OK, so let's finish the review.
It turns out that Galvatron's plan is to detonate the Seed in Beijing, "the world's most populated city."
Uh, what? By doing this, he plans to cause mass destruction and make lots of Transformium for him to use. He's gained control over the mass-produced Transformers made by Evil Business Corporation, which Evil Business Corporation plans to use to replace the U.S. Army. And Michael "I masturbate to the U.S. Army" Bay would not have that now, would he? Anyhow, Evil Business Corporation is conveniently planning to detonate the Seed in the Mongolian Desert, so Galvatron doesn't have to go far to plant his Seed. There's a short interlude where Marky Mark decides that Irish Douchebag Boyfriend is good enough to "take care of [his] daughter," apparently forgetting the statutory rape card and the fact that Irish Douchebag Boyfriend is a douchebag. After that, Marky Mark calls Asshole Businessman on his cell phone to warn him about Galvatron. It is never explained how Marky Mark has Asshole Businessman's cellphone number. But that isn't the stupidest part of this scene. Marky Mark
literally says "I know you have a conscience because you're an inventor like me." I had to stifle a laugh during this part, because that seriously sounds like something out of an Asylum film. Apparently Marky Mark has never heard of Thomas Edison.
But Asshole Businessman believes Marky Mark because he couldn't control Galvatron earlier. So he asks Kelsey Grammer if they can wait a bit, but he's deliberately vague. Why he doesn't just say "I think one of my creations is being taken over by the enemy, give me some time to think about it" is beyond me. So Kelsey Grammer points out that Asshole Businessman is just a businessman, while Kelsey Grammer is trying to keep the world safe (even though he's actually causing more trouble than he's preventing). For some reason we're supposed to sympathize with Asshole Businessman, but I honestly liked Kelsey Grammer more here. He's racist against Transformers, but he's trying to do what's best for the world and his racism isn't
completely unfounded (in both Bayformers 2 and 3, the Autobots are even bigger psychos than the Decepticons). Asshole Businessman just wants money, and is only backing out to save his slimy ass, since the destruction of Earth will kind of kill him along with the actually innocent. If Kelsey Grammer is a Nazi who sincerely believes his horrible ideology, Asshole Businessman is a businessman who profited off of Nazi concentration camps. That's right, I just fucking Godwinned this review. So yeah, honestly the guy Michael Bay wants us to think is worse comes off as a less terrible (if more misguided) person. Asshole Businessman runs off with the Seed, and both Kelsey Grammer and Galvatron send their forces after him.
Meanwhile, the Autobots are planning to just leave Earth (like in the last two movies) but Marky Mark makes a really dumb speech that convinces Optimus to save Earth from Galvatron, despite the bulk of Earth hating Optimus Prime. Since Optimus can apparently only stay mad at his own species, he agrees to help. Marky Mark, his daughter, and Irish Douchebag Boyfriend all tag along, despite the fact that they are useless in this scenario. Even the Beef had plot-device relevance; Marky Mark's got nothing. So Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch join up with Asshole Businessman, and never really bring up the whole "you were willingly working with the person who killed our friend, destroyed our home, and you're complicit in genocide" thing; we're just expected to think that Asshole Businessman is OK because he's an inventor. This really pissed me off, actually. They could've had him actually feel bad about being involved in evil plans, that discovering that he was killing Autobots made him realize what he was doing was wrong. But nope, he was completely OK with that back in Evil Business Corporation HQ. He even taunted Optimus by saying he was old technology. Asshole Businessman only regrets that the world might be destroyed, not any of the bad things he did that led to that. But this is a Bayformers film, so the "good guys" have to be unlikeable assholes.
So there's a lot of running around in Hong Kong, because apparently the film forgot that Galvatron's plan was in Beijing. Despite being an inept inventor, Marky Mark holds off kills Kelsey Grammer's top CIA hitman, and Optimus goes off to recruit the Dinobots. He beats the crap out of their leader Grimlock (in the name of FREEDOM. That's our Optimus) and this gets them to follow him. He returns to Hong Kong, and drives off the remainder of Galvatron's army. Galvatron basically goes "You'll pay for this," and walks off. Kelsey Grammer returns to hold Marky Mark at gunpoint.
Optimus confronts Asshole Businessman while riding Grimlock, but instead of doing something cool just tsk-tsks him for a moment, because again Optimus apparently can't hate humans, not even the ones complicit in killing his people. This is also crazy inconsistent with his character in this movie, since earlier Optimus freaked the fuck out upon seeing what Asshole Businessman did to Ratchet and the other dead Autobots (actually one of the better parts of the film.) As far as I can tell, Prime only didn't kill Asshole Businessman back in his HQ because Asshole Businessman uses the "if you strike me down
your journey to the dark side will be complete you'll prove my racism against Transformers correct" card. A card which Optimus then completely forgets, since he kills Kelsey Grammer to save Marky Mark. Aargh.
Lockdown finally realizes that Optimus has left his ship and turns back to Earth, and heads down to Hong Kong, using a giant magnet that he didn't use earlier for some reason. Optimus destroys it, making it moot. The Dinobots basically do nothing after this. So they appear in the film for like all of 10 minutes, after being hella advertised in promotional material for the film. Fuck you, Michael Bay. Lockdown comes down and stabs Optimus, once again being competent for a minute. Don't worry, he'll forget to again, The humans (minus Asshole Businessman) save Optimus, and Lockdown doesn't blow their brains out despite having a long time to do so. Optimus kills Lockdown, and then lets the Dinobots go. I wasn't kidding when I said they appear for like all of 10 minutes. Marky Mark and not-Katara realize they have no home now, but Asshole Businessman returns and says he'll fix that. SO IT'S TOTALLY OK THAT HE DID ALL OF THOSE BAD THINGS THAT HE SHOWS NO REMORSE FOR.
Optimus grabs the Seed and flies off into space to confront the creators. Hopefully this means that the next Bayformers film (and we know there will be another) will not have anything to do with Earth or annoying human characters. And while I'm wishing for ponies, I like to imagine that the surviving human characters in this film, in addition to the ones from the previous ones, got killed offscreen, in the same way Marky Mark's annoying friend did.
Anyhow, that's Bayformers 4. It kinda reminds me of The Dark Knight Rises, in that it's a confusing mess of a mindless action movie sequel that goes on way too long and squanders any of its good ideas in wave after wave of incomprehensible plot twists and way too many added characters for its bloated body to support. Also like The Dark Knight Rises, it left a slightly bad taste in my mouth the first time but the more I think about it, the more the film infuriates me. That being said, I stand by my claim that it's "watchable." Just barely. The biggest problems with the film are the same with the last ones: the movie focuses too much on the stupid human characters we're supposed to sympathize with for no reason other than that they're human, there are annoying robots whose purpose is to be annoying, and there's Michael Bay's painful attempts at awkward "humor." There's less of the problematic than in say Bayformers 2 or 3, but you don't get an award for being less bad than some of the worst movies ever made.
Edited out a bad link.
Edited in the actual quote from Marky Mark to Asshole Businessman.