So the question I have is how did 20th Century Fox even green light this project? Right off the top I will say that director Josh Trank’s “Fantastic Four” is a lifeless, dark and utterly un-engaging movie. The script is boring, nothing actually happens in the story, and lines of dialog are incredibly flat and poorly written.

 

There were two things everyone initially complained about; first during the reveal of an oddly too-young cast who would take on slightly more adult characters; second, when they cast Michael B. Jordan in the part of Johnny Storm; a traditionally white and blond-haired role. Interestingly enough, both these points have now been rendered completely moot, because this film will likely sink to the bottom of the bad movie ocean in fifteen minutes, never to be seen again and probably a footnote of how making more superhero films dark and brooding is absolutely NOT the way to go!

 

At the beginning of the movie we’re introduced to young grade school-aged Reed Richards and his friend Ben Grimm in 2007 as scientific genius Reed attempts to teleport a toy car from his parents garage to somewhere unknown, presumably another part of this planet. This sequence of these two boys first collaboration is completely unnecessary to the film, as such actions and friendships could have been explained when these characters were older, about to begin their experiment under the protective scientific wing of Dr. Franklin Storm, played by deep-voiced Reg E. Cathey.

 

Storm’s adopted daughter Sue and son Johnny join the experimentation, with Johnny portrayed as a hothead street racer who wrecks his car and must work for dad to regain his wheels. The problem with Michael B. Jordan is that he never really inhabits the character; black or white, Johnny is a loose cannon for sure, which never translates in Jordan’s performance.

 

When Miles Teller walks out as the older Reed Richards, we never really get a sense that this is the scientific genius that ultimately leads to the Fantastic Four. He still just comes off as a kid who’s incredibly smart. After some brief pointless flirtations with Sue Storm; probably the only one of the bunch who we buy as the iconic character, Reed is ready to take his project to the next level…yet there’s one more member of the team who needs to be included.

 

Dr. Franklin Storm introduces us to Victor Von Doom (Toby Kebbell); a loner who designed the "quantum gate" and begrudgingly agrees to help due to his unrequited feelings for Sue. None of this supposed triangle of Sue interest between Reed and Victor ever pays off or pans out, which becomes one more in a series of story elements that seem just thrown in to add tension; and the last thing this movie gives us is any kind of tension.

 

After Richards, Grimm, Storm and Doom realize that other more high profile successors will probably be named and given the esteemed credit as the first ones to open and break into another dimension, which is where Reed’s experiment is ultimately discovered to take them, once the US government steps in, the four decide to don their special environment suits and make the journey late at night without anyone knowing.

 

But wait!! Where’s Sue Storm?! In the original comics, she’s supposed to go with them during this experiment!!! Nope! After the boys go there, experience an accident that finds Victor stranded and barely making their way back after engulfed by a green wave of energy, Sue somehow gains powers that others were imbued with on the other side, merely by being hit with a blast in the lab as the boys return.

 

So since Johnny Storm is black now, anything’s game to change from the classic origin, right? Ugh!

 

And now the movie goes very dark.

 

As opposed to this too-young crew spending time wondering what happened to them while positively realizing they’ve stumbled upon an incredible breakthrough, instead we are given four individuals who go through incredibly emotional angst as they attempt to come to grips with their new horrific circumstances: Johnny Storm can become flame, Sue Storm can turn invisible and create force fields, and Reed Richards can stretch his body like rubber. This angst-filled period is only exacerbated by Richards escaping from the government study lab they now find themselves in, named Area 57, and disappearing after a promise to now rock-like creature Ben Grimm that he will find a way to help all of them.

 

Then a title comes up: “1 year later”. Wait, WHAT??!!

 

Without any much needed exposition, suddenly we are introduced to the Thing, the Human Torch and the Invisible Girl being sent on missions by the US government to take out bad guys on a global stage after being promised that the government will help them find a cure. Sooo…why would these three authority skeptics decide so very quickly to just jump in and fight for the red, white and blue? AND Reed Richards is still missing! Seriously??!! Turns out Richards is seemingly untraceable, as he supposedly has been trying to create another dimension portal device in South America in an attempt to help his friends.

 

After a military team and Ben Grimm extracts Richards from the jungle, it’s time to head back to the other dimension, now under complete control by government mover and shaker Dr. Allen, played by Tim Blake Nelson, who I will always think of as the cellular biologist who assists Edward Norton’s Bruce Banner in “The Incredible Hulk”. As is always the case, the military wants to use what they find on the other side as weapons of war; a very typical and tired plot device.

 

However, when a group of trained men are sent to the other dimension, they discover the lost Victor Von Doom. Doom is put on a stretcher and brought back to our world, promised by Dr. Allen that a cure would be found. However, the lost member of Reed’s original team has become strong and powerful; fused to his environment suit which now resembles the image of the comic’s Doctor Doom.

 

This is certainly a better cinematic live action incarnation of the character than 2005’s “Fantastic Four” movie, and definitely the most scarily threatening, as Doom denounces the government’s help, claiming the Earth has been poisoned by humans and must be destroyed, and escaping from his examination room as he kills anyone in his path in a sequence that’s like something out of a horror movie more than a superhero flick. This is a very affective scene, yet when the time comes for the pre-named Fantastic Four to take on Doom in the alternate universe, as Doom reverses the affects of the "quantum gate" to suck everything from our world through a black hole to be destroyed in the newly discovered one, Doom’s powers are strangely not used to their fullest.

 

And the fight ensues! Doom thwarts attacks by the now banded four heroes, but we keep wondering why he doesn’t just crush or explode them as he did to so many people in the lab before escaping. Oh wait, it’s over? Wow, that was fast! It almost seemed as though screenwriters Simon Kinberg, Jeremy Slater and Josh Trank suddenly realized that their overly long-winded wind up to this point in the story was running out of screen time and needed to wrap things up quickly. I won’t reveal any more of the plot from here, but let’s just say things don’t get any better or even any more memorable as they move to the final moments of the film.

 

I have to say there is one element of this entire misguided endeavor that was actually really well done: the best realized live action version of Ben Grimm/The Thing on film. As opposed to the rock suit worn by Michael Chiklis in the previous two movies, here we are treated to a very CG photo realistic, resonant rock creature with an appropriately gravelly voice. Good job, Los Angeles-based cloud rendering company, OTOY! Now if this Thing were only fused with the previous FF cast, we might actually have a better shot at a good movie; even though those two films weren’t great, but they’re definitely better than this low grade reboot.

 

So who really is to blame here?

 

Director Josh Trank’s “Chronicle” is a fantastic found footage movie about three boys who inexplicably received super powers after they find a downed alien spaceship. That was a much more compelling film put together on a very low budget and as an independent release than this mess of a major motion picture. Trank was recently and famously removed from helming one of the upcoming Disney Star Wars movies clearly over concerns that his “Fantastic Four” was in no way a good movie. There were certainly other issues included in the studio’s decision, but clearly Disney’s reasons are grounded if you take this Marvel outing at face value, or even on any level.

 

What “Fantastic Four” needed to be more like was Marvel’s “Ant-Man”; light-hearted with just the right amount of humor and engaging characters. But instead what we are presented with is dark, downbeat, depressing and completely void of what the Fantastic Four comics were and are all about. Let’s hope and pray that Bryan Singer’s recent hints that the new FF would cross over with his X-Men characters is now completely pushed off the consideration table. ✩✩ (2 stars)