Hello! Welcome back to my blog: Dude, You Got It All Wrong, where I, Brynn Viar, analyze female characters in films written (wrongfully) by men. The goal of my blog is to expose the inaccurate representation of women in film, and re-instill confidence in women who struggle with trying to live up to the impossible standards that film/social media have created.

This week, I decided to watch Transformers. Transformers was directed by the famous Micheal Bay and yielded a total revenue of over 700 million in the box office. It stars Shia Lebouf, Megan Fox, and a bunch of CGI-transforming car robots. Just to preview–in this post, I will mostly be talking about Megan Fox. 

The movie plot itself is irrelevant. What I want to discuss is the blatant objectification of women in the movie, which is seen through Micheal Bay’s interpretation of Megan Fox’s character–Mikaela Banes. 

Mikaela Banes is the only female character in the movie–and the director ensures the audience knows that. There are constant camera shots of her body; zooming in, showing different angles, panning up and down over her figure. It’s honestly kind of comedic if you’re aware of the absurdity of it. If someone asked me to explain to them the male gaze, I would simply show them the clip of Mikaela arching over the hood of a car, in her skimpy outfit, messing with the inside of the car and spewing out the names of car parts.

Throughout the entirety of the movie, Mikaela is also never given a full-length shirt. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, it’s just that in a situation where the characters are fighting a team of evil robots, I’m sure she would have liked to have a bit of a better wardrobe than hoop earrings and a crop top. 

I think it’s also important to note that I have absolutely no issue with women displaying and showing off their bodies. I actually think that it can be extremely empowering–if in the right context. In a movie produced for teenage boys, I feel as though the objectification of Megan Fox was not empowering, but the opposite. It’s dehumanizing, and teaching young men that women are merely objects to stare at, rather than deep, intellectual beings that are more than just their exterior. 

I hope that as a society we can wake up from this repetitive over-sexualization, and just represent women in a way that is empowering and respectful.