At the Movies: Becoming numb to the noise

Ben Lyons has not been so egregious lately in gushing over his friends--or rather, "friends"--at least not at every possible moment. Take this week's episode of At the Movies, in which the new Transformers movie is reviewed. Lyons doesn't even let on that he and Shia are buddies--or "buddies," as in Lyons says "See, we are totally best friends, look at this picture we took together," and Shia says "Ben who?" He has even removed the link on his Web page to the "Ben Lyons Poses with Famous People" gallery that he was so ridiculed for. The gallery, however, still exists.

But we do get this exchange on the movie:

Lyons: I was a fan of the first film, and I think part of the reason why it worked is there was so much anticipation to see these robots for the first time. And Michael Bay and the team at ILM, the graphics studio that does the special effects, really delivered in that first movie. Here it's excessive, and overkill, and your eye and your brain becomes rather numb to it rather quickly . . .

Mank: Particularly your brain.

Yes, so much anticipation. Just like he said last week that this is the most anticipated movie of the summer. Lyons continues:

Lyons: Oh my goodness, because it's endless, and it just sort of looses the mystique that the first one had of seeing these things for the first time. You become numb to it. And I found that the filmmakers were really irresponsible in ignoring the younger fan base of this franchise. You mentioned the 14-year-old boys loved the action and Megan Fox but the language and drug references, completely unnecessary. [my emphasis]

Wow, what a noble and controversial statement. Alright Hollywood, listen to this important message from Ben Lyons: We need less drugs and more female eye candy! Hey, anything less would be irresponsible.

Mank, who to his credit has generally been better at pointing at sloppy, stereotypical content in Hollywood films, put it a better:

Lyons: Dude, Megan Fox is so hot!Mank: I know why Megan Fox is in the film, no question. But at some point as you're trying to save the world and you're in the Egyptian desert, maybe jeans and a t-shirt. I mean enough, I get it, she's literally just there to run in slow motion and to be eye candy.

Unfortunately, we get this frat-boy grin (left) from Lyons as Mank is making this comment.