(With a new Transformers movie looming I thought it would be good to watch and review some of the franchise’s films I have yet to review.)

The third installment of the (mostly) lucrative Transformers film series had a tough hill to climb. The first film from 2007 was a fun, nostalgic, and action-packed blockbuster. But its 2009 sequel, “Revenge of the Fallen” was an abysmal disappointment which saw the series take shoddy writing and big screen excess to some annoying levels. That gets to “Dark of the Moon”, a nice turn back in the right direction yet one still hampered by some of the same nagging issues.

The first right move for “Dark of the Moon” was with its writer. Ehren Kruger is given solo screenwriter duties and the movie benefits from it. The story is still overstuffed; it goes on for way too long; and it can’t shake the annoying urge to be crude. Yet Kruger devises a fairly easy to follow story – one that may not develop as thoroughly as it needs to but that has clearly defined stakes and comes together more cohesively than you might think.

Bay opens the film with a fun play on history. War continues to rage on the far-away planet of Cybertron between the oppressive Decepticons and the noble Autobots. A spacecraft called the Ark flees carrying a piece of Autobot technology that would have won them the war and saved their planet. But it’s heavily damaged, eventually crashing on earth’s moon circa 1962.

A U.S. government satellite picks up the crash and they immediately begin planning man’s first trip to the moon. Through a cool mix of real-life historical footage and newly shot scenes we learn the 1969 Apollo 11 moon landing was actually a covert operation to investigate the alien wreckage. Even the real Buzz Aldren shows up playing himself. It’s a silly but undeniably fun table-setting intro.

From there the story moves to present day where we once again meet Sam Witwicky (Shia LaBeouf’s final turn as the lead character of the first three films). Still temperamental and insecure, Sam lives in Washington DC with his new girlfriend, Carly (Rosie Huntington-Whiteley) whose supermodel good looks clearly impresses her ludicrously wealthy boss, Dylan Gould (Patrick Dempsey). Sam on the other hand is three weeks out of college and still doesn’t have a job. That is until he gets hired by the boss of Accuretta Systems, Bruce Brazos (John Malkovich in an utterly frivolous role).

Meanwhile the Autobots led by Optimus Prime (again wonderfully voiced by the great Peter Cullen) have allied with humanity in solving human conflicts around the world. All the while they have their eyes open for the return of their arch enemies the Decepticons. One of their operations takes them to the Ukraine where Optimus learns about the Ark crash-landing on earth’s moon. He also learns that the long believed lost technology has been retrieved. The Autobots visit the moon to see what’s left of the Ark only to find a powered-down Sentinel Prime (voiced by Leonard Nimoy), Optimus’ predecessor as leader of the Autobots.

And of course the United States government is involved led by the Director of National Intelligence, Charlotte Mearing (Frances McDormand). She oversees a super-secret international task-force known as NEST which is commanded by Colonel William Lennox (Josh Duhamel). Chief Master Sergeant Robert Epps (Tyrese Gibson) also pops back up, now working for NASA but forced back into military duty once it is revealed that the Decpticons have been orchestrating an elaborate ruse aimed at draining the earth of its resources in order to rebuild Cybertron.

As you can see there’s a ton going on which would become the norm for the franchise. Bay loved the epic-sized stories as much as he loved the epic-scaled action. It didn’t always work but he managed to pull it off here. “Dark of the Moon” takes a lot of wild turns, ultimately ending with all the parties coming together (and with Sam once again caught in the middle) for a huge battle in the city of Chicago. It’s a massive sequence that highlights many of Bay’s strengths and weaknesses as an action filmmaker. But it’s an ending custom-made for fans and it place proves to have lasting repercussions.

Though a significant step up from the previous film, “Dark of the Moon” still repeats some of the problems many people have had with the franchise. It’s way too ambitious and it’s stuffed with too much story and too many characters (I haven’t even mentioned the roles played by John Turturro, Alan Tudyk, Ken Jeong, Glenn Morshower, Kevin Dunn, Julie White, etc.). Yet I enjoyed many of the crazy swings it takes. And it’s just cohesive enough to hold our interest until the next big set piece comes along. And in these movies that’s often all some people want.

VERDICT – 3 STARS