For a movie mostly consisting of dialogue along the lines of "Oh My God, did you see that?!" we sure didn't see a whole lot.

No, I didn't "see that" because the flippin' camera was pointed at some vapid twenty-something instead of the real action. I don't care about how much Rob loves Beth when a monster the size of Madison Square Garden is ripping through the streets of New York.

I didn't hate the movie, don't get me wrong. It was ten bucks reasonably well spent. However, I just felt that this was a film on the edge of being great. It had so much potential and a solid concept that could have been expanded upon. But it just lacked that certain something that could have put it that upper ranking of monster flicks.

SPOILERS AHEAD.

What was up with the ending and the camera? How did JJ Abrams miss out on the chance for great product placement? They should have told us the brand of that camera and I would have gone out and bought one immediately. I mean, to withstand a nuclear blast?

And I am assuming it was a nuclear blast. Some have suggested it was a "carpet bombing," but that seems thoroughly pointless. Conventional weapons had no effect on that thing (which was also a little unsatisfying; we all love to see the US military kick a** in these types of situations, or at least come up with something. When the monster is essentially invincible, it's no fun), and they had, in fact, carpet bombed it already (right before the helicopter went down). If it lived through that stack of bombs being dropped square on it, something tells me a few more would have little effect.

Perhaps someone out there can explain this to me.

Apologies for not reading your whole post before replying, but I take issue with your major premise. To me, the triumph of the film is that in spite of the giant monster in midtown you really do care about Rob's struggle to save Beth. At least I did. I know that most people in The Fray and others I've spoken to didn't feel the same way, but this is clearly what Abrams was going for. So while you may criticize the film for failing at this attempt, you must at least concede that the movie was not asking you to care about Rob and Beth instead of the giant monster but rather in spite of it. If you could care more about Beth than about the monster, then you would have been inside of Rob's head, which is more or less what the movie was going for (I thought).

I don't think Abrams missed a good opportunity for product placement: how could the camera take a shot of the camera? If you did that on purpose, okay, clever, but it didn't seem like you did.

In a movie where a giant reptile monster crawls out of the harbor and begins to tear down buildings while dropping little monsters from its pores, you are complaining that a camcorder buried under rubble withstanding a nuclear blast is unrealistic? So you're willing to suspend your disbelief to allow for a monster eating Manhattan, but not for a camera surviving an atomic bomb? What's the matter with you?