Best snark to date is a tweet from the webcomic Wonderella:
“there probably won’t be a fantastic five :(”
I saw it this weekend with the wife and kids and it seemed like there was a better movie looking to get out. They had a few good parts, namely Reed using his stretching to vault himself onto a platform and the Thing saying “It’s what I do” when he was about to clobber someone, but otherwise it was kind of plodding.
A few things I thought as I watched it:
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The kid genius building something cool in his basement or garage is not a very good trope. It looked bad when Anakin built C3PO and it doesn’t look good for Reid and Ben to be making a teleporter in a garage.
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Ben had little to do with the teleporter project itself and isn’t really connected to it other than friendship with Reid. If you make the characters a little older then they can be in college like the original FF stories (I’m not familiar with the Ultimate FF) and you can build them together as friends there. I think that would be stronger.
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Franklin Storm seemed unnecessary. Ultimately, it seemed like he was there to get Johnny in the project, tell people “that’s not going to happen,” and then to die and tell the kids to be heroes. Better emotional cores for the movie can be developed elsewhere (Reid and Sue? Reid and Ben? Johnny and Sue? Reid and Doom?)
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Doom wasn’t a very good character here. He’s called Borat once but he doesn’t really have an accent. He’s a troublemaker but they brought him back into the project because for some reason someone really wants his origin tied into the Fantastic Four’s. Give him a different reason to hate Reid than he got green goop on himself on Planet Zero in the Other Dimension.
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The Thing needs pants. I said it before and it still seems right after seeing the movie.
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Doom’s “Scanners” power. WTF? he wants to destroy Earth. WTF? His mask is his enviro suit melted onto his face. WTF? If this thing gets a sequel, the best first step they can make is to bring him back, say he lost the powers and his “connection” to other dimension. Give him an iron mask and then send him on his evil way.
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Central City? Why? Why not the Baxter Building?
Intergalactic Gladiator:
I don’t know about the Ultimate version, but in the original FF, Central City was actually where the FF were based out of before they used the Baxter Building.
The Baxter Building is where the think tank was that Reed was recruited to.
A minor saving grace might have been:
Reed: [speaking to Sue] So… you’re adopted?
Sue: [looks at him like he’s an idiot] No. tsk
And then just leave it at that. What difference does it make, really?
Well, she also told him she was from Kosovo. But, yeah, that 30 seconds was all that was needed.
I didn’t realize that. Central City makes more sense now.
I know that – I figured it would work for them to go back to it after.