Michael Bay and the Transformers are inseparable. The 160 minutes of metal-crushing action and visual spectacle in the new Transformers: Age of Extinction is the latest evidence.
迈克尔·贝与《变形金刚》已经密不可分：《变形金刚4：绝迹重生》——这部160分钟充满金属碰撞的视觉盛宴再次证明了这一点。
The fourth installment of the franchise — also said to be the start of a new trilogy — picks up several years after 2011’s Transformers: Dark of the Moon, which ended with the Autobots’ victory in a battle against the evil Decepticons in Chicago, and Optimus Prime promising to always protect Earth and the humans. This time, the human-friendly Autobots are being targeted for elimination by a second generation of human-designed transformers.
作为《变形金刚》系列的第四部，据说是另一个《变形金刚》三部曲的新开始，《变4》衔接 2011年《变形金刚3：黑月降临》的情节展开。在第三部中，汽车人赢得了与邪恶霸天虎的芝加哥之战，擎天柱承诺将一直保护地球和人类。而这一次，人类的好朋友汽车人成为目标，遭到人类自行研发的第二代变形金刚的驱逐。
Throughout the movie, you can sense that director Bay is determined to add something new to the franchise. To begin with, he has changed to a whole new human cast. Shia LaBeouf is gone as Sam Witwicky, the Autobots’ teen friend, and in his place is Mark Wahlberg as Cade Yeager, a Texas mechanic who buys an old truck that turns out to be Optimus Prime. Megan Fox and Rosie Huntington-Whiteley are gone, too, but there’s Nicola Peltz as Tessa, Yeager’s 17-year-old daughter, who wears high heels and denim shorts, even when she’s on the run, so Bay’s camera can slobber all over her — some things never change.
在《变4》中，你可以感受到贝导演为《变形金刚》加入新元素的决心。首先，《变4》中人类角色进行了全新调整：汽车人的昔日好友——希安?拉博夫饰演的青少年山姆?维特维奇，被马克?沃尔伯格饰演的凯德?耶格尔所代替。凯德?耶格尔是一名德州的机械发明家，他无意买回的一辆旧卡车其实就是擎天柱。梅根?福克斯与罗茜?汉丁顿-惠特莉也不再出现，而是被妮可拉?佩尔茨饰演的泰莎一角所替代。她是伊格19岁的女儿，即使在逃命时也身着牛仔短裤，脚穿高跟鞋，让观众通过贝导演的镜头而一饱眼福——看来有些东西还是不会变。
The movie also introduces two new things: “transformium”, a rare metal that humans use to build Autobot clones; and Dinobots, a new species of robot that was created during the Jurassic era. These ideas may make the movie go awry and seem weird to some viewers, but four movies into the series you can’t blame Bay for trying to keep the story going.
其次，《变4》中还加入了新名词，其一是transformium——一种元金属，人类可以用它克隆汽车人；其二是恐龙金刚——制造于侏罗纪时代的新型机器人。这些新想法也许让影片变得难以自圆其说，在很多观众看来不伦不类，但是《变形金刚》已经拍了4部，贝导演不得不为推进剧情发展而做出努力尝试。
The movie’s climax is set in China and Hong Kong, with the Chinese government and military playing helpful roles in the story. This international angle, plus the fact that the US military isn’t the world’s police, are a sharp change from past Transformers movies. Add several Chinese cast members and it’s easy to explain the 600 million yuan box office over the opening weekend in China alone.
《变4》的高潮部分发生在中国内地与香港。而相较与前几部，《变4》的另一个重大转变则是采取了国际视角：美国军队不再是国际警察，中国政府与军队在片中发挥了关键作用。再加上中国演员的参演，这也就不难解释上映第一周，《变4》仅在中国的票房就高达6亿元人民币。
Of course, fans of the older Transformers movies will find many familiar themes, such as the exciting robot-to-robot fight scenes, the stunning 3-D effects, and the relentless devotion to product placement.
当然，《变形金刚》的老粉丝们也能在这一部中看到许多熟悉的元素，例如激动人心的机器人大战，令人瞠目的3D效果，以及“矢志不渝”的广告植入。
But ultimately, analyzing the movie’s hits and flaws doesn’t matter much, since Transformers has a massive fan base both among younger fans who love the movies, and older fans who still love the cartoons and toys from their childhood. This is a series that’s performed consistently well for several years, and there’s no reason to doubt it will continue that trend.
话说回来，分析这一部的优势与缺陷也是无关紧要，因为《变形金刚》拥有庞大的粉丝群。其中有喜爱电影的年轻粉丝，也有从小就喜爱《变形金刚》玩具和漫画的忠实拥护者。在他们的支持下，《变形金刚》系列连续数年都表现良好，因此，这一次也不用担心，它一定会继续大红大紫的。