So I finally went and saw the Fantastic Four movie.

   I say finally because I was really worried about this one. The Fantastic Four was the first comic book I’d ever read. I was into comic characters before that, but just from where they’d permeated the mainstream media. I was reading at the age of three, so when I got to the first grade I was all over the library shelf in the back of the room. Most of it was shit. To tell the truth, ALL of it was shit, but the other members of my class spent more time trying to eat the books than trying to figure out what the little squiggly things in them meant, so they didn’t have to be very good.

   But then I found it: a small, hardbound edition of the first 12 issues or so of the Fantastic Four. I lapped it up like antifreeze at a petting zoo and I’ve been a comic book addict ever since. The thing is though, comics back in the 60’s when the FF was born comics weren’t very complex. I’m sorry, but they weren’t. Their basic function was to entertain just well enough to separate children from their allowances. Very soon I was off to other books: Spider Man, Ghost Rider, Swamp Thing, and the FF, who seemed to be perpetually stuck in the 60’s got left behind. Once in a while I’d pick up an issue, but they were never as interesting or as fun as those first few.

   In 1994, the first attempt at a Fantastic Four movie was made. You didn’t hear about it? Most people haven’t. Just us ravening comic junkies. I first saw it in Gateway Comics in Morgantown West Virginia. They had a bootleg VHS copy they’d purchased at some convention for some obscene amount of money playing on a little TV in the back room. It was the most horrific piece of crap I’d ever seen and would remain so till I saw Catwoman.

   According to the Internet Movie Database (IMDB) the 1994 film rivals the 1978 The Star Wars Holiday Special as the most popular bootlegged film among comic and sci-fi fans. And like the Star Wars special, it is universally hated by both the fans and it own creators. I own copies of both of these movies and I have to say I can understand why. That is, I understand why they’re hated, I doubt I’ll ever understand why I own them. At least I downloaded them like a normal person…

   In the DVD Stan Lee’s Mutants, Monsters & Marvels (which I also own) Fantastic Four creator Stan Lee told filmmaker Kevin Smith, that unbeknownst to the cast and crew, the 1994 movie was never intended to be released. It was made only because the studio that owned the rights to make a Fantastic Four movie would have lost the rights if they did not begin production by a certain date.

   According to the IMDB The ’94 film, produced by film legend(?) Roger Corman, was thrown together on a shoestring budget and rushed into production so as to be finished before the big budget adaptation director Chris Columbus was scheduled to make once the rights were clear. Once the cheap ass one was complete they basically ransomed it to the makers of the new film threatening to release it and thus hurt the opening of the big budget film. It worked, and the film was bought for many times the cost of the option and production, just so that it would never see the light of day.

   All of this, and some less than spectacular trailers, made me really worried for the new movie. But my roommate and I had free tickets that we’d gotten when he purchased I Robot (good movie) and Man On Fire (excellent movie) and we decided to use them.

   To start with, Fantastic Four 2005, Directed by Tim Story and written by Michael France and Mark Frost, takes some pretty big liberties with the source material, but in a case like this you pretty much have to take liberties. Comics and movies are both visual mediums, but pacing and direction are very different. What works on the page doesn’t necessarily work on screen.

   Sophistication of the audience is also a factor. In the 60’s comics were considered a medium for kids and though the Fantastic Four was Stan Lee’s first attack on that notion, they still seem like children’s stories when compared to the comics and movies of today. For example, in the 1961 comic the family is cruising around in a rocket just for for kicks and they get hit by cosmic rays, crash and surprise! They’ve got superpowers! The movie origin is more complex and, not to fault Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, makes more sense.

   The characters are well written and well acted. Some people have complained about Jessica Alba’s (Dark Angel, Sin City) performance, but I can’t imagine why. She did what she was there to do, look hot and provide a love interest. Michael Chiklis (The Shield) was born to play the thing. The makeup looks good and doesn’t seem to hurt his ability to perform. Ioan Gruffudd (Black Hawk Down, King Arthur), which is less an name and more a bad Scrabble hand, made a good Reed Richards, though the amount of gray hair at his temples (a trademark of the character) comes and goes throughout the movie. And Chris Evans (Not Another Teen Movie) was perfect as the Human Torch. Of all the characters he was the best adaptation. The fire effects looked pretty good too, though some people (fanboys) complain that “He’s supposed to have blonde hair!” I’ve found that a punch to the throat tends to shut them up.

   The biggest departure is they included Dr. Doom, played by Julian McMahon (Nip/Tuck), arguably one of comic’s greatest villains, into the origin story of the FF. This makes some sense in that he is their signature villain, but in doing it they change his character radically. In the comic he’s ruler of a small country somewhere in Eastern Europe, he wears a suped up suit of armor and his face is hideously scarred up. In the movie the exposure to the radiation that changed the FF turns his body into living metal. It’s cool, and looks cool, but it just isn’t Dr. Doom. In the movie Doom is exposed to a lab accident and begins to change. This leads to his board of directors trying to wrestle control of his company away from him and he goes after them. Why does that sound familiar? Because we’ve seen it already, In Spider Man. They turned Doom into the Green Goblin, and as good as Julian McMahon is as this version of Doom, he’s no Wilem Dafoe. One thing they did bring to Doom though, that he seemed to lack in the comics, is a real motivation, a real reason for hating the Fantastic Four and wanting to kill them.

   But since I’ve inevitably opened the Pandora’s Box of comicdom, I must address the fanboy issue…

    I’ve often said that the difference between a rabid fan and a ‘fanboy’ is that a rabid fan knows everything there is to know about a given character and will notice changes, but they don’t necessarily detract from their enjoyment, while a fanboy not only notices the differences, but they feel personally affronted by them. They’ll bitch and moan and piss all over any film that changes anything at all from the source material. Your fanboys are the ones that start letter writing campaigns, haunt internet chatrooms, and organize ‘boycotts’ of films that offend them, but everyone involved still goes to see the movie on it’s opening night and buys it the day it comes out on video anyway because, well, they’re fanboys.

   That being said, the fanboys are going to hate this movie. So they’ll probably each buy at least two DVD copies. One to watch and one to leave unopened in a fireproof box with their unopened, bootleg copy of the other Fantastic Four movie.

   The biggest problems with the movie from my point of view are that it kinda drags in the middle and the ending is a bit anticlimactic, but I enjoyed it. There are a couple of continuity errors too. One you might not notice and one big one at the end, but the one at the end is so bad that maybe the film at my particular theater broke and was put back together sloppily. I’d have to see it at a different theater to be sure. I don’t want to give away any plot points (but if you don’t know this scene is going to happen then what are you doing watching this movie?) so if you’ve seen the movie and you know what I’m talking about email me at Ford_Maverick@hotmail.com. I guess all the fanboy death threats can be sent there too. Bring it on motherfuckers.

   When it comes right down to it, it was good, worth watching, and might make a good first entry into a series, but I can’t call it Fantastic. Though I must admit, of anything I’ve seen involving the self proclaimed “First Family of Comics” it comes the closest to those memories of reading those first twelve issues all those years ago and I really did enjoy it. If you liked Spider Man, you’ll like the Fantastic Four. Spider Man was better, but they’re similar enough in execution.

   And so, to coin a phrase, Excelsior!

   God I’m such a fucking geek…