We’re introducing a new, occasional review segment this week…so,
Leeeet’s get ready tooo Ruuuuuumbllllllllllllllllllllle! (cough cough cough) Ok, too much.
The following is a @nerdycurious production, I am your host and moderator, Roni, today’s review is featuring Richard and Jaime Whittaker, married nerds who will be sharing their opinions of the newly released, highly much talked about, Fantastic Four. Let’s begin… 
Rich & (Jaime)
With all the negativity that’s been floating around the last couple days (with due reason) from the critics of Fantastic Four I wanna give the every day (overly enthusiastic) moviegoer/comic book fan’s perspective. While it wasn’t a masterpiece of a film it definitely wasn’t one of the “worst ranked films of all time”.
Jaime? do you agree? (……)
Let’s start first with the casting. The studio decided to go with a younger, “edgier” cast which for the most part worked (Yeah if you want to ignore the title of Fantastic Four and the comic book lore). A lot of people complained about casting Miles Teller in the role of Reed Richards/Mr. Fantastic, saying that he did not look the part. I believe the studio made the right choice here (Surprisingly, I agree). Miles Teller has yet to play a bad role, he brings a nerdier feel to the role than Ioan Gruffudd did, which for me is not a bad thing. I felt some of Teller’s jokes fell flat from poor writing, but that is more scripting issues than actor (We are talking very cliché, over-used, poor effort to pander to the comic book fans, lines here!). (Ouch!) The roles of Johnny and Sue Storm were perfectly cast. Michael B Jordon was amazing as always. He has always blown me away with whatever role is given to him, which is why I’m sure Stallone and Weathers gave him the blessing to play Apollo Creed’s son in the next Rocky movie CREED. (Nice tidbit of info.) Jordon brought his comedy chops to the role of Johnny/Human Torch, which fit since the character has always been wisecracking. Did he do better than Chris Evans in this role? No, but he did not have to. He brought his own style of acting into it and made it fun (I can agree with that). Kate Mara was perfectly cast as Sue Storm/Invisible Woman (Anyone with blonde hair could’ve performed the same way she did). (Dang, girl!) She is the one going into the movie that I was intrigued with the most. I loved Jessica Alba in the original movie and I think Kate outshined her (I don’t know about outshining but there was more focus on the character and less on her sex appeal than there was with Alba’s portrayal). (IDK, if Jessica really set the bar that high for Sue…) She fit the role so well and left me wanting more. The breakout star of this film for me was Jamie Bell as Ben Grimm/The Thing (Ooh! I like him!). (I’m glad to hear! I was very intrigued by his casting! He’s phenomenal!) I think he delivered and had more heart in this role than Michael Chiklis did in both of the earlier films (I strongly agree here. The Thing felt more real and less lovable goofball in this movie. I mean come on….dude just got turned into a rock monster and he doesn’t have any pants to cover his ass crack the size of the Grand Canyon! There is bound to be some angst!) (snorts…sorry, continue!) Now let’s get to Toby Kebbell as Victor Von Doom. While I enjoyed his earlier works, Drake Stone in Sorcerer’s Apprentice being one of my favorites, in this role he just fell flat (I liked Toby as “Victor” the guy, not as Doctor Doom). The character was boring and not the intimidating Doom I love from the comics. Julian McMahon at least brought coldness to the role in the original, Toby not so much (I also agree with this. Doom looked like literal garbage…seriously, it looked like someone found some glowy, metallic garbage and constructed his face and entire body out of it and left him with a tiny, non-threatening, teenage boy body…not scary!). (Interesting.)
Now onto the rest of the show…From the stories that are coming out of Hollywood, Fox hijacked the film away from Director Josh Trank, even to the extremes of removing him from the editing portion of the film and reshooting the final sequence without him (This is speculation but go on…). (Agreed) With that said it was not a bad ending, but you could tell that it did not mesh with the rest of the film (That’s because it was the only part of the film that wasn’t boring). I would say my favorite part was the Sci-fi origin story that was given in the first act. I think this was very well done and you could tell it was Trask style of directing and storytelling. Sure the dialogue was a little cheesy at times but I really like cheese (So do I…on my French fries!). (LOL! Some cheese is good sometimes, but usually unecessary.) All the characters meshed well together, especially Teller and Bell. They made me root for them as the underdogs even more than before (on a side note, no teacher would be as much of a douche as Reed’s was to him (I concur with this side note. I wanted to punch the stupid teacher in his stupid face!). The second act was a little slow for me (a little? I spent the majority of the movie waiting for the movie to happen!!!), I found myself yawning at times. I feel they could have cut out about 20 minutes (45 mins) (lol! That’s a long time Jaime, considering the movie is an hour and 46 minutes.) (wink) of this act and the pacing would have flowed a lot better. The third and final act however… it looked pretty, some cool special effects, but the story fell apart. It felt way too rushed and did not blend with the rest of the story. I feel like it was one of those, “ Oh crud, we need an ending…quick, quick! What can we do that’s fast and cheap?!” (I got nothing here…totally agree.) As a whole story though, I would give it 3 1/4 Stan Lees out of 5. It would have gotten a 4 if not for the ending.
Let’s take a look at the Overall
Pros: The super comfy seats at the theater. (I’m glad for you both, they’re hard to come by sometimes)
The Deadpool and Last Witch Hunter trailers
The sound fx and soundtrack.
The casting of the main 4.
Cons: Doom
Some of the special fx felt cheap and looked like poo
Doom
The ending and no after credits (boo, but what could they have really added?)
NO STAN LEE (What the wha?! Don’t they know we only go for his cameos?!)
DOOM. (Did you mention Doom? Ouch!)
Well, there you have it nerds, what were your thoughts?
Also, check out our friend NerdyGras’ for another honest Fantastic Four review! You can find it here.
Till next time… Live long and timey wimey (And stay nerdy my friends!)
This was Rich and Jaime…
Aren’t they adorable?!
and this is Roni! Enjoy Nerds!
