*** Official FANTASTIC FOUR Discussion Thread (1 Viewer)

[Jacinto]

In a long shot after Sue goes invisible on the bridge, I'm pretty sure I saw Reed and Johnny sneak around the cop cars while everyone was distracted by the commotion caused by the Invisible Girl. Did I imagine that? Can anyone else confirm?

 

[Michael Martin]

How did she get there so quickly? Is she such a heartless wench she'd do something so mean in front of TV cameras and dozens of strangers? It was far too convenient; I wasn't heartbroken for Ben, I was saying "Oh COME ON" to the screen because it doesn't make any believable sense.

Stuff like that ruins the movie for me, not chintzy effects or comedic moments.

And need I say it again: Jessica Alba as a scientist? :rolleyes

 

[Edwin Pereyra]

~Edwin

 

[JoSAN]

.

 

[Dave Scarpa]

I saw this this weekend with a friend and his son, they liked it and I did too. I get the feeling this will be more kid friendly than the superior Batman Begins. The plot was'nt the greatest but it was fun. Chiklas steals the Show as the Thing.

 

[Dustin Elmore]

Then why did he take the stairs instead of another elevator.

 

[Edwin Pereyra]

~Edwin

 

[JoSAN]

.

 

[Jon Bell]

Can anyone comment as to why the film has a PG-13 rating? My 8 year old son is dying to see it, but I don't want to bring him to anything that is too violent/ scary. I took him to Star Wars III, and he was fine except for Deep-Fried Anakin
.

 

[JoSAN]

.

 

[Edwin Pereyra]

Compared to Star Wars III and Batman Begins, this one should have gotten a PG rating. I took a 6-year old girl who is pretty sensitive about scary moments but nothing here bothered her.

~Edwin

 

[SteveGon]

I'm looking forward to a sequel too, though I think it would have much cooler to end the movie with a shot of the Silver Surfer approaching Earth. Oh well, whatcha gonna do? Maybe we'll get Annihilus as the next villain...

 

[Ruz-El]

I saw this last night, and didn't mind it. I went in with absolutly no expectations, I was one of the guys who basically wrote the movie off as a turd based on the trailers. It was decent, but pretty forgettable. My big problem is in the portrayal of Doom.

Doom, in the movie is basically a rich scientist who gets blasted by the same rays as the FF, get's a chip on his shoulder and uses new found powers to get even with Reed Richards for stealing his girl. this just so cheapens the character. In the books, he is a self made man who has amstered the occult and science, with an intellict that rivals anyone elses in the marvel universe. He is basically Batman, except he imbraces power at all costs, instead of justice. I haven't read the complete FF continutity, but based on the original 60's run, doom's interest in Sue Storm is that as kidnap bait to get the other 3 into a trap, not some jealous love triangle with Reed. If you want a fantastic four movie with a love triangle, than wait to the sequel and bring in Submariner, a great classic character whose first reappearance in the Fantastic Four comics would make an awesome, epic movie. As such, by cheapening Doom, the movie as a whole was cheapened for me. I like the idea of a guy who has mastered pretty near what all earthly knowledge has to offer is much more interesteing than a jealouse rich boy who accidently gets his powers.

I also didn't like the extreme sports scenes with the hip music for the teens to show how extreme Johnny was, and if I ever see an animal cover it's eyes in an action sequence again I'll continue to yell at the screen.

My last gripe is more for my fellow Canadians: Are any of you as sick as I am of seeing Terry David Mulligan show up in movies? And now we have Ben Mulroony popping in to slime his way as Terry's heir apparant. CHRIST!

But again, the action was mostly fine, the climatic battle was cool, lot's of collateral damage, just like a marvel mag, and the dynamic of the 4 was decent as well. Reed was a bit of a milksop as opposed to a true leader, while Sue was too accertive. What surpirsed me was that The Thing was GREAT! He looked so shit in the trailer and stills, but was just solid (no pun intended)in the movie.

 

[Patrick Sun]

I wonder if Doom blowing holes through the bank exec's chest impacted the PG-13 rating, otherwise, the action/violence was cartoony.

 

[MikeRS]

I understand what you're saying, but if Stan Lee was writing FF today, he'd probably riff on whatever was considered hip in youth culture.

 

[Kirk Tsai]

The end of this movie reminded me very much of Raiders of the Lost Ark.

I was glad that the end battle wasn't epic. In the recent wave of comic book films, Batman Begins, Spidey2, and both X-Men movies had some kind of masterplan or doomsday gimmickery that was unnecessary.

 

[David Williams]

It was more than that and I thought that the writers pretty much nailed the Doom character. Doom has always been jealous of Reed's success, which is exactly how Victor is portrayed in the movie. Reed's failed experiment cost him everything: his money, his business and his girlfried. The movie made it obvious that they had been competing against each other since they attended MIT. The exposure to the cosmic rays took his character flaw and amped it up a hundred billion times and made him unstable.

They nailed the costume... The eyes, the mask was perfect, the hood and the cloak clasps. This is how they should have done Green Goblin in Spidey 1. They took the one problem I had with the character, Von Doom Industries, and managed to fix it in the end by shipping Doom back to Latveria. This is the second time this has happened this summer, Batman Begins was the first (with Ra's al Ghul being Japanese and Lucius Fox being an inventor/archivist. Both problems fixed by the end of the film.)

The powers for Doom never really bothered me, because it gives him more of an edge in dealing with the FF. His elaborate traps from the comic book would be problematic to translate to film without making Doom look lame. The problems would have multiplied if they had tried to give him magic powers. The whole Doom-turning-into-Colossus-with-the-powers-of-Storm/Magneto thing gives the writers a way to give Doom the abilities he had in the comic (it would have been even cooler if the doctor had told him it was adamantium), without having the character resort to building himself a suit of armor to traipse about in, with built-in laser blasters. It definitely seemed like the writers were trying to ground the movie in a more realistic sense.

The only real problem I had with the film is Debbie, Ben's wife, showing up at the bridge. They could have squeezed in a scene at the Baxter Building but they took the easy, time-friendly way out (it not like the film was overly long... it clocked in under 2 hours). Loved Stan Lee as Willie Lumpkin, though! I also would have liked to have seen more of a brow ridge on The Thing, too.

 

[David Rogers]

Interesting point about the bridge.

The whole sequence was fluff and poorly edited, but it did have a rather brilliant moment in it.

After Ben's fiancee leaves the ring on the ground, and Ben is trying to pick it up. Reed steps over and simply picks it up, and gives it to his friend. Nothing is said, because nothing needs to be said. They're friends and friends help each other in all things, large or small.

Probably my favorite moment in the whole thing.

 

[TheLongshot]

See, tho, the problem is that it all happens because the script says it does, not because it makes logical sense. There was no hint of trouble with Doom's company. In fact, everything is going great for him, but there is a problem with the mission (not even a disaster, because everyone makes it back to earth.), and all of a sudden the stock tanks and the board wants his head? Doesn't make sense at all. (It also doesn't help that the whole plot device was stolen from Spiderman, which handled it better.)

Also, the comment by Sue at the end of, "He wasn't my boyfriend", really undermines the whole thing with Doom and Sue that they tried to establish early on.

Jason

 

[Alex Spindler]

With regards to the rating, there are several people who get a visible hole burned through their bodies and then you have the invisible girl's underwear collection. Pretty sure those two are the reason for the rating.