I had to spend my evening somehow

*May contain spoilers*

For a movie based off an old school board game, I don't think they could've went about it any other sort of way.  It was jammed packed with action and explosions, cleverly using that tsunami bouy system to simulate the actual game What I loved the most was the alien mortars shells that were shaped JUST LIKE THE PEGS. At first I didn't make the connection right away, but I had a good chuckle when it was pointed out to me.  The visuals and special effects were off the wall; I wouldn't have expecting anything less from the guys who did Transformers.

Now. . .for what I didn't like.

The movie was like Michael Bay did it. Except he didn't do it. This is a scary sign.  It contained lame characters, a half-assed plot where we only briefly get to see what the aliens are actually up to AND they never said "You sunk my battleship".  What really gets to me is that we keep seeing movies with humanoid aliens in them, sometimes with little or no variations from humans.  In this case, we have four-thumbed, hairy-chinned aliens that wear ODST helmets they stole from Halo.  I know that you can really only do so much with battlesuits before they start looking the same, but seriously, they need to start making aliens that are actually ALIEN.  Or talking raptors or something. Or octopus people, I don't care!

The beginning of the movie dragged on for far too long before anything really interesting happened, aside from learning a bit about the hollow characters.  Aside from stealing a chicken burrito out of a corner store, the first 30 minutes could be easily chopped out.  After that, I was geared up to seeing some kick-ass navy action against an alien armada.  Sadly this was not to be. We get focused in on 3 destroyers which are cut off from the rest of the navy and are forced to fend for themselves against the alien threat. They get their asses handed to them, TWICE before they do anything clever.

And there was those scenes with the mechanical ball thingies with blades.  That scene felt kinda purposeless aside from telling us that there was no air support from from the island, not that it would've done any good since those alien battleships are well equipped. We get to see some wanton destruction too, but its pretty boring.

Now, as I said before, the tsunami bouy system was clever when it came to emulating the real board game and helped with the fact most of their electronic equipment was being jammed by the field the aliens set up. What I didn't understand is why the aliens couldn't see the navy unless they pretty much had their faces down the barrels of their guns.  If the field was also effecting the alien's systems, THEN WHY HAVEN'T THEY BUILT SOMETHING TO WORK AROUND THAT?  It seems pretty obvious, why would you build something that cripples your enemy as well as yourself? AND WHY AREN'T YOUR WINDSHIELD'S POLARIZED TO BLOCK OUT THE SUNLIGHT?  These aleins' eyes are super sensitive to sunlight, so you would've figured. But NOPE, they fall for the oldest trick in the book and literally get the sun in their eyes before they fire which ends in their extraterrestrial behinds getting fragged.

So overall. . . just wait till its available on the internet.  Or in a cheap theater.