Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer

Two words: Ho-hum.

The Fantastic Four franchise, for me, ranks second only to Daredevil in the worst comic book adaptations category. Now why oh why did they ever think of making this sequel?

1. The special effects were terrible. Maybe it was just me, but the effects seemed worse here compared to the first film. They could've at least improved on Mr. Fantastic's stretching ability. The only time the stretchy thing looked good was when the Human Torch absorbed it from Mr. Fantastic. But when Reed Richards was doing the stretchy thing while dancing – bleh. It looked like CGI from the early nineties.

2. The Surfer was cool, but he wasn't bad-ass. The Silver Surfer is actually one of the strongest characters in the Marvel universe, yet what does he do here? If my memory serves me correctly, I believe the Surfer can move at the speed of light, or somewhere close to it. In this film, he just moves fast. Not bad-ass fast. But the Surfer's voice was bad-ass, being voiced by Morpheus himself, Laurence Fishburne.

3. I liked what they did with Galactus, making him into this dark, planet-consuming cloud. But I really hated the way Galactus was destroyed. You can't just fly into the center of the cloud and dissipate Galactus into cosmic dust. Not even if you're the Silver Surfer. And even assuming the Surfer could do that, that would be the bad-ass, lightspeed-travelling Surfer. Not this impostor that travels at the mere speed of sound.

And before I forget, let me just mention Jessica Alba. Yes, she's hot as ever. But (let me break it down for you in monosyllables). She. Is. Not. Sue. Storm.

So. There.


*some info from IMDb
pic from comicbooks.about.com


Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer. USA. 2007.


Rating: Four out of ten.

Fantastic Four

This film tried very hard to capture the essence of the comic book. Tried, but failed.

Let me try to find some good points, though. Okay, the casting was great, except for Jessica Alba. Chris Evans was perfect as the cocky and arrogant Johnny Storm, and Michael Chiklis portrayed The Thing quite close to his comic book persona. Ioan Gruffud seemed to pull off Reed Richards quite well, as he made quite a believable dork. Jessica Alba however, was not even convincing as a scientist. Sue Storm should be smart with a strong personality, and should complement the character of Reed Richards. And this Jessica Alba failed to do.

Special effects-wise, it was great, like a typical Marvel movie. But again, effects are merely tools to help propel the story forward. And this film is nothing more than the story of how they got their powers. Big deal.

I'm really sorry, but the Christopher Nolan Batman reboot has raised the bar for superhero movies. Any film that falls short will just be popcorn fare.

Even if it has Jessica Alba in it.


*some info from IMDb
pic from thecia.com.au


Fantastic Four. USA. 2005.


Rating: Five out of ten.