Twentieth Century Fox
Fantastic Four is this year’s latest comic book movie and a relaunch of Marvel’s “first family.” The film was directed by Josh Trank, whose first film Chronicle was a fun, surprisingly fresh take on superhero movies. Fantastic Four begins with the misunderstood boy genius Reed Richards (Miles Teller) and his friend from the wrong side of the tracks Ben Grimm (Jamie Bell) as they try to create teleportation technology. Reed’s genius is brushed off by his peers and teachers (including a strange appearance by Dan Castellaneta of The Simpsons) and it’s not until he’s discovered by Franklin Storm, played by the always enjoyable Reg E. Cathey, that Reed’s invention is appreciated for what it is, a portal to another world. From there we get to meet Storm’s children, Johnny, played controversially by Michael B. Jordan, and Kate Mara as his sister Sue. In addition to the Storm family, Reed also works side by side with a fellow genius Victor Von Doom (Toby Kebbell).
So lets get the first question that everyone has out of the way. Is this Fantastic Four movie better than the previous two?
Luckily for us the answer is a resounding yes, though to be honest, that bar was never a very high one to cross. Fantastic Four seems to be an unfortunate example of a movie that is less than the sum of its parts. With a great cast, good design, great effects, and heck, even some fun dialogue the movie should be a home run. When they come together though, something seems to never quite click. Whether it’s a missing piece of the puzzle or just a script that needed a little more time to polish up, the film feels like something that could have been really special but ended up as just OK.
Mediocrity can be even worse than failure in cinema. Where something as mind numbingly stupid as Jupiter Ascending will generate think piece articles, podcasts, and videos picking it apart for years, Fantastic Four on the other hand is just good enough that people will see it and it will likely make back its money, but not good enough to encourage any repeat viewings in the future.
The movie starts with Reed and Ben as children, establishing their long friendship, but it takes far too long to get to the meat of the story. The first twenty minutes or so of the film are fairly dull. Unless you’ve been under a rock you know exactly where this is heading, you know the group will be part of an experimental expedition, get powers, and face Victor Von Doom in some kind of conflict. Instead we get way more details into the backstory of all these characters and frankly none of it is terribly interesting or different from what we’ve seen a thousand times before. Reed is smart and his parents don’t understand him, Ben is poor, and in a semi-abusive household, Sue is an adopted child who shines in her father’s eyes, while Johnny is the natural born child who lashes out and never lives up to his father’s ideals. We have seen these same tropes time and time again, the sibling dynamic is even reminiscent of Thor and Loki’s relationship.
Where the film does shine is in its look and its cast. The cast is one of the most solid you’ll ever find in an ensemble this size. While the script fails them many times in the film, the actors are always bringing their A-game. You’d be hard pressed to find a weak link among them. Miles Teller, hot off last year’s Whiplash, brings a dorkiness and weight to Reed Richards that feels perfect. Jamie Bell probably gets the worst treatment, his character is absent through a sizable chunk of the film, and then once he is the “Thing” it becomes a CG performance that never really gets its due. The effects for him however, are pretty impressive. In fact, it’s safe to say that all the powers in this movie are head and shoulders above what we’ve seen in past FF movies. Reeds stretching no longer looks ridiculous, Sue’s invisibility and force fields are used in interesting and creative ways, Ben looks powerful and intimidating, and Johnny’s flame powers look amazing. This quality carries through most of the film. The labs feel real, the dimension they travel to feels alien and believable, and Doctor Doom looks as close to his comic counterpart as we’re likely ever to get.
The best parts of this film are surprisingly the smaller moments. There are scenes of Reed, Victor, Sue, and Johnny working together in a lab where their chemistry is great and the movie starts feeling like something kind of special in an ocean of big blockbuster comic movies. It’s obvious the director wanted to do something more character driven but he didn’t go far enough with the concept. Unfortunately as soon as we get to any action, of which there isn’t much, the movie becomes boring. There is a brief moment where they actually fight as a team and use their powers in tandem in smart, interesting ways but aside from that brief glimmer of what could have been, the film’s third act is cliché.
Speaking of cliché can Hollywood stop having giant beams of light shooting into the sky in these movies? This isn’t a spoiler as it’s in the trailers and posters for the movie but there is a beam of light shooting into the sky that holds some significance in the film. The Avengers did it, Ghostbusters did it, The Fifth Element did it, it’s been done to death. It’s boring and lazy writing so just stop it! Let’s just all agree to retire this tired idea along with cloud monsters and characters who turn out to have been dead all along.
So the Four aren’t fantastic. They are more of a competent cuatro, a quirky quartet, a menagerie of meh. There are glimmers of something great here and there teasing us with its promise. Maybe with some time and the right people behind it we could see the full potential of this franchise in follow-ups down the line. The sci-fi aspects of the film are really interesting and if fleshed out could really serve to set this franchise apart from the rest of the pack. As disappointed as I was with the film as a whole, I’m actually rooting for it to do well enough that we might get a second chance with this cast, a chance to see something truly fantastic.
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