Optimus Prime once again allies with Earthling Sam Witwicky (Shia LaBeouf) in “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen.” (Photo courtesy Paramount Pictures)

Twitter and the blogosphere have been abuzz this morning with reports from people who saw “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen” last night. I was not one of those folks, although coincidentally I did spend the evening cozied up to 2007′s “Transformers,” accompanied by RiffTrax.

This morning’s tweets and posts have included a lot of the typical post-movie review fare, but The X-Change Files pointed me to a an interesting article in Variety on the U.S. armed forces’ involvement with the film. According to Variety, the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines are all part of the movie, and some of the scenes set in the Middle East were shot near military bases in U.S. deserts.

Involving the military wasn’t just a move of filmmaking convenience, though — it was part of the armed forces’ public relations strategy. Variety has an interesting quote from Army Lt. Col. Greg Bishop: “I suspect most American citizens could never accurately describe what it’s like to be a soldier in today’s Army. They get their perception of the Army through the media, so our job is to educate the American people on who we are. At the end of the day, they are the stockholders.”

Tyrese Gibson returns as USAF Master Sergeant Epps in “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen.” (Photo by Robert Zuckerman, courtesy Paramount Pictures)

I’d never really considered the use of entertainment as PR for the military before, but it’s not a new phenomenon. The video game America’s Army, for example, made headlines back in 2002 and served as a PR and recruiting tool.

What do you think — should movies and games work as public relations tools for the military or the government?

Read more about it at HowStuffWorks.com:
How Real Transformers Work
How America’s Army Works
How Advergaming Works