For some reason (a reason which I seem to be alone in realising on boards across the interweb) this teaser has pissed me off.

Firstly they have a dramatic countdown to what was obvioulsy gonna be a teaser trailer since the countdown ended on an unimportant date, other than prior to major summer releases. That's fine.... no problem.

Then it's all downhill from there.

They give us a trailer full of nothing but stock footage, captions and what has been ridiculously referred to as a "cool silouhette". Again... that's fine. Or at least it would be if this was March.

This trailer is supposed to run in front of the summer blockbuster releases. In my opinion, if you have that much exposure, you must take absolute advantage of it. It's the summer, you have a product you want to sell, you have asses in seats in cinemas across the world (a captive audience!) and the way you advertise your product is with a minute and a half trailer...... WHICH DOESN'T EVEN CONTAIN YOUR PRODUCT!

This was a wasted opportunity in my humble opinion, and I want to address a few things which I know people are gonna bring up....

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1 - The Marketing: "It's only a teaser!"

I don't care. These guys must have known that they were shooting a summer schedule (and if they didn't then this is a symptom of that). Someone dropped the ball when they failed to account for the fact that they needed to have a teaser in theatres before the summer. If need be, they should have devoted a whole unit to accrue as much footage as possible in order to have as much hype as possible coming out of this announcement teaser. As it stands now, it was half arsed. The simple fact is, like it or not, some people have never heard of TF, some people don't know about this movie, and some people don't have the internet.

How did this trailer inform those people?

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2 - The Fanboys: "The trailer ruuuuuules!"

No it doesn't.

Some people aren't going to like this bit, but remember, it's only my opinion.

The fanboy reaction to this teaser is simply childish and unforgiveable, and on more than one level. Let me first lay down that it's cool for people to get hyped about this movie. But to get hyped about this movie because of this trailer (which is what seems to be going on since it was leaked) is just groundless and completely transparent horse crap.

It translates into nothing more than a competition to be the biggest TF fan on your respective board;
"I watched it 20 time and it ruuuuules!"
"I watched it 437 times and I think it rules more than you think it rules!"

I can totally understand their enthusiasm, but ultimately, what they are doing is a contiributing factor to the decline of what thier community is based on, and is bad for movie goers goers in general. Why? Because it tells studios/moviemakers that they can put out any old crap and the fans will lap it up as long as it has the right logo on it. I guess we'll never really know, but the fanboys may have lowered the efforts invested in this movie by making the creators feel too comfortable considering they haven't even released a frame of footage yet.

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3 - The Content; "It's, like...... so deep man!"

.... as a puddle.

Some people have said to me that it subtly conveys some minor facets of the story. For instance, that the TF was on Mars and that the US Gov knew this makes it an interesting conspiracy into intelligent life outside Earth. Well, in the words of Kevin Spacey....... WRONG!

Now Rich spills the bean on this story and it turns out that the little bit of story which we could take away from this trailer is redundant! None of it will be used in the movie! That is, the Mars landing won't be, and seeing as the rest is stock, that doesn't really matter now does it?

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People are setting themselves up for a fall. Misled high expectations are bad enough, but they're worse when they're based on nothing at all. People need to grow up and stop playing into the hands of weak marketing.

Ive heard all the defence there is to be offered for this teaser, and I can admit that I may be reading into it a little too much. But let's just say it tweaked something in me. If people think I'm crazy, that's cool. Keep it to yourself, or even politely tell me! But this trailer makes me mad.

Mad because they offer us less than we want/deserve, and mad because people thank them for it.

Rant over...........

Whew, now that that's over with!

They should definitley try and keep the pace up, a short intro would be nice, or better yet...

Maybe they could reveal parts of the origin throughout the movie so as not to hold the pace back. Start right in the thick of things and then reveal parts of the beginning as they become necessary.

It could work, done properly.

All said, I'm looking forward to this.

Wow, well written Rynndar. I have to say you've managed to write down what I was thinking much better than me.

Totally agree with all those points. That teaser was a drastic let down.

Sheesh! That's a better receiption than I was expecting! I was worried writing that I must admit. Not that I worry about what people think all that much but some people hold this material close to their heart you know?

My comments have recieved flaming on other sites.

Strange how some people retort with intelligent discussion, and some accuse my mother of being less than faithful to my father!

I must still say again though, I am lokking forward to this movie. My comments only concern, as you say, the teaser.

Now, that's what I call a real rant! *gasps* You okay now?

Can I just say without wanting to look as if I am crawling on Rynndar here that if this teaser teased me a little bit, just reading his post now teased me so much about this movie. Now I am psyched to keep an eye on any news about it! Fantastic job!

Shall I contact Michael Bay's staff and give them your bank account details, they should have have you on their payroll! ;-)

i just want to point out that when they first recieved pics back from pathfinder, they saw a blue sky.

the image wasnt calibrated right and thusly it transmitted a light blue sky above it's head.

the new images, however, from the Spirit and Opprotunity rovers have confirmed, however... the sky, as you said, is not blue.

I commented on the sky of mars because it's much more interesting than the Transformers Teaser.

but Rich, the faint sillhouette of the robot smashing the rover DID get me psyched for the movie. so I guess it did what it was supposed to do.