Month of Superhero Film Reviews: Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer

Howdy ladies and gentlemen and welcome to Day #16 of my Month of Superhero Film Reviews! During this month I’ll be reviewing of some of the best and worst comic book adapted films. Okay with the first Fantastic Four film out of the way we can now move onto the sequel that pisses me off even more, time to go back to Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer.

I knew this day was coming, I just didn’t want to come. This is one of those films you don’t talk about in a casual manner, its one of those films that you kill, bury in the back yard and never speak of ever again. But for the sake of this review series I will go back through hell for your reading pleasure. Prepare yourself, I may go a bit mental…

In terms of the plot for this film can be seen in this summary below:

“After defeating Von Doom, the Fantastic Four can really enjoy life more. All four are now comfortable with their new powers. The Thing and Johnny Storm now get along with each other, and Sue Storm is now planning to be Mrs. Fantastic. Galactus, an evil creature in space, has decided that Earth is its new target, and sends the Silver Surfer to destroy it. Reed Richards and his team must now work together to capture this surfer, and even must now team up with one individual who they didn’t expect to help.”

The story was slightly better due to the more cosmic stuff that took place in the film. You had the introduction of the Silver Surfer and this made for some interesting and new dangers that the film faced. However these new elements were still bogged down by a poor script filled crappy dialogue, absurd amounts of poor humour and a lack of care for the source material. The family dynamic of the team is still never fully realised and returning villain returning from the previous film isn’t any wiser or better than before, he’s actually worse. There is a much-needed insert of danger and serious stuff in this film which makes it better than the last film but it doesn’t come across in the way it was intended. There’s just a lot of issues I have with this film. Why are the team still bickering? Why do they have to power switch so much? Why is Johnny Storm made to be an even more annoying character than before? Why is the Silver Surfer so pants? WHY THE HOLY MOTHER OF GOD WAS GALACTUS A FRIGGING CLOUD!?! And how comes there wasn’t a more capable director handling this film? These are questions I don’t think will ever be answered. 😦

Now let’s talk about the cast. Ioan Gruffudd continues to be as dull as ever as Dr. Reed Richards/Mr. Fantastic his character is still pretty lame and lacking in common sense for a person who is supposed to be really smart. Jessica Alba may be a very hot woman, but I COULDN’T STAND HER as Susan Storm/Invisible Woman. All she did was bitch, whine and moan and it drove me mad. Any time the film focused on Sue and Reed’s relationship I turned off immediately.

Chris Evans continues to be the best part of these films as Johnny Storm/Human Torch, I liked how his character was still similar to the source material and Evans did well considering the horrible material he had to work with. Michael Chiklis as Ben Grimm/The Thing was good but I couldn’t stand him in the film once he found out he could switch powers, stuff like that shouldn’t have been included in this film.

As for Silver Surfer well he was voiced by Laurence Fishburne but was modelled by Doug Jones. Jones does good body work and Fishburne does a decent job at voicing the character though I wish his voice had sounded a little more other-worldly and distorted. As for Julian McMahon returning as Victor Von Doom/Doctor Doom he was actually worse than before, his character seemed to be even more basic than before and just didn’t come across the brilliant, evil supervillain I know from the comics. And lastly while it was nice to see Kerry Washington as Alicia Masters, in the end I wasn’t that bothered about her contribution to the film as it didn’t affect the overall story.

Now let’s talk about the presentation. Visually this film is a cut above the last film with improved CGI that makes for some nice-looking action sequences, but I’m just gonna say this now. Only the scenes with the Silver Surfer are good, everything else is just average and not overly exciting. As for the soundtrack, John Ottman returns to score this film and honestly it isn’t much better than the last film so it’s not really worth mentioning.

And lastly how does it compare to the comics? Well I dunno much about the Silver Surfer but I feel like his powers were nerfed in this film and weren’t fully explored and one thing I know for a fact is that Galactus, the planet eater is not a fucking cloud! Sure you could see tiny shadows of him within the cloud but hell why even introduce the character if you’re not gonna properly put him to use? Such a fail.

So in con Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer is a film that makes me angry. While there are some better elements like the appearance of the Silver Surfer and Chris Evans’ longer hair, everything else is terrible. This film tries to add drama and a few more comic book elements but in the end it just becomes a frustrating mess that progressively gets worse, I can’t stand Jessica Alba in this film and the way that Doctor Doom, Silver Surfer and Galactus were treated in this film was nothing short of disgraceful. I seriously can’t wait for the rebooted film in 2015, please Josh Trank, get it right for the sake of the fans!

Rating: 5/10 (Even the Silver Surfer can’t save the shitfest that is this film!)

So there’s my review people, only 14 more to go. So have you seen Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer and if so what are your thoughts on it? Drop me a comment and let me know your thoughts yo! Come back tomorrow and I’ll have a new film review online, until then peace out!