Transformers One: Steelbook Edition - 4K Blu-ray Review

[Michael Scott]

Transformers One: Steelbook Edition



Movie:
4K Video:
Video:
Audio:
Extras:
Final Score:

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Movie
In the world of film, we haven’t seen a really popular animated Transformers film since the 80s. To date, Michael Bay and his spinoffs have taken the lion's share of the transforming robotic superheroes, with each and every film past his original trilogy basically dying a horrible death in theaters (well Bumblebee wasn’t half bad). So when I saw the trailer for Transformers One I immediately wrote it off as Paramount seeing that live action was going nowhere, so might as well pump out a cheap looking DTV type animated film. The trailer itself didn’t do the film much service either, as it looked rather cheesy and stupid from what I could tell. So I summarily ignored it until this last week when Paramount dropped a 4K copy of the Steelbook off for me to review. Pop in the disc and not 15 minutes in I get the weird sensation that this was not what I expected.

Orion Pax (Chris Hemsworth) is a mining robot working hard on Cybertron to mine Energon for his people’s existence while their glorious leader, Sentinel Prime (Jon Hamm) is out searching for the matrix of leadership that will allow the primes to come back to Cybertron and bring forth another prosperous era. You see, the Autobots have fought a long and hard ward against an invading species known as the Quintessons, but the conflict left them with only Sentinel Prime out of all the great primes that fought in the war. Energon is low, and the menial worker Autobots cannot transform and are used to dig up the precious energon that keeps their species going.

However, Orion Pax wants nothing more than to be an Autobot that MEANS something. While his best friend D-16 (Brian Tyree Henry) just wants to live peacefully and not make any waves, Orion is constantly looking for a way to get out of the mines and become somebody. The little Autobot gets his chance when he enters into the Transformers race of the year to prove that miners are “more than meets the eye” and garners the attention of Sentinel Prime. However, Sentinel is not exactly the Transformer we think he is, as he puts the two miners into the lowest level of the city, where they find the actual location of the fallen prime. Now it’s a race against time to find the matrix of leadership and prove to the entire Transformer world that they can be whatever they want.

I’m kind of going out on a limb here, but I think that Transformers One is probably the best Transformers film since the 1986 animated classic. It’s pure adrenaline fun, giving us a fantastic re-do of the classic lore and showcasing just how the leader of the Autobots comes to be Optimus Prime. The film is fast-paced, filled with action, and balances kid-friendly fun with brutal violence as it pits Orion Pax against in best friend in what will become one of the greatest rivalries in all of Transformers history.




Rated PG for sci-fi violence and animated action throughout, and language.




4K Video: Video:

Paramount almost always does amazing work with their day-and-date releases, and Transformers One is obviously no different. Comparing the Blu-ray side by side with the 4K UHD and I’m absolutely blown away with how good the 4K disc looks. The Blu-ray is a perfect 5/5 for a 1080p disc, but the 4K disc takes it a huge notch with the Dolby Vision application. Things are razor sharp and crisp as a digital 100-dollar bill, but it’s the colors and the reflections that really make this thing. The bright shiny colored film shows huge increases in color richness and saturation, and the Dolby Vision adds some incredible depth to the metallic sheen on the Autobots. Metal faces actually shift and reflect back objects in them, and have this 3 dimensionality to them that is just shocking to the eye. I could find zero instances of major banding, crush, or any type of digital artifacting, leaving this one of my favorite-looking 4K discs of the year so far.







Audio:

The audio is NEARLY perfect, and I’ll tell you why. On the surface, it seems to be recorded rather low (I had to boost it nearly 5 DB on my receiver to get it to reference levels) before it really opens up, but once it’s boosted there things really take off. This is a wildly kinetic action experience, with Autobot chases, explosions, score elements, and the like all encompassing the listening position with rabid aggression. One weird element I had was that the bass sounded weirdly soft, however, after bumping it up 0.5 DB’s in my internal receiver suddenly it exploded like you wouldn’t believe. Explosions shake you down to your core, and that giant race near the first 1/3rd of the movie has some absolutely devastating moments. It just strangely took that ½ DB bump to get there. I had a hard time scoring this as I wanted to give it less than 4.5/5 due to the weird bass issue, but giving it a 4/5 seemed a crime for how good it sounds, so 4.25/5 would be my actual rating, but since we don’t have that number, 4.5/5 it is.





Extras:

• In The Beginning — Witness the origin story of OPTIMUS PRIME (ORION PAX) and MEGATRON (D-16) and the evolution of their relationship from brothers-in-arms to sworn enemies. Filmmakers discuss the vision for the film and how it was brought to life.
• World Building On CYBERTRON — Hear from director Josh Cooley, the production design team, and the visual effects team about rendering the colorful world of CYBERTRON in a way that fans have never seen before.
• Together As One — Meet the A-list voice cast for each of the TRANSFORMERS: Chris Hemsworth (ORION PAX/OPTIMUS PRIME), Brian Tyree Henry (D-16/MEGATRON), Scarlett Johansson (ELITA-1), and more!
• The Iacon 5000 — Behold the most epic TRANSFORMERS race ever as competitors vie for the ultimate prize! Go behind the scenes with the filmmakers as they break down this breathtaking action sequence.
• The Battle For CYBERTRON — Cast and filmmakers take you through the film's epic climax as OPTIMUS PRIME and MEGATRON battle for CYBERTRON's future.

Final Score: ​

Reiterating what I said above, I had ZERO expectations for Transformers One going into the viewing. The trailer was boring and derivative, and I expected nothing but a kiddie cartoon ala the likes of the DTV stuff meant to keep sub-12-year-old people entertained. Color me extremely shocked to find a rather fun animated adventure that world well as a sort of redone “prequel” to most modern day Transformers lore. Sure there are plenty of tropes and cartoon cheesiness as well, but overall this was way better than I ever expected it to be. Couple that with a stellar 4K combo pack steelbook (thank you Paramount for making this a combo pack) and this is certainly well worth checking out.


Technical Specifications:

Starring: Chris Hemsworth, Brian Tyree Henry, Scarlett Johansson, Keegan-Michael Key, Laurence Fishbourne, Steve Buscemi, Jon Hamm
Directed by: Josh Cooley
Written by: Eric Pearson, Andrew Barrer, Gabriel Ferrari
Aspect Ratio: 2.39:1 HEVC
Audio: English: Dolby Atmos (TrueHD 7.1 Core), French, Spanish DD 5.1, English DVS
Subtitles: English, English SDH, French, Spanish, Mandarin Simplified
Studio: Paramount
Rated: PG
Runtime: 104 Minutes
Blu-ray Release Date: December 17th, 2024

Recommendation: Very Good Watch

 

[tripplej]

Thanks for the review. Will check it out.

 

[Travis Ballstadt]

This has been in my Kaleidescape queue for the audio/video. I've enjoyed the across/into the spiderverse animated movies, and even the mutant mayhem movie, so I have been planning to give this one a watch. Over the last week I keep hearing from more and more folks how good the actual movie is.

Sounds like a holiday break watch for sure.

 

[Mike Schramm]

Just used gift cards from my students to purchase a copy. Will be checking it out over break as well. As a Transformers fan, I have high hopes. When it was in theaters it didn't look too appealing, but with all this chatter about how good the AV is I am excited to check it out.

 

[Michael Scott]

Just used gift cards from my students to purchase a copy. Will be checking it out over break as well. As a Transformers fan, I have high hopes. When it was in theaters it didn't look too appealing, but with all this chatter about how good the AV is I am excited to check it out.

This has been in my Kaleidescape queue for the audio/video. I've enjoyed the across/into the spiderverse animated movies, and even the mutant mayhem movie, so I have been planning to give this one a watch. Over the last week I keep hearing from more and more folks how good the actual movie is.

Sounds like a holiday break watch for sure.

the trailer did this film a massive injustice. I would have completelye ignored it if it wasn't for me reviewing it.