Fantastic Four

Emma Castle
10th Aug 2015

Screen adaptations of Marvel comics are seemingly a dime a dozen. One minute, it’s The Hulk. The next minute, it’s Superman. Fantastic Four is yet another instalment in this never ending parade of villains, nerd babes and souped up heroes. 

While there is nothing particularly special about this film, it is fun. Fans of the format will enjoy all the familiar themes; misfits making friends, outlandishly monikered bad dudes, space/time travel and planets that deliver supernatural benefits to visitors. 

This story revolves about two friends who invent a teleporter and are later ‘discovered’ at a school science fair. The brains of the operation, Reed Richards, is then recruited to work on a military grade teleporter and is taken to a lab in the city where he works alongside a bunch of other kids. 

As with all teenagers, add alcohol and hell breaks loose. The group decide to test the teleporter and wind up on another planet. Spoiler alert: they come back with super powers. 

The only real emotional depth comes from Ben Grimm aka The Thing’s character who struggles to come to terms with the fact he’s turned into a rock. Unlike Franz Kafka’s Metamorphosis (a guy wakes up one day and voila – he’s a cockroach), Grimm struggles with this development for approximately three scenes and then cheerfully goes to work crushing enemies of the state. 

While there is some romantic tension between Richards and Sue, one of the other teens working on the teleporter, there is more sizzle in a snowstorm. 

There’s nothing fantastic about this latest Marvel instalment but, like a cheese and tomato toasted sandwich or a rerun of The Simpsons , it’s still pretty enjoyable.

Fantastic Four is in cinemas now.