(Not so) Fantastic Four

[The Burgomaster]

I was really looking forward to this one, but it was pretty bad.  The Reed Richards character was all wrong - - they made him a complete buffoon.  Also, the storyline was uninteresting and Dr. Doom was a weak villain.  The only bright spot was Michael Chiklis as The Thing (his acting as Ben Grimm was awful, but he was good as The Thing).  Big disappointment.  Thumbs down.

[Archivist]

Ooooh boy, I just saw it over the weekend, and I was quite disappointed.  As an old fan of the comics and even the original TV cartoon series I obviously had some bias about how the characters and plot should be handled, but I put that aside as I wanted to see it 'as a movie' rather than an adaptation of one of my favourite comics from the old days.

The casting seemed wrong, the acting was too 'showy' (seemed like they were 'trying' rather than 'being', except for Michael Chiklis), and the direction seemed slow.  The plot seemed like it was trying to go somewhere but it never did.  The whole movie was of a pretty low grade, although there were some fun moments like the snowboarding, the space station, various explosions and the bridge incident.

Then I started to compare the movie to what I know of the comics and characters, and I was appalled.  Reed Richards is not the emotionally ineffectual dorky scientist of this movie, but a very intelligent, direct and no-nonsense MAN.  Jessica Alba (may she live forever in skin-tight bodysuits) was not bad as Sue Storm, but Sue is the blue-eyed, blonde haired 'all American girl' type, and Jessica with blonde hair and blue contacts doesn't cut it.

Michael Chiklis was very, very good as Ben Grimm/The Thing.  Best acting in the movie, far better than the others.  The guy (!) who played Johnny Storm was too over the top.  Johnny was a hothead (figuratively) in the comics but not the 'extreme sports idiot' that he was portrayed as in the movie.

And my god, they COMPLETELY messed up Victor Von Doom.  Dr Doom is probably one of the most popular villains in the Marvel universe, and certainly one of mine.  In the comics he is a highly driven monarch, scientist, magician, martial artist and megalomaniacal dictator.  In the movie he was some investment entrepreneur with roots in engineering and a lot of money, LIVING IN AMERICA.  Heck, by the time he met the Fantastic Four he was already the Monarch of Latveria, with hundreds of complex inventions making life better for him and his country.

The movie lost Doom's incredibly rich back story, his depth of character, and made him into a petty, shallow 'movie villain'.  And for heaven's sake, he never turned into metal, and he was certainly never exposed to the cosmic radiation cloud that the FF were.

Argh.

I had medium expectations for this as a movie.  Those were not met.  And I was really disappointed at the treatment of the characters by the scriptwriters.  I highly doubt there will be a sequel.

~Archivist~

[Shark]

I'm sorry, but this movie was not "decent" or "solid" or even "mediocre"...or anything else that some of you have been describing it as...it SUCKED, and it sucked HARD!  The acting all-around was horrible, the plot was ridiculous (even for a comic book-based film), the FX were cheesy, and the Human Torch was so annoying I just wanted to clobber him in the face with a 2x4.  The only somewhat tolerable aspect of the movie was The Thing and his little side story, but really, that's not saying very much at all.

For the sake of decency, DO NOT WASTE YOUR TIME AND MONEY on this piece of tripe.  Please, please, PLEASE trust me on this one, or brace yourself for one of the most agonizing experiences of your life.

[The Burgomaster]

I totally agree with Shark.  This movie scores high on the Suck-o-meter.  It raises the bar for Suckiness, Suckosity, and Suckishness.  This movie is a real Suck-o-rama.

[Fearless Freep]

Hey, you mispelled "smurf"...and that thread is just next door....