Fantastic Four: The Rise of the Silver Surfer...

[fajrdrako]

Last night I went to see Fantastic Four: The Rise of the Silver Surfer.

I've explained before how reading Fantastic Four #18, "The Return of the Super-Skrull", was a pivotal experience in my young life. I loved that series with a passion - along with X-Men, Daredevil, Sgt. Fury, Spider-Man and Journey into Mystery. I was particularly in love with Reed Richards, who to my ten-year-old eyes was the perfect man and hero.

For decades there was talk of making a Silver Surfer movie. I guess this was it.

Silver Surfer was an interesting character. Gorgeous, angst-ridden, one of Jack Kirby's finest moments, though the premise always struck me as absurd and I never really understood the Surfer's cult status. There was an element of self-pity to him that kept me at arm's length. But there was an interesting paradox to the concept: an embodiment of power and powerlessness at the same time.

Well, this movie made the most of him. The Silver Surfer himself was stunning: I loved the special effects, I loved his manner and his voice, and I loved his situation. I liked it that they didn't embellish on the original story, or change its details. I was waiting for him to say his name, and when he did at last say "Norrin Radd" quietly in the Fantasticar, it put shivers up my back.

Aaah, nostalgia. This all dates back to Fantastic Four #48 and a time in my life when I could probably name every issue by title and tell you what happened in it. I remember once going to a comic con in London, England, where someone had a terrific Galactus costume - just boots, huge boots, that disappeared up behind the stage curtains above. Works for me.

So Galactus here really was a force of nature, just suggested by the shadow of his Kirbyesque headgear. Looks like this, for the uninitiated. Works for me.

On the other hand, Doctor Doom seemed sort of irrelevant to the story - a gadfly, a complication, but not significant to the main themes. And the FF themselves....

I love Ioan Gruffudd from Horatio Hornblower and Century City, and he makes a fine Reed Richards, but... that childhood passion I used to have for the man is gone. Jessica Alba is sweet and has many of the characteristics I used to so love in Sue Storm, but at the same time... she isn't real, she isn't my Sue Storm, I find it hard to take her seriously. Johnny Storm is good - and his character development here was probably the best of the bunch - but he lacks the youthful spark of innocence I once loved in the comic book character. And Ben Grimm... ah, bashful Benjy. I don't think they could ruin that wonderful character. But there wasn't a lot of focus on him.

I liked it that there was a theme of the abortive attempts of Reed and Sue to have a real wedding - a bit of a comic book in-joke maybe, but effective and fun. And in the end I liked the theme that Reed and Sue wanted a 'normal' life but Sue eventually realized they had higher duties - and I particularly liked it that it was Sue who said so, when she'd seemed the one most likely to want a house in the suburbs. Now, as comic books, TV and movies go, I've never really understood or sympathized with the 'wanting a normal life' business, but it was handled as well here as I've ever seen it. Me, I'd rather be extraordinary, given the chance.

Stan Lee got to play himself - just as in the original wedding comic!

So: I enjoyed myself watching this movie. I smiled a lot - out of nostalgia, recognition, pleasure, all sorts of things - and truly felt for the Surfer. At the same time, it all seemed much more shallow and simple than it once did in the comic books I loved so much. Not magical, not meaningful, but pleasant entertainment.

Makes me want to go and reread my old Fantastic Four comics, now.

Comments

[star-momma.livejournal.com]

I'm glad to hear that it at least didn't ruin any memories for you. I admit that the first movie seared my soul with it's awfullness despite how much I love Julian McMahon. Not everything was awful, but the leads just didn't fit to me (Sue and Reed, that is), and the whole thing... it felt slapped together. Hopefully this one was at least more artfully composed and not written by a 12-year-old ;)

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

I'm afraid there's something of the feel of "written by a 12 year old" to it. Not entirely in a bad way - it has a lot of that humour/action mix that I always feel is the hallmark of an old Marvel comic, and a fairly sparky feel to the characterization. But it is fairly simplistic in plot, unsubtle in characterization, and there's very little sense of literary structure or pacing. Compared to, say, the average episode of "Heroes", it's pale and puerile stuff.

It's sense of fun does a lot to redeem it, but it isn't the movie I would want it to be.

It's one of those movies where it helps to have low expectations. Better than the first movie, yes, but... still not satisfying to my inner-FF-lover.

What do you know Julian McMahon from? In both movies I felt he was a good actor doing a strong job of characterization despite a script that offered him absolutely nothing at all in either personality or plot.

[star-momma.livejournal.com]

Julian's one of the leads on Nip/Tuck, which is one of my favorite shows ever. No redeeming social value at all, but it's just wonderful for some reason. Lots of sex and violence and shock value, but the actors are really quite good, and it's excellent brain candy :)

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

Ah - I've heard of Nip/Tuck, but I've never seen it and really don't know anything much about it. Sounds like fun!

[filkferengi]

He was also in several seasons of "Charmed." Yummy!

[mommimus-prime.livejournal.com]

Okay, you've actually made me want to see this. I have a couple of days with nothing to do, so I guess a trip to the movies is in order.

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

Well - I'll be interested to hear what you think of it! I liked its spirit, but the writing is.... thin. A little too obvious. Emptier than I would hope, and not well structured.... But making up for its lacks with a sense of fun and something of the spirit of the old FF.

[mommimus-prime.livejournal.com]

I did go see it. I enjoyed it. It was short, it was faithful to my concept of FF. Agreed about the emptiness. There was also a lack of emotion regarding the arrival of Galactus. Could be the wedding stuff just drowned it out but there was was just no sense of dread that you'd think the world would be feeling about the coming of ultimate destruction.

Liked the Surfer. Properly angsty without making me roll my eyes.

I can't, though, get past Jessica Alba as Sue Storm. All wrong. Everybody else, great.

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

I enjoyed it.

Good! I'd hate to think I led you astray.

it was faithful to my concept of FF. Agreed about the emptiness.

Yes - there wasn't much there, but what was there was true to the spirit.

There was also a lack of emotion regarding the arrival of Galactus.

That's true. It was as if the personal stuff, and the microcosm - like the personality clash with the General, or Doctor Doom's meddling, or the decision to break up the FF - had more emotional importance than Galactus coming and destroying the world. As if nobody but the Surfer believed it could happen.

Liked the Surfer. Properly angsty without making me roll my eyes.

Yes. He had just the right mix of noble/conflicted/dangerous/compassionate and even sexiness. He was the best thing in the movie.

Jessica Alba... sigh. I try to give her the benefit of the doubt, but she just doesn't make the grade. She's... inadequate.

[walkingowl.livejournal.com]

The Silver Surfer is my single favorite comic book character. This, from someone who is not oriented within the framwork of "list your favorites, most to least) -- I never think about things that way. So, I'll repeat: the Surfer is my single favorite comic book character.

When I first encountered him, I was both older and younger than you were at your first encounter. I think it was in comic book form, but it would have been in reprints... or else it was in one of the early book-bound collections. I know I had two of them, and The Superhero Women was the other one.

Early on, the Surfer was mine. The brooding and inwardness that you say you never got, I chimed with it from the start. I felt like the Surfer. I, too, was trapped on Earth because I had refused to do something unthinkable... well, so to speak, here! Myself, all I'd done to get "stuck" here was not be someone who forced herself to fit into the mainstream. So, I was perpetually an outsider. And yet I could not leave to find some other place that would clash less with my energies.

Funny that you say that this movie struck you as much more ephemeral than the comics. The reviews were raving about it, saying it was the best comic book movie yet. I conclude that it may have found the happy medium of using our glorious comic heroes in such a way that eternal non-fans can get hold of them too... sad thought, that. But it's so great to see these wonderful characters in movies and have them be in common speech that I'm likely not to complain too much about the false-ringing versions that we are seeing.

I'm still waiting for the LSH movie. Except I'll go jump off the Baxter Building if Mark Waid ends up doing the screenplay, aarrggh!!!

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

from someone who is not oriented within the framwork of "list your favorites, most to least) -- I never think about things that way

How interesting - someone said the same thing to me in almost the same words just yesterday.

Interesting comments about the Silver Surfer, too. I was trying to think who I did identify with in the FF... I wanted to be Reed Richards, but that was an aspiration, not a reality. I certainly identified with Sue Storm, but I think I mostly identified with Ben Grimm.

The reviews were raving about it, saying it was the best comic book movie yet.

Really? Well, I guess the judge by different standards than mine. I think the best 'comic book movie' ever is Unbreakable. Mext... Asterix maybe. There aren't many comic book movies I think are as good as the comics they're based on. But that's maybe my bias - my love of comics - affecting my judgement. Or my preference for material in the medium in which it originated. Not always, but usually.

I think comic book movies tend to be too action-oriented, rather than character-oriented, and to simplify too much, and to be rather poorly written in terms of script, and rather poorly structured in terms of plot.

I agree with you that it's wonderful to see them, and in ways that can be understood by non-comics-readers. It's wonderful to see them in movies that treat them with a certain love and respect, and keep the spirit of the original.

As for your last sentence - I'd be right there jumping beside you!

[walkingowl.livejournal.com]

Hm. I took the review to mean, non-comics-fans say it's the best comic book movie. Meaning, people who have a strongly different take on comics than we do. I agree with you on "the best comic book movie."

The second time I saw the new FF movie, I was deeply struck by how well they got the "team/fellowship" element of the Fantastic Four. It was... right, it was just right.

I was also struck by how true to the original early-60s comics it kept. Aww... sweet! That part about Norrin Radd putting himself on the line because Sue Storm reminded him of his own love... gad, I can't believe it worked, but by gosh it worked. And it was not maudlin at all.

I'd like to know who it was who also said "I have no single-favorite anything," not to intrude on their privacy, but only to find out if they too have any of the other cognitive and perceptual aspects that I have. I'm beginning to conjecture that the neurotypical trait of thinking in words might have a good deal to do with some of the differences between that neurotypical majority and those of us who are somewhere on the autistic spectrum. Here's a thought: when you have a thought, it has many aspects; when you put it into words, this necessarily limits it to only certain of those aspects, becuase words are less flexible than thoughts. Just a thought, eh?

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

I think you feel limited by words for communication in a way I do not. What the implications of this are, I'm trying to explore.

Yes, I liked the family spirit of the FF and the movie captured that well.