Fant4stic
Year: 2015
Director: Josh Trank
Starring: Michael B. Jordan, Jamie Bell, Kate Mara & Miles Teller
Runtime: 100 mins
BBFC: 12
Published: 10/05/23
Director: Josh Trank
Starring: Michael B. Jordan, Jamie Bell, Kate Mara & Miles Teller
Runtime: 100 mins
BBFC: 12
Published: 10/05/23
Following the box office disappointment of Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer, and Marvel’s shift into forming Phase One of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, the Fantastic Four property was left untouched for many years. With Fox starting to wind down the X-Men franchise, there was a spot opening up for them to try giving Marvel’s first family another shot, with the hope that it would go down better than the mid 00’s films. With Josh Trank signed on as director, and a promising cast of young Hollywood talent, the Fantastic Four reboot look like it might just work…and then suddenly it didn’t.
With one of the worst critical receptions to any superhero film of the last twenty years, and a total box office bomb, Fant4stic quickly became the internet’s answer to why film studios should be handing back the rights to Marvel’s characters as they would be better served in the MCU. But is Fant4stic really that bad? Now that the dust has well and truly settled on this swiftly forgotten superhero dud, was there a good film in here somewhere?
Childhood friends Reed Richards (Miles Teller) and Ben Grimm (Jamie Bell) create a device capable of teleporting matter to an unknown location, and back again. Scouted out by Dr. Franklin Storm (Reg E. Cathey), the boys are brought into the fold of his own teleportation experiment that’s being headed by Victor Von Doom (Toby Kebbell), to work alongside his children Susan (Kate Mara), and Johnny (Michael B. Jordan). Reckless and impatient, Reed, Ben, Johnny, and Victor teleport themselves into another dimension, and upon their return have imbued themselves, and the nearby Susan, with extraordinary powers.
Captured by the United States government and used as weapons, Reed, Susan, Ben, and Johnny must put their differences aside and work together to stop Victor from using his powers to destroy the world.
With one of the worst critical receptions to any superhero film of the last twenty years, and a total box office bomb, Fant4stic quickly became the internet’s answer to why film studios should be handing back the rights to Marvel’s characters as they would be better served in the MCU. But is Fant4stic really that bad? Now that the dust has well and truly settled on this swiftly forgotten superhero dud, was there a good film in here somewhere?
Childhood friends Reed Richards (Miles Teller) and Ben Grimm (Jamie Bell) create a device capable of teleporting matter to an unknown location, and back again. Scouted out by Dr. Franklin Storm (Reg E. Cathey), the boys are brought into the fold of his own teleportation experiment that’s being headed by Victor Von Doom (Toby Kebbell), to work alongside his children Susan (Kate Mara), and Johnny (Michael B. Jordan). Reckless and impatient, Reed, Ben, Johnny, and Victor teleport themselves into another dimension, and upon their return have imbued themselves, and the nearby Susan, with extraordinary powers.
Captured by the United States government and used as weapons, Reed, Susan, Ben, and Johnny must put their differences aside and work together to stop Victor from using his powers to destroy the world.
There are elements of Fant4stic that work, and others that don’t, and I’d rate it alongside Rise of the Silver Surfer in terms of its quality. So, it’s definitely not good, but I think it got undeservedly crucified by critics and audiences. I think the biggest problem is the pace, and the fact that it’s not really a Fantastic Four film. Almost half the film is spent building up to the moment where the group get their powers, and the screentime for this first half is heavily weighted towards Reed (with Johnny only receiving a measly few minutes of screentime), then the second half is predominantly about Reed evading government capture. This really is the Reed Richards show, and for a Fantastic Four film it marginalises the other three team members massively.
Victor’s arc into a villain is also really weird and had no proper explanation. He starts off as a ‘villain’ in the sense that he doesn’t like that Reed has the hots for Susan, and that Susan isn’t swooning for him every time he walks into the room. But then Victor gets left behind in the other dimension, only to turn up again in the final act and decide that everyone must die, and Earth must be destroyed for no real reason.
There’s so much time spent establishing the backstories of these characters that there’s no time given to actually making them Fantastic Four. I mean the film only has one proper action sequence in it and that’s the finale. It’s such a bizarre choice for a superhero film, and whilst I did enjoy aspects of it, I couldn’t help but feel extremely bored for most of the runtime.
The decision to go for a gritty and dark tone is also puzzling. It doesn’t quite fit right and kind of comes out of nowhere. The film looks pretty bland for the most part, but then once the final act kicks in and Victor starts exploding people’s heads you start to question whether the film should have gotten by with a 12 rating, and why the sudden violence was necessary.
Fant4stic isn’t a criminally bad film, but it is extremely bland, kind of boring, and poorly paced. It reeks of studio interference in an attempt to create the glossiest, least offensive, and most mass marketable film possible, rather than feeling like a film that anybody actually wanted to make.
You could do worse than Fant4stic, but the reality is that I can’t really see anyone actually having a good time with the film. It’s totally forgettable, because there are no moments in the film that feel like they’ve been made to be remembered. It has as much personality as plain toast, flavourless and totally dry.
Victor’s arc into a villain is also really weird and had no proper explanation. He starts off as a ‘villain’ in the sense that he doesn’t like that Reed has the hots for Susan, and that Susan isn’t swooning for him every time he walks into the room. But then Victor gets left behind in the other dimension, only to turn up again in the final act and decide that everyone must die, and Earth must be destroyed for no real reason.
There’s so much time spent establishing the backstories of these characters that there’s no time given to actually making them Fantastic Four. I mean the film only has one proper action sequence in it and that’s the finale. It’s such a bizarre choice for a superhero film, and whilst I did enjoy aspects of it, I couldn’t help but feel extremely bored for most of the runtime.
The decision to go for a gritty and dark tone is also puzzling. It doesn’t quite fit right and kind of comes out of nowhere. The film looks pretty bland for the most part, but then once the final act kicks in and Victor starts exploding people’s heads you start to question whether the film should have gotten by with a 12 rating, and why the sudden violence was necessary.
Fant4stic isn’t a criminally bad film, but it is extremely bland, kind of boring, and poorly paced. It reeks of studio interference in an attempt to create the glossiest, least offensive, and most mass marketable film possible, rather than feeling like a film that anybody actually wanted to make.
You could do worse than Fant4stic, but the reality is that I can’t really see anyone actually having a good time with the film. It’s totally forgettable, because there are no moments in the film that feel like they’ve been made to be remembered. It has as much personality as plain toast, flavourless and totally dry.