Fantastic Four – Richards Reckons Review

The Fantastic Four. They were Marvel Comics’ premiere superteam – a mish-mash of powered peeps all coming together as a collective to bust crime and fight evil, all the while giving themselves a rather arrogant title (“Fantastic Four”? Why not hedge your bets and call yourself the Qualifiable Quartet and just wait for other people to deem you fantastic?). The foursome, who comprise of Reed Richards aka Mr Fantastic (Señor Stretchy), Sue Storm aka Invisible Woman (Seethrough Sue), Johnny Storm aka The Human Torch (Sizzle Supreme) and Ben Grimm aka The Thing (Sedimentary Sasquatch – see, I could totally rename all of them with some assonance to boot), are no strangers to the big screen and this is third iteration in total, making them close to Spider-Man in the reboot wars. Their rights belong to Fox, who now want to make them fit in with their X-Men universe for some future crossover glory further down the line, so it’s important to note that this ISN’T anything to do with the Avengers and co despite what the Marvel logo may make you think.

This time it’s directed by Josh Trank, who played cleverly with the superhero concept as a whole in his 2012 debut Chronicle. It stars a cast of Hollywood’s young rising stars in the form of Miles Teller (Reed Richards), Kate Mara (The invisible Woman), Michael B. Jordan (The Human Torch) and Jamie Bell (The Thing). It’s from the producers of X-Men: Days of Future Past and even Matthew Vaughn, director of Kingsmen: The Secret Service. Everything is in place for this film to be a cracker – a stalwart tentpole movie of the modern superhero genre.

Alas, it’s not. It’s a befuddled, stumbling mess.

The issues mainly lie with its absolutely staggeringly ill-considered approach to tone and pacing. The studio has obviously seen the light-hearted approach that Marvel Studios takes to its movies and the conversely dark/gritty approach that DC hope to have with theirs and tries to be both at the same time; with sequences that have the odd quip or two which fall on their respective bottoms or heavy-handed attempts at pathos which never really go anywhere or mean anything. It goes between these two gears like a pair of sugared-up children on a see-saw. As for the pacing, the film doesn’t know where to spend its minutes wisely. There are random and ill-judged time-jumps; characters disappear for scenes at a time (forgetting the nature of an ENSEMBLE movie); their evolution into working together and becoming a team is rushed through an incredibly underwhelming climax.

As for the story, parts of it are genuinely laughable – and not intentionally. The reason for the crew going on their doomed space journey in the first place is quite frankly ridiculous (especially the way that Ben gets involved too). You may think that a film that includes a man that can stretch like his last name was Armstrong is a strange place to complain about ridiculousness but in story terms it just bypasses any natural logic.

The actors really do try their best with the material that they’re given but are constantly shortchanged – the person who suffers most is Toby Kebbell and his character Victor Von Doom. In the comics, Doom is one of the most powerful and villainous baddies out there – here he is simply a “wake up sheeple!!!!11!!!11!”-style conspiracy theorist who has a little accident in space and turns into a bog standard deranged baddie with a completely illogical (as well as unexplained) plan and the appearance of an action figure dipped in silver nail polish and coloured in with splashes of a mint gel pen.

Overall, this reboot is a bland and uneventful experience that reeks of studio interference, something evidenced by the erratic marketing (the irritatingly obvious fact Fox paid popular Twitter accounts to tweet about it as well as the confusion of tone between trailers aren’t exactly good indicators here). There are positives here as the performers put in their all and the effects for the most part are pretty good (the use of mixing their powers in the end could be a lot worse), but mostly this film tries to be every kind of superhero movie and fails at being any at all.

<insert your own pun/joke about it being called Fantastic and it not being so Fantastic at all here>

Ant-Man – Richards Reckons Review

 
Ridiculous. 
Unrealistic. 
Tiny.

No, this isn’t a list of things that my sexual partners have said to me at some point or another, but some of the buzzwords that Ant-Man has had slapped onto it like the cinematic version of something in a reduced section of a supermarket. “A man who can turn into an ant?!” the befuddled ask, well, befuddledly. When they are corrected and told that actually the suit allows the wearer to shrink in size and grow in strength while giving them the ability to talk to ants, that makes it worse. “That’s completely stupid! Why should I waste my hard earned dosh on that?! I could buy at least 3 limited edition Des Lynam coasters with that money!”

Peyton Reed picks up the somewhat troubled reigns from Edgar Wright to direct this adaptation that’s been in the works for ants years (assuming they’re very long). The plot concerns Michael Douglas’ Hank Pym, an aging scientist who discovered “Pym Particles” (the wonderstuff that makes organic matter able to shrink) back in the day and used them to fight bad guys before retiring and creating his own company Pym Technologies. Cut to the present and his former protege Darren across (an un-wigged Corey Stoll) has taken over and is planning to weaponise the technology, so Pym and his daughter Hope (an off-island Evangeline Lily) seek to shut him down – and who else better to put in the admittedly dangerous Ant-Man suit than recently released cat burglar Scott Lang (an un-newsreader Paul Rudd). Heists and height-based hijinks ensue aplenty. 

Marvel are well aware of the tall tale they’re telling here, and get the self-deprecation out of the way pretty early on to focus on the fun and actually quite “badass” (I hear the kids say this word so I thought I’d give it a whirl) facets of the character. If they’d have attempted a dark, Nolanesque take on Ant-Man that obviously would not have worked so the trademark “Marvel is fun” approach is in full effect – naysayers and defectors will no doubt complain and use the word “samey”, but actually it is a great fit for this character. The point of view of the world being suddenly magnified is used for some fantastic physical comedy and some of the most inventive and best looking set pieces that Marvel has ever put out. The regular “MCU third acts all being the same” could not be more wrong here (you’ll also never see keyrings quite in the same light). 

The cast here are firing on all cylinders; Paul Rudd is a charming addition to the ever-increasing roster and is distinctive enough to not feel like a snarky Tony Stark/Star-Lord rip off, which in other hands he could’ve been. Evangeline Lily isn’t physically given a lot to do but emotionally has got a lot of manoeuvring and does it very well; the pair of them have great chemistry with Michael Douglas as a threesome (not like that, come on, grow up). I feel some are being harsh on Stoll who brings vim and vigour to the megalomaniacal Marvel villain role. It could be argued however that Michael Pena steals the show here with his endlessly optimistic criminal Luis – he has a couple of chances to reel off some brilliantly complex Edgar Wright flavoured dialogue. 

Ant-Man isn’t a perfect movie, with some pacing and continuity errors (including one so obvious I can’t believe it was allowed), but on the whole this has everything you could possibly want in a movie experience, with great characters, some awesomely inventive setpieces (Thanos the Titan? More like THOMAS) and a script that crackles with comedy (thanks to a strange Paul Rudd + Adam McKay/Edgar Wright + Joe Cornish hybrid that works better on paper than you think it might). There are connections to the further MCU that feel developed and comic-like rather than screaming “CASH IN” (the crossover with another Avenger being a particular highlight), but Ant-Man works extremely well as a standalone superhero/heist movie, so don’t worry about not having an encyclopaedic knowledge on the Avengers and co. While Wright would’ve made a film that was a tad more zippy and frantic, Reed has done a great job with the troubled production and lack of fan enthusiasm he was given. In the mean time, just sit back, relax, try to forget about all the ants you’ve ever massacred in your life and prepare to feel small (in the best way possible).