It’s no surprise to anyone that “Transformers: Dark of the Moon” dominated the weekend box office, though how overwhelming it was may have been.  It pulled in $210 million overseas, and $162 million domestically, for a total of $372 million dollars.

Now keep in mind that the film cost almost $200 million to produce, and (I assume) at least $100 million to market.

In other words, it’s almost made back its production costs in little more than THREE days (and this is not even considering the revenue that comes from the toys, T-shirts, and other Transformers-related merchandise).

And while I haven’t seen it, it appears that Mr. Bay took the lessons learned from “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen” to heart and cut much of what made that film akin to a root canal (a dental surgery which  I have never had, but hear is remarkably painful).

Another thing I have to hand to Michael Bay is that, whether or not you like his movies, the money is on the screen.  Some films cost more than the GDP (gross domestic product) of some small countries, though you don’t see it.  With Transformers, the money is there, which I guess is a good thing.