Director: Josh Trank
Starring: Miles Teller, Kate Mara, Michael B. Jordan, Toby Kebbell, Jamie Bell, Reg E. Cathey, Tim Blake Nelson.
Really isn’t fantastic, more so average, but why? It seems this series of marvel characters always has a hard time being on the big screen. Is it the actually film and film making itself or is it the characters and plot, leading me to debate; if Joss Whedon did the movie would it be any better?
Could it be that the powers these characters possess are kinda insignificant when compared the rest of the marvel universe? The background story isn’t exactly fantastic either and it can’t be easy trying to make a movie with four main characters. It only works with Avengers because we got introduced to each character individually before them uniting.
I enjoyed Josh Trank’s chronicle and you can see the same gritty darkness emitting here in this Fantastic Four. But I don’t think this, or any of the previous F4 films for that matter have been well casted. I like Miles Teller, especially his Whiplash performance and I’m a massive Toby Kebbell fan because of Dead Man’s Shoes and RocknRolla. Even his smaller, sillier roles make me enjoy a movie more. But both roles here aren’t amazing.
The rest of the cast, okay but that’s all. Again I don’t think there’s anything the audience can relate to or feel anything with these characters. They’re not anymore likeable as heroes then when they were before they had super powers. It’s like they wanted to make the characters geeky scientists that have had a rough time being kids in hope to earn the audience’s empathy. They did try very well to get this human element across, the friendship bond between Grimm and Reed, and the parental/sibling struggle between the Storms, mix that with Doom’s unworthy ambition that manifests into home world destruction and you have a fantastic mess.
Kate Mara I think has a face that’ll suit the next Planet of the Apes movie, no offence, but she does. Bad call on using CGI over prosthetics for Grimm’s Thing, yet it looks like they used toilet roll tubes and green LEDs to portray Doom. Who could have been, should have been such a bad ass and instead give him Vader like powers. And Michael B. Jordan seems to lack the flare Chris Evans had in the previous ones. (Pun intended). Reg E. Cathey’s voice is amazing though, he sounds like a transformer! His voice would be perfect for Soundwave!
The plot line isn’t new nor is it interesting, and the beginning felt more like a remake of Explorers, (no they shouldn’t, or could they? Love that movie) Reed being River Phoenix’s Wolfgang and Grimm being Darren Woods. Then it turns into SpaceCamp! They breach another otherworldly dimension, upset the planet’s chemistry and pay the consequences returning to Earth as US military experiments.
You don’t see much superhero action, even at this stage. And The Thing’s action is seen mainly second hand from a monitor. He’s a bit of a whinge bag of stones, think sadsack but as a rock. He wines “help me” more times than saying “it’s clobbering time”. Plus he doesn’t wear any pants. And what’s with that force field!? Again, Explorers! It felt like a cheap shot with them flying around in it as an escape pod that ripped off Stark’s reentry in Avengers Assemble.
It’s a let down but with the bad press going about, it was expected. As Sue Storm would say, there’s a pattern here. There is no Stan Lee cameo, and no sneaky extra scene hinting at a sequel which isn’t a bad thing. Leave it as the only one, not a terrible two. The not so Fantastic Four.
Running Time: 6
The Cast: 5
Performance: 4
Direction: 6
Story: 3
Script: 6
Creativity: 4
Soundtrack: 5
Job Description: 3
The Extra Bonus Point: 5 for Reggie's voice!