Happy 4th of July!

I love the 4th of July. Mostly I love it because of the atmosphere of Sugar House, where I grew up. It feels like the 4th in the movie Sandlot. Suburbia, fireworks, barbecue, baseball, summer magic. Out in Saratoga Springs it's not so much that way. So my parents and I headed into Salt Lake for the fireworks at Sugar House and a movie beforehand. We saw Transformers 3: Dark of the Moon. It was a mostly enjoyable popcorn movie with incredible special effects. Man, that is an expensive movie. The number of digital artists working on it seemed to outnumber those working on a Pixar film, which is entirely digital. I felt a strange sense of nostalgia sweep through me as I watched Optimus Prime transform into and out of his truck form, like I was a 12 year old boy again (which is funny because I've never actually been a 12 year old boy...). However fun the movie was, here are the problems with it:

1. Leonard Nimoy, as the voice of Septimus Prime, quotes Spock in the movie. Really, people?

2. Optimus Prime was turned into a blood-thirsty, vengeance-seeking dirtbag. They took away the one perfectly redeemable character of the series. After ripping out Megatron's spinal cord in a vicious frenzy, he spouts off some line about wanting peace. Bologna.

3. The romance. I have never like the Transformers love stories, with the exception of bits in the first one because they were funny. I really disliked Megan Fox, and the new girl, though slightly better, still exudes a "I'm really hot but have no brains" quality. She's cute in it though. And man, skinny jeans really work for her. I wish I looked like that in my skinny jeans.

4. The Decepticons. As voiced by one of the characters in the movie, why do the Decepticons get all the good stuff? Though many of them are cool, I had issues with the giant worm one. As I read somewhere, it really is just metal in a blender every time it comes on screen. Over and over, grinding metal. It is sweet when Optimus takes it out though.

So see it, by all means, if you want a straightforward, futurist action movie with lots of flash and bang but no heart. I really did enjoy the time I spent watching it - all the above problems were mostly laughable, except the Optimus Prime thing. I really am upset at Michael Bay and his team for turning Optimus into a jerk. But it was fun, about exactly the movie I thought it would be.

Anyway...

Fireworks were fun! We ran into some old friends and I took some sweet pictures with my gorgeous camera. Man I love my camera. Good stuff. Lucky Mather, the wonderful person that he is, let us park in front of his house, so our exit was rather smooth. It was a very fun day. Happy Birthday, America!