# The Fantastic Four; is anyone gonna see this turd? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [July 7, 2005, 6:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fantastic-four-is-anyone-gonna-see-this-turd/311422 "2005-07-07T06:01:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 8
**Author:** ![Cervaise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cervaise/32/16693_2.png) [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2005, 8:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fantastic-four-is-anyone-gonna-see-this-turd/311422/141 "2005-07-10T20:55:33Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > Dude, Ebert frequently doesn’t even watch the whole movie. > [@acsenray](#): > > Do you have solid proof of this? Among Chicago film buffs, Ebert is notorious for his frequent and lengthy trips to the snack bar while the movie is running. He sometimes misses important plot points on these jaunts, which may occasion a complaint in his review that the movie didn’t explain some development or other. For example, in his original review of the caper flick _The Italian Job_, he complained that the heist at the beginning made no sense, because the safe plunging through the floor would be far too heavy to be caught in the waiting boat. The only possible way he could have missed what actually happened there (the boat was a decoy; the safe fell into the water and was cracked on the bottom while the authorities’ attention was elsewhere) was that he was out of the theater. I note that the passage in question has been [removed](http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20030530/REVIEWS/305300302/1023) from the official review, but it was definitely there in the original version. Read it myself opening week when I saw the movie and thought, WTF? ---
**Author:** ![middleman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e9a140/32.png) [@middleman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/middleman)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2005, 8:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fantastic-four-is-anyone-gonna-see-this-turd/311422/142 "2005-07-10T20:57:55Z")
Apparently [urlhttp://www.boxofficemojo.com/daily/chart/]a lot of people were gonna see this turd! And that is with most of the Gulf Coast worrying about Dennis the Menace. I expect a HUGE drop off in the second week, however. ---
**Author:** ![middleman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e9a140/32.png) [@middleman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/middleman)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2005, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fantastic-four-is-anyone-gonna-see-this-turd/311422/143 "2005-07-10T20:59:00Z")
Gah. Here’s the corrected link: [a lot of people were gonna see this turd!](http://www.boxofficemojo.com/daily/chart/) ---
**Author:** ![Misha77](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f19dbf/32.png) [@Misha77](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Misha77)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2005, 10:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fantastic-four-is-anyone-gonna-see-this-turd/311422/144 "2005-07-10T22:15:39Z")
FTR, I was intrigued by **acsenray** ’s question, but I didn’t want to hijack this thread. So I started [another](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=324889). **Cervaise** , thanks for your reply. That’s the kinda thing I was wondering about. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Hook](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ccd318/32.png) [@The\_Hook](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Hook)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2005, 10:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fantastic-four-is-anyone-gonna-see-this-turd/311422/145 "2005-07-10T22:54:55Z")
> [@sturmhauke](#): > > No mention of Cruise. To be fair, the soldiers who fired the RPG were hitting the body area around the central eye, and we don’t see any major damage to the legs. Maybe the joint was damaged, maybe the control systems were knocked out. In any case the thing fell over. I don’t know about Riddick, but the online review was changed. I read it the day the movie came out and it specifically said Cruise damaged a leg. It also said nature grants the number of legs in an animal so that they’re divisible by four. This second one I can accept as a brain fart, but the former statement is way too smelly for that. ---
**Author:** ![Pythian\_Habenero](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/a6a055/32.png) [@Pythian\_Habenero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pythian_Habenero)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2005, 11:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fantastic-four-is-anyone-gonna-see-this-turd/311422/146 "2005-07-10T23:11:14Z")
I saw Fantastic Four. I liked it. I don’t have any actual reasons for this; I just liked it. Such is often the way of my liking movies. That said, I happen to really really want a sequel. Why, you ask? Well, because I wanna see more of Johnny Storm. He’s just that cool. I mean, he’s all macho and can light himself on fire. How much cooler can you get? Plus, great CG job on that, too. Er, in conclusion, Johnny Storm is cool and so by extension are the rest of that lot. (And hey, Jessica Alba is hot. :D) ---
**Author:** ![gfloyd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/d2c977/32.png) [@gfloyd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gfloyd)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2005, 11:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fantastic-four-is-anyone-gonna-see-this-turd/311422/147 "2005-07-10T23:11:29Z")
I got dragged to it by my roommate. It was much better than I feared. If nothing else, there’s decent eye candy for both genders and stuff catches on fire, which is all I ever expect from an action movie. ---
**Author:** ![Tamex](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ccd318/32.png) [@Tamex](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tamex)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2005, 1:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fantastic-four-is-anyone-gonna-see-this-turd/311422/148 "2005-07-11T01:30:38Z")
> [@Bryan Ekers](#): > > Saw it. Thought it was okay, though they dragged out the origin story (which could have been tightened up a _lot_, I thought) and the product placement was intrusive. No kidding. The movie is set in New York, and the Thing uses an SBC payphone! I bet Debbie (?) gave him the ring back because he made an operator-assisted collect call from a payphone that turns out to be right across the street from her house! Within shouting distance, even! I know that I’d be pretty pissed if that happened to me. ---
**Author:** ![sturmhauke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e47c2d/32.png) [@sturmhauke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sturmhauke)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2005, 1:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fantastic-four-is-anyone-gonna-see-this-turd/311422/149 "2005-07-11T01:38:42Z")
> [@The Hook](#): > > I don’t know about Riddick, but the online review was changed. I read it the day the movie came out and it specifically said Cruise damaged a leg. It also said nature grants the number of legs in an animal so that they’re divisible by four. This second one I can accept as a brain fart, but the former statement is way too smelly for that. Well, shit. I decided to check Google’s cached page, and you’re right: [link](http://72.14.207.104/search?q=cache:6iITpegpSXEJ:rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article%3FAID%3D/20050628/REVIEWS/50606007/1023+ebert+war+of+the+worlds&hl=en&start=1&client=firefox-a) > [@](#): > > If evolution has taught us anything, it is that limbs of living things, from men to dinosaurs to spiders to centipedes, tend to come in numbers divisible by four. Three legs are inherently not stable, as Ray demonstrates when he damages one leg of a giant tripod, and it falls helplessly to the ground. Goddammit Ebert, why do you have to go and pull crap like that? This sucks. ---
**Author:** ![mobo85](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b19c9b/32.png) [@mobo85](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mobo85)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2005, 2:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fantastic-four-is-anyone-gonna-see-this-turd/311422/150 "2005-07-11T02:11:26Z")
> [@Tamex](#): > > No kidding. The movie is set in New York, and the Thing uses an SBC payphone! As far as product placement goes, I thought that the Thing’s giant Nikes were pretty funny. Then again, The Thing was the funniest character in the movie, as far as comic relief goes. I thought the film was pretty good, as far as superhero films go. I’m not familiar with the FF outside of the film, but I thought it was interesting how the heroes squabble like regular people do. Surprised there hasn’t been a mention of the familiar-looking mailman yet in this thread. Re _The Incredibles_: I can find no mention in Ebert’s _Sun-Times_ review of the film, but he did compare the Four to the Incredibles on his TV show, along with the Hulk and others. I think he was just saying the Four have powers similar to other superheroes we’ve seen in movies. An _Entertainment Weekly_ article said they feared unintelligent audiences wouldn’t know that the Four came first and think it was an Incredibles rip-off. ---
**Author:** ![Gangster\_Octopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a8b319/32.png) [@Gangster\_Octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gangster_Octopus)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2005, 2:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fantastic-four-is-anyone-gonna-see-this-turd/311422/151 "2005-07-11T02:32:42Z")
A very entertainnig movie, IMO. Not the best comic book movie, but certainly fine afternoon fare when you need something not too heavy. ---
**Author:** ![cmkeller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmkeller/32/118_2.png) [@cmkeller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmkeller)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2005, 3:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fantastic-four-is-anyone-gonna-see-this-turd/311422/152 "2005-07-11T03:39:41Z")
I saw the fantastic four this afternoon. The lion, the hippo, the zebra, and the giraffe. Though the penguins were the most fantastic foursome of all, and totally stole the show. I was laughing through pretty much the whole film. What can I say? My own fantastic foursome (9, 7, 6 and 3.5) had been begging to see Madagascar since it came out, and it was now showing at a nearby discount theater, where every ticket is the fantastic price of four dollars. As far as the (properly capitalized) Fantastic Four, I’ll wait until it’s in the bargain theater at that price, or wait for Blockbuster. ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2005, 4:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fantastic-four-is-anyone-gonna-see-this-turd/311422/153 "2005-07-11T04:08:09Z")
That’s your _discount_ theater? \ **Author:** ![BlackKnight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/eb8c5e/32.png) [@BlackKnight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BlackKnight)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2005, 5:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fantastic-four-is-anyone-gonna-see-this-turd/311422/154 "2005-07-11T05:25:27Z") I saw this movie today, and I think it’s total crap. “Chem 101 - what happens when you rapidly cool a hot metal?” Well, it warps and can crack or shatter, depending on how hot it is and how rapidly you cool it. What it doesn’t do is freeze to the point where something made out of it is less mobile than it was before. All they did, apparantly, was return Dr. Doom to his original temperature. Sooooo … why the hell couldn’t he move? I’m lost here. I don’t get it. Alba does a poor job acting. So does the guy playing Mr. Fantastic. The Human Torch annoyed me to no end. The Thing is the only character I gave a damn about. (And I agree with **Aeschines** : The blind lady was far, far hotter than Alba.) ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2005, 5:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fantastic-four-is-anyone-gonna-see-this-turd/311422/155 "2005-07-11T05:29:22Z")
Just musing on ways the story could’ve been better. I’ll spoiler-box it, though I’d be kinda surprised if there’s anyone still reading this thread who hasn’t yet seen the film: [spoiler]Ditch the whole corporate Von Doom stuff. When he faces ruin and then uses his powers to kill the board member, it’s too much a copy of Norman Osborne’s actions in _Spider-Man_, anyway. Also, the entire notion of his corporation going into instant collapse after the mission failed is improbable, since the company already had the space station and the shuttle and the implication that flying into space is something Doom does pretty casually. Further, why is Doom an American (or at least with thoroughly American speech patterns?) Rather, start the movie with Richards, Grimm and Sue Storm approaching Doom with the plan to study a radiation cloud they expect will pass near Earth two years from now. Richards knows Doom because they got their doctorates together at MIT some 20 years earlier, but Grimm is nervous. Doom has established himself as the dictator of his native land, the small Balkan nation of Latveria. Under his technical brilliance, Latveria has become a major leader in weapons and space technology, possibly rivalling the U.S. in innovation, though there are suspicions of humans rights abuses and whatnot. Richards is somewhat indifferent to these rumours, since he wants desperately to get to space. Grimm goes along, uneasily, but a sharp rift is created between Richards and Storm, destroying their tenuous romance (helped along by Richards’ over-thinking of just about everything). She stays with the project, but she and Richards are over. Then run the opening credits, showing the names and a bunch of comic-book panels showing the construction of the shuttle and the growing romance between Doom and Storm, with Richards and Storm throwing longing looks in each other’s direction, i.e. she loks at him while he’s bent over a computer console, he looks at her when she dancing with Doom at some fancy dress ball, etc.[/spoiler] There, that could’ve saved at least 20 minutes of screen time, leaving more clobberin’ time available. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2005, 5:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fantastic-four-is-anyone-gonna-see-this-turd/311422/156 "2005-07-11T05:36:38Z")
The “is anyone gonna see this turd?” question seems to have been answered, as the movie made about $56 million this weekend and the box office seems to have ended its run of 19 straight weeks of underperformance compared to last year. Which I guess ensures us some sequels and many more movies like this one. Woo fucking hoo. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Aeschines](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aeschines/32/16251_2.png) [@Aeschines](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aeschines)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2005, 6:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fantastic-four-is-anyone-gonna-see-this-turd/311422/157 "2005-07-11T06:40:26Z")
> [@BlackKnight](#): > > And I agree with **Aeschines** : The blind lady was far, far hotter than Alba. It’s [Kerry Washington](http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0913488/), who was also in _Ray_. I thought she looked delicious in that movie too. Her RL pics don’t look as great, but still good. Look at the “come hither” look on her main IMDb pic. The very definition of heaaaaaat! ---
**Author:** ![robotic\_panda](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ed8c4c/32.png) [@robotic\_panda](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robotic_panda)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2005, 12:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fantastic-four-is-anyone-gonna-see-this-turd/311422/158 "2005-07-11T12:42:52Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > The “is anyone gonna see this turd?” question seems to have been answered, as the movie made about $56 million this weekend and the box office seems to have ended its run of 19 straight weeks of underperformance compared to last year. Which I guess ensures us some sequels and many more movies like this one. Oh, wow, I just threw up a little bit into my mouth. I didn’t taste popcorn or Whoppers, either. I must be sane still. ---
**Author:** ![Cliffy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/59ef9b/32.png) [@Cliffy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cliffy)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2005, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fantastic-four-is-anyone-gonna-see-this-turd/311422/159 "2005-07-11T13:22:09Z")
I thought it was good – flawed, certainly, and pretty well empty-headed, but fun, and worth my eight bucks. –Cliffy ---
**Author:** ![Nic2004](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/4491bb/32.png) [@Nic2004](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nic2004)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2005, 1:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fantastic-four-is-anyone-gonna-see-this-turd/311422/160 "2005-07-11T13:40:32Z")
We just took our (almost) 4 year old son to see it the other day because he loves “Rock Boy” and I was pleasantly surprised. I am not very familure with the mag. charictures but I thought it was fun and I too like “Rock Boy”. I recommend it for families to watch together. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fantastic-four-is-anyone-gonna-see-this-turd/311422.md?page=7) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fantastic-four-is-anyone-gonna-see-this-turd/311422.md?page=9)