#54 THE FANTASTIC FOUR

#54 THE FANTASTIC FOUR

Starring Miles Teller, Jamie Bell, Michael B. Jordan, Kate Mara, Toby Kebbell, Reg E. Cathey and Tim Blake Nelson. Written by Simon Kinberg, Jeremy Slater and Josh Trank. Directed by Josh Trank. Mercifully just 100 minutes long.

Good news and bad news. Good news first, this isn't anywhere near as dreadful as Pixels, nor as vile and detestable as Batman and Robin or Batman Forever. Neither is it as loathsome as Catwoman, Electra or Johan Hex. Bad news, that's all the good. 

SPOILER ALERT! THERE ARE SOME SPOILERS, BUT SERIOUSLY NOTHING THAT YOU SHOULDN'T HAVE WORKED OUT FROM WATCHING THE TRAILER, BUT NEVER THE LESS, I DON'T WANT TO BE ACCUSED OF BEING A SPOILER.
 
The story, Reed Richards is a boy genius who creates a teleporter to another dimension. Seven years later he's hired by Doctor Storm to help complete Von Doom's inter-dimensional portal device. 15 minutes later, Reed has finished it and so he, Doom, Johnny Storm and Billy Elliot travel to planet Zero, as this new dimension is called, and Doom is seemingly killed by Zero. The others try to escape but are attacked and they barely manage to escape back to Earth. However, each of them Sue, Johnny, Billy and the Little Drummer boy have been changed by Zero and they now all have magical powers, Reed escapes, for some reason and a year later the others are all working, quite happily for the US military doing covert wetwork operations, apart from Reed who's building another machine for some reason not really explained. Anyway, he's politely asked to come back and he does and spends less than 5 minutes helping them fix their new machine then the military send another team of scientists back to Zero, where they meet Doom, now transformed into a sort of metal-thingie who opens up a black-hole between Zero and Earth and starts to suck everything into it. So it's up to our plucky four heroes learn to work together and save the day. Hooray. Then it's back home in time for tea and the naming of our new heroes, luckily, Billy Elliot says how fantastic everything is and that gives Reed an idea and the film ends with him telling everyone they're now called the Four Twats. The credits roll and the audience slowly moves towards the exits muttering things like, 'basic', 'bland', 'dull', and those were the positive things.

Just like Billy Elliot's Thing, Josh Trank's Fantastic Four film lacks balls, it lacks gumption and it's utterly lacking in any action, drama, adventure, excitement or fun. Ensconcing Marvel's sense of fun, this embraces Nolan and Synder's ethic of dark, gloomy, poe-faced seriousness. That's not to say the whole film is a laugh-free train wreck, no not at all. Indeed, when it starts there's a certain fun to be had watching the young Reed and Grimm meet and have a special Goonies style bonding moment, but then it's a flash forward 7 years and the laughter free snore-fest can begin in earnest.

This is just a dull, very uninvolving film that never really gets going, it's like a very long 100 minute windup. It's like one of those old Evel Kenevel bikes, the longer you wound up the bike the faster it would go, well Trask spends a 100 minutes charging this film and sadly he just forgot to let go. 

I'd actually recommend the trailer, as it gets to the point far quicker and shows you all the scenes from the film, including the demise of Doom.

This is just a long, plodding, dull dirge. A film that never gets up to speed and just sort of coasts to the end, offering nothing new. In a summer of mediocrity, this floats like an unwanted turd in a bowl of tepid meh. Not totally horrific, but definitely totally Meh.

It gets a solid 3/10 for no other reason that it didn't elicit loathing or hatred for it.