Fantastic Four

Director: Josh Trank
Writers: Jeremy Slater, Simon Kinberg
Stars: Miles Teller, Kate Mara, Michael B. Jordan 
Strengths: Cinematic effects, Humour
Weakness:  Plot, Casting, A poor reimagining of the comics
Runtime: 100 minutes
Rating: 1.5/5

Plot: Four young students travel to an alternate and dangerous universe which alters their physical form in shocking ways. The four must learn to harness their new abilities and work together to save Earth from a former friend turned enemy.

Review: While most will agree that the original Fantastic Four movies starring Chris Evans wasn't really all that great, this new reboot will surely make you feel like they were. As per previously leaked information before launch, the story for the movie is mostly original with very little input from the comics. The film starts with Reeds and Grimm as kids experimenting with teleportation technology. At a science fair, they are discovered by Sue Storm and her father, who reveal that Reed's teleporter actually travels to another dimension. He is brought into an institution for gifted scientists and they work to hone the teleporter further with the help of other students, including Victor Von Doom. Once they do get it to work properly, they take an unsanctioned trip and things go wrong and the resulting tragedy leaves them all with very unnatural powers, which incites the government to use them as tools and utilize the new dimension for their own needs. 

To those who are accustomed to the comics, or even the Saturday morning cartoons, the stories is very different, but even more different are the characters themselves and their dynamics. The movie portrayed the characters in a very "looking out for number one" manner; meaning there was very little coordination or trust or respect between them until at the very end when they realized they'd be doomed to failure otherwise. Also due to such drastic changes in the story, Sue and Johnny arent really brother and sister per se as Sue is adopted, which is why Johnny is depicted as an African American. As such, the brother-sister dynamics seen in the cartoons, comics and even the original movies are lost. This movie also proves that Marvel, who has been enjoying quite a successful streak with their cinematic adaptations, may have just had its first flop. What's truly confusing is that the recent Batman trilogies are also original stories, but it still managed to win hearts. This movie also had potential had the casting and character profiles were kept intact. 

Reviewed by Intisab Shahriyar