destroyed. I think the "script" said it was Allspark energy. Still, I hope that thing was wrong.

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  12. Oops... my bad. I just checked and it was written as an "orb" that has absorbed energy from the Allspark while it was at Hoover dam.

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  13. All this ancient Transformers history on earth stuff makes me wonder about....GRIMLOCK!!!!!!!!

    "Me Grimlock laugh at small creature who make big problems."

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  14. Nice photo.

    Now we got to wait for the trailer.

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  15. Tuturro back in action baby!

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  16. HURRY UP AND RELEASE THE TRAILER ALREADY !!!!!

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  17. im sure the thing in the tube is the part left of the allspark.. looks like its in some sort of guarded govt complex. Regardless this movie is gona kick ass.

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  18. Devastator Says:

    "Prepare for extermination! And all you punks who said I wasn't going to be in TF2, i'm gonna put my left cement mixer up your ass!!!"

    WOOOHOOOO!!!! C'mon Superbowl trailer!!

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  19. Wow ! 'Devastator' is really gonna be a waaay big deceptiproblem ! Maybe Prime and Jet combine then . But a trailer izzzz wanted !

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  20. Does anyone else see a face in blue tube? Like someone is looking into it from the other side ... except no one is on the other side?
    Please be Sam's severed head.

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  21. "Does anyone else see a face in blue tube? Like someone is looking into it from the other side ... except no one is on the other side?
    Please be Sam's severed head."

    Holy shit, your right! If you zoom in on it you can see it, and it looks like it has a some kind of hat, like a hard hat or something!

    That's fucking creepy!!

    What's up with that? Is that a joke or something??

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  22. What's up with that? Is that a joke or something??

    No, it's a head of a fan, who asked Bay for the 3543423 time "whEN aRe We GOinG to sEE somE roBOts???!!???!!!#@!@#"

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  23. its the face of alpha trion in the blue tube

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  24. GREAT!! I CAN not wait any longer the movie needs to be out now ASAP!!!!

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