Hey Snapchat, I Think I Love You (for now).

Yeah, sure, I may be too old for it but I'm loving the story aspect of Snapchat. Truthfully, I thought Snapchat was used by teens for shit I could care less about. I'm sure that's the main use of it actually, BUT, I'm a story guy and I'm a guy who likes to film. This is a perfect combination.

In case you don't believe me, I made a video about it.... If there's a video that means you have to believe me. Of course, if you'd like to follow my stories on Snapchat, my username is: TheJoshford

[embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MkbU2zq_yRQ[/embed]

The TSA Is Clueless

When I was in high school living in Greendale, Wisconsin my friends and I used to get harassed by small town cops with nothing to do. The cops were the most two-faced humans on the face of the planet, wait, not all, but most of them. The majority would put on a facade of “hey, we’re your friends” but what they were really saying is, “hey shitbag, please sneeze so I can arrest you.” It was from my high school encounters that a subconscious hatred-seed was planted in my head and as time went on I grew to actually distain police officers. I never trusted them. I feel like I saw more officers walk with an air of entitlement rather than officers actually trying to help the public. It took longer than I care to admit to say that I respect police officers. As I’ve gotten older some of the best men I’ve met are officers. Solid guys sacrificing themselves for others. It took time for me to see that and I wish it didn’t, but my small town asshole cop named Officer Daniels ruined it for everyone.

Flash forward to current day: I’m now having the same adverse reaction to the airport TSA people as I did to cops and I don’t see this changing at any point in the future. The way that the TSA “structure” is supposed to be is the biggest load of bullshit that I can imagine. It’s nonsense. Literally, nonsense. Let me breakdown what happened today at LAX:

- Arrive to security.

- See the big magnetic new age body scanning machine and directly next to it is a traditional metal detector.

- See some people walk through the traditional metal detector with shoes and a belt on.

- Unload my belongings on the conveyor belt, take off my shoes and belt, approach the new age magnetic body scanning machine.

- I say to the TSA guy “hey, I want to walk through the other one.”

TSA guy says, “no, you have to go through this one (magnetic new age monster)."

Me: “Come on man, I see all these people going through that one, what’s the difference? And why do they have their shoes on?”

TSA guy: “You either walk through this one (fuck you magnetic one) or you opt out and do the pat down.”

Me: “Seriously?”

TSA guy: “Seriously.”

Me: “Why?”

TSA guy: “You opting out?”

Me: “Can I just walk through that other one? What exactly is the problem?”

TSA guy: “We’re only letting adults with children walk through there.”

Me: “Dude, I literally just saw a bunch of people walk through there without kids.”

TSA guy: “They had kids”

I’m now starting to get angry. I should note that I have this dark side that only comes out when an authoritative person like this starts bullshitting me. Oh, also, there were no kids walking through the traditional one. But it begs the questions, why the fuck aren’t kids walking through the new age machines? Are they harmful to kids? If so, aren’t they harmful to adults?

Me: “Seriously man, you’re going to tell me they had kids? There were no kids!”

My voice, slightly raised.

TSA guy: “So you’re opting out?”

Me: “Yes, fine.”

TSA dude calls someone over and says I’m opting out. I wait about 30 seconds and guess what, the new age magnetic machine stops working, someone yells that it needs to be re-calibrated, and then suddenly they direct everyone to the traditional machine.

I asked the guy if I could just go through the traditional machine, he said no, it was too late. I lost my shit. My arms were failing, I was literally on the verge of a breakdown. I started to bitch about how this doesn’t make sense and why can people suddenly walk through here?

I saw the look on this TSA guy’s face, and it was a look of total enjoyment. A look of knowing full well what he was doing. A look of entitlement. A look of unwarranted power as though he was actually doing something good. We all know the look. We’ve been there.

While I was ranting and yelling another TSA woman yelled from somewhere “Whats wrong?” I pleaded my case, trying to tell her I just want to walk through the machine. Why can’t I walk through the machine!? 

As I was making a fool of myself they just let me stand there until the woman came over and told TSA guy to pat me down. As he took me over I asked him why some people were able to wear shoes and a belt and others couldn’t. He said

“If you pay $85.00 per year you can get a back ground check done and it will give you an express pass through security so you can keep your clothing on.”

Wow. You fucking kidding me? 

He patted me down, I was angry, my fiancé just looked at me like I was nuts, knowing full well my problem with these guys. When it was all said and done I took one final glance at the smug assholes who actually thought they were doing something beneficial… And just like that, current day TSA people entered into the realm of the high school cops.

The thing is, I know that the TSA is meant for good but the reality is — It’s a total cluster fuck. There is no rhyme or reason, which is as much scary as it is frustrating. Everything about it makes no sense and I feel like we all know it, I even think the TSA knows it. It makes no sense to have a new magnetic body scanning machine and a traditional metal detector next to each other yet not allow someone to walk through whichever they choose. It makes no sense to allow someone to pay $85.00 per year to keep their shoes and a belt on. These are both just a big slap in the face.

It’s infuriating.

So, that’s my vent while flying on an airplane. My attempt to not sound like an asshole when talking about such a sensitive subject. I want to note that while I fully acknowledge the good that is intended, it’s a faulty system, it just is. We’ve been scrambling for years to stop people from harming others at airports and keep out the “bad guys” and while we haven’t perfected that system we have perfected the art of frustrating travelers.

Last thing - Fuck you, Officer Daniels.

 

inTransit: A Brief History Of My Journey and the Greatest Travel Show... Ever.

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Let me jump into a very quick story that turned out to be the catalyst to a life changing event. At some point in 2007 I met a guy at a ridiculous Hollywood party, he was sporting a Bulls T-shirt of Michael Jordan doing something awesome. Weird that I remember this? Yeah, maybe. But I’m from Wisconsin and if I think anyone is from the Midwest odds are we’re having a conversation. So, I go up and say:

“Hey man, nice shirt, you from Chicago?”

And he probably said something along the lines of:

“Yeah, where are you from?”

Which then sparked a casual run of the mill conversation in Hollywood that ended with us saying, “Hey, we should hang out some time.”

Flash forward to a few days later….

I get a text on my awesome 2007 flip phone from this guy saying:

“Hey, I’m going to walk over to your apartment, do you want to hang out?

To which I guess I said something along the lines of:

“Yeah, sure.”

The weird thing about this is that I didn’t know where he lived, I just said yeah because I was in my early 20’s and would say yes to anything. I called my other friend Ethan who knew this guy and told him he was walking over to my place. Ethan said that this guy lived over the hill.

***Just a quick little cool-guy Hollywood talk for everyone: When someone says, “over the hill” they’re basically saying they live in another world. I lived in a studio apartment in Hollywood and to go over the hill I’d have to take Laurel Canyon or God forbid, the Cahuenga Pass. I can’t talk about this anymore because my douche bag nonchalant Hollywood level is starting to get higher than I want. Long story short over the hill is far away…

So when I heard he may potentially be coming from over… and walking… I was confused. It didn’t make sense. Sure enough, a short time later this guy knocked on my door holding a six pack and said, “Hey, I found this on the side of the road.”

After a quick hang out he asked me if I wanted to walk back with him. I had to work at a Sushi restaurant later that night and I didn’t think I could do the walk. But after a moment of thinking I ended up saying, “yeah, sure” (I was early 20’s) and then he’d drop me off at work once we concluded the walk. We proceeded to walk back to his apartment.

On the long walk back he started to tell me how he always wanted to have a travel show and how much he loved travel. He went on, to what would later turn out to be an incredible philosophical approach about travel, and tell me about how important it was to see the small things along the way. How when people travel they can miss things, and essentially it’s all about the journey, not the destination. Of course, everyone knows it’s about the journey but few people actually instill this into their DNA, this guy was not someone who lacked it.

Flash forward to a few weeks later…

This guy comes over and tells me that he wants to document a travel series on YouTube. He wanted to walk from Los Angeles to San Diego, film it along the way, and then upload the videos at night. I thought it sounded awesome. Also, keep in mind that this was the early stages of YouTube, this wasn’t exactly a “normal” thing to do.  At some point he said he wanted to call it “The Walkstars" and get his two brothers to walk along with his friend from Hawaii. I said I was in.

Flash forward to a few more weeks later… 

We walked from Los Angeles to San Diego. Uploaded videos along the way. Got blisters. Got tired. Minimal arguing from everyone. Some drinking. A total of 5 days walking. I was going through a break up at the time and this allowed me time to reflect on how depressed I was and listen to Justin Timberlake’s “Cry Me A River” on repeat. It was a successful walk.

Flash forward to a few months later…

At this point this guy and I are pretty great friends. We connect on a production and life level, we like making short skits, music videos, and we constantly toss around ideas. We have a conversation discussing a scooter trip across the USA. We’d ride 29 mph scooters and instill the idea that it’s about the journey and not the destination. We’d take our time and see things in America that people ignore. We’d meet people along the way. We’d camp. We’d explore. We’d call ourselves “The Scootstars". We’d talk about creating an umbrella called “inTransit” for travels like “The Walkstars" and “The Scootstars" to live under… And yes, we’d film this trip.

I was in.

We spent roughly 3 months together traveling. At one point my scooter broke down so I hopped on the back of his. We spent so much time together we could probably read each others minds, whether or not this was a good thing, I’m not sure, but it sure as hell wasn’t a bad thing.

I can’t speak for him but I can tell you that a few very important things happened to me while I was on the road:

- I realized how much I cared for a woman who was back in Los Angeles. Little did I know but I’d end up asking this same woman to marry me.

- I realized that I wanted to focus on my writing and crafting stories through screenplays.

- I came to a new found appreciation of humans in America. I realized that there are great people everywhere and it’s what makes us, as people, great. There’s a lot of good in this world and people are at the core of it.

Once the scooter trip concluded my life was forever changed. Of course, I didn’t know it at the time. I needed years to reflect and connect the dots. The adventure and journey on the road changed me.

Flash forward to yesterday…

This guy released a sizzle reel highlighting his traveling, himself, and also the soul that is (what I think) his philosophical traveling beliefs. Since I stopped traveling with him after the scooter trip he’s taken public transportation through Central America, A canoe down the entire Mississippi River, a Train through Russia, A Land Rover across America, and most recently a quick trip to commemorate Peter Tosh’s 69th birthday (to name a few).

This guy is Peter Bragiel and he’s one of my best friends. We’ve basically been neighbors for the past 7 years and still collaborate on ideas, videos, and drinking beer. When I watched the sizzle reel I caught a glimpse of our scooter trip and it made me reflect how important that time of my life was. It was roughly a quarter of my life ago but it’s still a fresh memory. Our traveling caught me at an interesting point in my life and I may even go as far as to say it was transformative.

Then I got to thinking… That’s the beauty of travel. Specifically, that’s the beauty of inTransit and what Pete has created. He offers an outlet for those who don’t have it, or want it and haven’t embraced it yet. The motto of enjoying the journey is said so often yet it is rarely approached. InTransit is that outlet. It’s a journey, the adventure, the experience. There’s a cliche saying, “You don’t know what you don’t know” - and in my opinion, that’s the beauty of what inTransit is. You don’t know what you’re about to experience but you’re probably going to be better once you know it. Also, Pete is the anchor behind the whole thing and he's a person who genuinely loves to travel and experience what the road has to offer.

Below is Pete’s sizzle reel and if you haven’t seen inTransit you’re missing out. For me, watching this is an incredible journey that I watched my friend go on and fortunately I was able to be apart of it, if only for a short period of time.

Check out this reel. I can’t tell you how badly I want this to be a fully funded TV show or show that lives online. It’s different from anything you’ve ever seen. I’m not just saying this shit because he’s my friend. Trust me. If you live like this, if only for a little while, who knows what will happen to your life…

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wM4mpPYUHQU?list=UUs1o_kAxoMj1xcRyBp-rIYg&w=560&h=315]

Pete's Youtube Channel: www.youtube.com/pdrop

London: One Week Later

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I was in London last week and during my trip I intended to film it and update this blog with regular (but brief) entries. Very quickly I knew that I wasn’t filming anything, and not so quickly I realized I wasn’t going to be doing any writing or entries. Why? Well, a few reasons:

1 –I didn’t film because I had friends in town and I didn’t trust myself carrying my camera everywhere. We’d leave the flat for long stretches and I didn’t know if I could confidently say, “I won’t lose my camera.”

2 – Drinking.

That pretty much sums it up.  Let me digress and give a one-week-later London reflection.

It doesn’t help the situation that I’m from the land of beer (Milwaukee) and I was staying with my friend who also was from Wisconsin, and who happened to be hitting a 3-day work hiatus. Also, I had two of my best friends (also from Wisconsin) come visit for two days. When the four of us got together it was as though we could all see into the looking glass and what we saw were pints and hangovers.

Do I wish I had better self control, yes, of course. But my self-control ties into a larger issue with being in London – people like to drink, a lot. There is a pub on nearly every corner. It was as though every stereotype that has ever been said about London was true. I guess stereotypes exist for a reason. Also, I can’t help it if drinking and fun occasionally go hand in hand. I can’t help it that I really like to talk to people and when you’re in a pub getting shitfaced (whoops, excuse me, getting “pissed”) people become more talkative. I can’t help these things. I can only experience them, and that’s what I did.

My drinking experiences directly tied into my lack of motivation to write or do anything. There was one night when I was laying in bed and whipped out my laptop, started to type and this is the actual entry:

Man, what the F d over am I

Yup. You may notice that doesn’t make much sense. There may be a child sitting in preschool somewhere who is going to write the same thing in about 30 minutes. The beauties of drinking. For every great night of conversation there is an incoherent phrase waiting to be muttered.

Moving on from the perpetual state of drunk – London is pretty awesome. I’d be lying if I said that I knew where I was half the time; I couldn’t get my bearings. I kept asking people which way north was and half the time people didn’t know. Of course the monuments and landmarks are beautiful, outside of the city is peaceful, the culture is interesting, the curry was great… The world is fucking awesome.

That’s my takeaway.

That’s always my takeaway when I go somewhere I don’t know. Even if I hate the places I go to, I love that I hate it. I love knowing there are other experiences in the world. There is no substituting experience in life, you either have them or you don’t.

This is it. This is my one-week-later London refection. Pretty in depth, right? I kind of wish there was more to this but I think I need to blame the drinking for lack of substantial memories. There’s just a lot of fragmented good times, and really, how do you express fragmented good times?  The best way is probably through video…

Shit.

London Adventure: Need Advice

http://youtu.be/Zgt3C9IT3mo If my blog post yesterday wasn't enough I went ahead and followed it up with a video. Heading to London, any advice on what to see would be appreciated. I also became "ask-for-help-on-Twitter-guy" in this post. Not something I'm totally proud out, but something I'm coming around to.

Off to London...

Image I’m going to London to meet up with a group of friends. I’ve never been, but I think it’s safe to say that I’m looking forward to it. Aside from the fact that I like to see people close to me, I also like to get out of the house and explore new territory, and truthfully, I don’t do it enough.

I’m going to cut the shit and get to the chase here because I’m on the verge of walking down a road reflecting on friendship and how life takes us in a new direction and blah blah.

I’m writing this is because I’d like some advice on what to see and where to go in London. I’m not talking about the basic things, i.e.: Big Ben, London bridge, London eye, Windsor castle…  or really anything I can find on the internet in 30 seconds. I’m talking about off the road hole in the wall historic landmarks that I wouldn’t be able to find unless I pleaded for help on the Internet.

Also, and I mean this – If you’re reading this and will be in London over the next few days please don’t hesitate to connect. The best way is to email me: Josh@thebigshoe.tv or twitter: @JoshuaHallman

(Just became that dude asking people to tweet me)

Only reach out if you want to have a drink and talk about life, movies, sports, adventures, conspiracies, travel, and writing. Hope to talk with someone somewhere, it would be cool to connect... I think.

Art and Adventure.

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As I’m writing an outline for a script I’m drifting off and thinking about adventure. It’s underrated.

On a personal writing level I like to put a relatable individual in a highly unlikely situation and thrust him/her off into some form of an adventure. More times than not it’s usually a very exaggerated situation. But it always comes back to the adventure. Part of me thinks that most writers kind of follow this idea, especially if you’ve ever read Joseph Campbell.

However, the great thing about adventure is that it doesn’t have to be something exaggerated and I think people forget that. Adventures can be small and contained. They can be a night. They can be a drive. They can be quick. They can be a day. If you learn something new from an experience and it takes you mentally to some place you’ve never been then I’d chalk that up to an (mini) adventure.

The great thing about adventure is that it feeds into what’s amazing about life. The majority of us live pretty standard lives in the sense that we know how our days are going to unfold – coffee, work, work, work, home, dinner, TV, internet, sleep - Rise, lather, repeat. But adventure changes that. Adventure allows our brains to respond to something it doesn’t expect - it keeps us fresh.

I like to think that our minds and bodies need new experiences to keep us new and young. Adventure offers us that. AND I’m not even touching on the amazing stories created, new people we meet, and many regrets we secrets don’t regret that adventure offers. Underrated right?

BUT… As amazing as small adventures are how great are the ones where you take a monumental trip to Italy, sleep with a foreign diplomat and find yourself in the middle of a terrorist plot.

Adventure.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xRCbVehdHtQ&list=UUs1o_kAxoMj1xcRyBp-rIYg&index=1&feature=plcp]  

In case you’re missing it, Peter Bragiel, Dan Bragiel, and Paul Bragiel canoed down the Mississippi… This of course… Is InTransit. If you haven’t checked it out – check it out. Also, check out - Intransit.tv as well as www.youtube.com/pdrop

Transformers - I quit you.

I had a bit too much to drink on Friday night, and for me “a bit to much to drink” is holding hands with me having a late night. I had to get up fairly early on Saturday morning and by Saturday night I was committed to not repeating my Friday night - told myself I’m taking it easy. Taking it easy meant that I was going to order a movie via OnDemand from Time Warner. Without much direction on what to get I had to know what I didn’t want, I didn’t want something that would make me think, I needed mindless entertainment.

After navigating through the Time Warner guide that can use some updating I had narrowed down my choices. First choice was – Fast5, it took only about 6 seconds to realize I’d have to be in the mindset of Friday night to purchase this. Second choice was – Transformers: Dark Side of the Moon, the third installment to the series. The latter it was, and before I knew it Michael Bay and all his exploding glory was getting ready to play on my screen for the next… wait… how long… 144 minutes… um… almost 2.5 hours!?

5 minutes into the 144 I knew I might regret this purchase. Not sure if the regret came from the fact that they were intercutting actual footage from John F Kennedy’s 1969 space launch speech with a modern day actor, or the fact that Megan Fox had been replaced with someone who actually made me ask “Wait… what happened to Megan Fox?” It’s my own fault, I should have known this, I was warned twice…

Warning Shot #1:
Transformers (July 3rd, 2007)

I was traveling when this movie was released so I didn’t see it right away, but I remember being excited for it. The Transformers were my favorite toys as a kid and the trailers for this film made it looks like some justice may be served. This seemed like a perfect equation for a major reason… Michael Bay. Say what you want about Bay but he brings it when it’s time for action. The other things this had going for it –

Steven Spielberg: When I see Spielberg’s name on anything I still get excited to see it.

Shia LaBeouf: At this point he wasn’t the Shia he is today. This movie actually really helped bring him into the household name conversation. Before TF he had a surprise hit “Disturbia” which helped give him some weight and add to the “Oh we want to see him act discussion.

Megan Fox: I’m not about to give her acting credit but the fact is she added to this movie… yes, for aesthetic purposes. She was still relatively unknown, so we didn’t dog on her as much as we do now.

The Bad Ass Robots: It was cool to see Optimus Prime on the big screen trying to look real. The special effects seemed pretty cool too.

Seemed like a good equation? Yeah. A light-hearted family action movie that can be seen by various age groups and people. Kids, Adults, Comic lovers, Cartoon lovers – It’s a destined hit. And it was: $319 Million in the US and $719 Million worldwide. How can so many people be so wrong? This has to be good.

When I finally saw it about halfway into it’s theater run something happened that I didn’t expect – I didn’t really like it. It was just ehhh’ and from what I heard I thought I’d love it. It seemed as though everyone liked it. What happened?

I recall walking out and thinking it was corny, not terrible but ultimately corny. I specifically remember a scene when Shia’s Transformer is hiding around his house and Shia was trying to hide it from his parents. It was a goofy forced comedic moment that basically summed up the movie in a whole. But that’s to be expected in films that Spielberg has his name on. I just wasn’t ready for it.

The first TF – I give it a C+. Average film.

Warning Explosion #2:
Transformers 2: Revenge of the Fallen (June 24th, 2009)

Where do I being? How can I say this? This movie fucking sucked so bad. I’m honestly trying to wrap my head around this and figure out how to explain why and how this movie is bad. For starters I went and saw it with my girlfriend and good buddy who is a director and loves action/adventure films. That good buddy fell asleep during this movie and I contemplated walking out, in hindsight I don’t know how I didn’t. Seriously, my friend fell asleep in a movie that has insanely loud noises, Shia yelling a lot, robots, and action (to name a few).

That’s not a reason as to why this movie is so bad it’s just an example that the perfect storm of shit pushed us into a corner – a sleeping corner and a contemplative walking out corner.

Somehow this movie is the most profitable (in the US) out of the 3. It made $402 Million domestic and $836 Million worldwide, that is a lot of money. To confirm I’m not crazy – Rotten Tomatoes has it coming in at 20% - meaning 80% think this movie is as bad as I do.

I think it’s pointless to say what’s wrong with this film because it’s a list that’s so full it would look like that one scene in Charlie and the Chocolate factory when Willy Wonka asks the kids to read the rules before they enter his place. I think I can actually try and put some meat behind why this movie is so bad.

A) Megan Fox’s completely irrelevant ass posing while working at a car shop with her father, not only was it weird for her to be straddling a motorcycle the way she was, but she was dressed like Jessica Simpson in The Dukes of Hazzard.

B) Mid filming Shia was in a car accident, which required him to start wearing a cast on his hand. At minute who gives a shit, Shia inexplicably has this random cast he’s sporting. Seriously, it’s as if he was running in one scene and the next scene he’s got this cast on. Okay, that may sound like I’m loser nit picking but I think it says a lot. This movie gave up on the average from part 1 and decided to just make it all about the action. It’s kind of understandable… but is it?

I need to stop talking about this movie; it’s giving me a headache. The main thing I can do now is to ultimately tell you what I decided at the moment I saw that movie. I decided never to see another TF again. No way.

The second TF – I give it an F. Not just any F, one of those F’s that’s a low F, not scratching the surface for a D, F.

Enter Saturday and my detoxing body.

I didn’t hear much about TF3 but I did hear that it had more action than part 1 and 2, and it was also shot for 3-D. 3-D translates to higher ticket prices which translates to more $$$. In fact this movie made $352 Million in the US and $1 BILLION worldwide… 3-D makes cash. However, there was no Fing way I was going to go down that road so I stuck with old school 2-D.

Getting back to my regrets I mentioned above. How can any movie that doesn’t have Kevin Coster Dancing with Wolves be 2.5 hours? Bay has been treating these films as though they’re looking for an Academy Award for best picture. I guess, that’s actually kind of cool to a certain extent, but it takes up a lot of my time.

That time that was taken up with was filled with utter insanity. Insanity in the sense that I felt as though I was watching a real life video game unfold… seriously. I could see how kids would find this movie amazing – I talked to my buddy (buddy who fell asleep in part 2) and told him I could imagine this film as a ride at Universal Studios, and I don’t mean they make a ride for the film… The film IS the ride.

They tried so hard for there to be a plot – there is none. They tried so hard for comic relief – there isn’t. They tried so hard for a serious film – it isn’t. They tried so hard for the new chick to be a good actress – she’s not. This movie isn’t a lot of things, but it is a ride. That’s the main reason I didn’t stop watching it, If I stopped watching it I’d be one of those kids who leaves an amusement park because the rollercoaster’s are to scary. I wasn’t going to be that kid… It’s an experience and I wanted to show Michael Bay that I could handle this shit.

I did handle it, and truthfully I kind of hope this would be the last film in the series even though I don’t think it is. How could it be? Why stop when there is so much of a cash return? It just seems that we’ve watched all we need to watch with this, even Shia seemed like he was done with this blow em’ up shit.

To this movies credit I did walk away minus a headache. Granted I was reclined on my couch drinking Tea, but ultimately it did the trick and gave me mindless action that I was looking for. Which kind of makes me wonder if the whole point of this series is to dumb you down for 2.5 hours a piece while exposing you to more action than… well… a different Michael Bay film.

Shit, now that I think of it this movie served its purpose. My recommendation for watching any Transformer movie: Drink too much the night before so you’re forced to lie like a zombie. Like I said… it’s an experience.