FILM NOTES: From GLADIATOR to THE BATMAN: PART II & More

REVENGE OF THE FALLEN Update... Last Tuesday, Michael Bay stated on his message board that he was gonna ask Frank Welker to do the dialogue for Soundwave in Transformers 2. In case you don’t know who Welker is, he’s a well-known voice actor who’s worked on numerous animated TV shows throughout the years, ranging from the original Transformers cartoon (where he voiced Megatron and Soundwave) in the 1980’s to more recent fare like Futurama and The Simpsons.



The reason why this is big news is because of the fact a lot of die-hard Transformers fans (especially those who are huge supporters of "Generation 1", or G1, which consisted of classic characters like Optimus Prime, Megatron, Bumblebee, Soundwave and Ironhide) have been critical of the way Bay has recently been approaching the films. With the exception of Prime (and Peter Cullen reprising his voice role for the character in the 2007 film and Revenge of the Fallen), a lot of folks have been critical of the way Megatron has been designed for the movies (plus the fact The Matrix’s Hugo Weaving did his voice and not Welker), characters from more recent Transformers series (such as The Fallen) being introduced...despite the fact the mythology behind the Decepticons and Autobots haven’t been fully explained on-screen yet (which it should be, presumably, in Transformers 2...according to articles I’ve read online), and the fact Michael Bay’s certain sense of humor is fueling a sense or worry in terms of two new robots that will be introduced in Transformers 2: Skids and Mudflap.



I’m not a G1 purist, so with the exception of the way Skids and Mudflap are designed (on the Web, die-hard fans decry them as "retardbots"), I don’t care about these other criticisms of the film. I thought that Megatron was awesome in the 2007 flick, and I think he’ll kick ass in Revenge of the Fallen as well. Having Welker do the voice of Soundwave is a nice nod to the hard-core fans...and shows that Bay actually cares ‘bout what they think. In non-Transformers news, there are rumors that Megan Fox is reportedly dating Twilight star Robert Pattinson.

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Hm, I don’t know whether this will make me watch the Twilight films (a sequel is being made; I’ve never seen the first one) as a way to give Pattinson props for getting with BAG’s (Brian Austin Green) ex-fiancée, or to despise Twilight even more. Whatever.