Super-Cember Day #24: Fantastic Four (2015)

(Originally posted December 24th, 2017)

If I was smart, i would have scheduled this movie for the 4th of the month, but it's the 24th, so technically we've still got the '4' motif here. Fantastic 4 (2015) is pretty much exactly like everyone says it is. I don't really have many things to say here, because the issues are so obvious everyone noticed them. That's part of what makes this review so difficult to write, but here we go. Starring Miles Teller as Reed Richards/Mr. Fantastic, Michael B. Jordan as Johnny Storm/The Human Torch, Kate Mara as Sue Storm/Invisible Woman, Jamie Bell as Ben Grimm/The Thing and Toby Kebbell as Victor von Doom/Doctor Doom.

Fantastic Four (2015)

It's worth mentioning here that I had seen the original 2 Fantastic Four movies several years ago, and my feelings on them are mixed. The one thing I will say for them is they had exactly the right tone: it never took itself too seriously. This film, however, takes itself so goddamn seriously, you'd almost think this was one of those Oscar-bait movies. It tries to play up these themes of humans having destroyed the planet and nonsense like that, and those would be interesting themes to explore if this wasn't a f***ing Fantastic Four movie. As a general rule, no comic-book movie should really be taking itself too seriously. That's why the MCU works so well: it manages to find that great zone of being able to wink at the audience while also grounding itself. Part of why this movie, and the DCEU, failed is because it takes itself so seriously that when the comic-book aspects come in, it just doesn't work. The only two properties that should and could get away with the darker tone are Batman and Wolverine. That's it. Those are the two. Anything else? No. It's hard for me to focus on this 'super-serious' story this movie's trying to tell when there's a human made of rocks running around.

Jamie Bell as The Thing

I will admit that I found myself somewhat enjoying the first half of this movie. Granted, there were definite issues there, but I was generally invested in what they were setting up. I wanted to see this crew build their machine, I was interested in seeing them bond. I wasn't on board with the whole 'we should go to the other dimension ourselves instead of using trained professionals' thing, but I could see where they were coming from. Then, once they'd finally been granted their powers, I looked at the clock and saw the movie was over halfway over. Instantly, I lost all respect for all that set-up. If your superhero movie's only going to be 100 minutes long, maybe drop some of that over-complicated exposition and instead get to the stuff we all came to see. But, instead of cutting much of the un-needed build-up, the movie would much rather cut the 'discovering-the-powers' thing from all origin stories. Someone clearly didn't tell them that's one of the best parts of all origin stories. I don't want to skip it. One of the best aspects of the first Fantastic Four movie was seeing them all learn about their new abilities and what they can do with them. Here, we're just given a 'One Year Later' title card, and that's it. No, thanks, I'll go back to Jessica Alba's terrible acting over this.

Miles Teller as Reed Richards

That said, seeing these guys use their powers is pretty fun to watch, and the final fight scene is a good one. That is, until it ends after what feels like 3 minutes. This is what happens when you front-load your comic-book movie: the final act is underwhelming and therefore your whole movie feels that way. For a villain as iconic and powerful as Doctor Doom, he sure went out easily. Oh, and speaking of Doctor Doom? He's an idiot. Brain-dead stupid. We see him, with barely any effort at all, use his powers to make about a dozen people's brains explode at once. Not sure if he has those powers in the comics, but fine. Why, then, doesn't he just do that during the fight against the Fantastic Four? Seriously, he's got all of them trapped in 4 different traps, why not just use that effort to explode their brains, and then win the entire world? I'm sorry, but I just have a real problem when someone is shown to have a really over-powered ability and they never use it in beneficial situations. Either use it, find a believable way to neutralise it, or just don't give them that ability at all.

Toby Kebbell as Doctor Doom

But, what about the Fantastic Four themselves? Well, it's kind of a mixed bag. Sue is bland and uninteresting. She just is. 'Pro' tip for screenwriters: giving your character an interesting trait, like the fact that she's into rhythm, doesn't automatically make that character interesting, it just makes them seem more like a character. Ben's okay, but he's incredibly defined by his friendship with Reed, which starts out great. However, once they get into the semi-believable conflict they have which never really gets resolved, it just falls apart. Johnny is incredibly inconsistent. He's the one who goes out and drag-races every other night, but he's also the one guy who doesn't want to go exploring in an alternate dimension. Reed is definitely the most well-defined of the four, but he's still sort of unappealing and un-interesting. I don't know what it is, Miles Teller does a great job in the role, but maybe it's because none of them are ever really given anything to do that they just all fall flat here. The most confusing part is they all do have relatively good chemistry with each other, but on their own, they're all sort of bland, which is really the whole point of the movie in the end, so I guess it got that right, just not in the way they wanted to.

Michael B. Jordan as Johnny Storm

Fantastic 4 (2015) was nothing special. There was nothing particularly interesting or new about it and I don't think I'd see it again. When Disney bought Fox a few weeks ago, I hope that means they got the rights to these characters, because I'd love to see how Marvel Studios handles them, but for now, I have to accidentally give this movie an ironic score. 4/10.

Tomorrow: it's Christmas, so I'm treating myself to a movie I've heard nothing but good things about: it's X-Men: Days of Future Past.