The Fantastic Four.
Marvel's first family.
The comic book characters who quite literally saved
Marvel comics twice.
If there was any karmic justice in the world,
there would be a massively successful feature film
franchise, and it would inspire a generation of creative minds.
And yet--
There he is.
Unfortunately.
The Fantastic Four were created by Jack Kirby and Stan Lee
in November of 1961.
The book quite literally reinvented the comic book form,
ushering in bold new science fiction ideas, daring
new formal inventions, and charming characters that
have become international pop cultural icons.
There have been four animated TV series,
and the live action films include
the Roger Corman low budget picture from 1994, which
was never officially released, the Tim Story film Fantastic
Four which debuted in 2005, its sequel Rise of the Silver
Surfer in 2007, and the attempted
reboot by Josh Trank in 2015.
Each of these films had aspects of the Fantastic Four
that they got right.
But by and large, they all missed the mark
on what makes the characters tick,
why the concept has endured for close to 80 years,
and what people love about the property as a whole.
At its core, the Fantastic Four is an adventure family drama.
Reed is the aloof father figure, sue is the emotional heart
of the group and the mother, and Ben and Johnny
are more often than not the bickering siblings.
This character dynamic serves as the backbone
for every important Fantastic Four story.
They're a family.
They have ups and downs, but they
are living proof that blood is thicker
than, well, cosmic rays.
Look at the work that was done during the original Jack
and Stan run or how Sue Storm leaves
Reed Richards during Civil War or how the family evolved
to new heights during the Jonathan Hickman and Dale
Eaglesham run.
All of these aspects of the characters
typically flow from the fact that the team
is set up as a family.
Everything is personal.
Everything is emotional.
We know one thing from the blood test.
It's made us feel that our worst character defects are
in fact our greatest strengths.
One of the folkloric origin stories for the Fantastic Four
is that Martin Goodman, Marvel's publisher,
heard that DC was going to be doing
a team of superheroes book and wanted to beat them
to the punch, so Jack Kirby and Stan Lee
set about doing just that.
But in an effort to set them apart,
Kirby and Lee gave the characters
interpersonal conflict, real world problems,
and daily struggles.
In 1961, this was truly a huge step forward.
This spawned a superhero comic unlike any before it.
Yes, the main characters had powers
that they received in a tragic accident with cosmic rays,
and yes, they fought supervillains
like Dr. doom and the Mole Man.
But the real selling point of the book is that it evolved.
It progressed into something truly special.
A boundary pushing science fiction adventure serial.
Most of the very beloved and successful Fantastic Four
runs center around them as adventurers.
Going out into space, the Negative Zone,
or even the Earth's core.
Finding new life, meeting these entities,
and attempting to exchange knowledge.
It's Star Trek, but, you know, before Star Trek.
The feature films that have been made thus far
don't really embrace these concepts at all.
They're trying to focus on templates and what
had worked on films previously for superhero stories
and emulate that.
The Roger Corman Fantastic Four existed
purely to keep the rights of the characters.
It is a fully produced film, but it was never actually intended
to be screened theatrically.
Unbeknownst to everyone working on the film.
We were very surprised, because the thing
is, they finished the movie.
This version is a very faithful version to the initial comics,
almost to a fault. The bottom line
is they just didn't have enough money
to do everything they set out to do.
Tim Story's version of the characters
is mired in tropes and problems that
surrounded many of the 2000s era superhero films.
Audiences and execs weren't necessarily willing to go along
with large heady sci-fi, so you instantly
end up focusing on the family drama aspects of the stories.
But you have to kind of play with kid gloves
on the whole time, especially when you really
can't have the characters hurt each other, which just makes
the film version of the family drama misunderstandings
and bickering.
That's it, Tinkerbell.
You want to fly?
Then fly!
Many of the best Fantastic Four comics
present an ideological issue and then have Reed,
Sue, Johnny, and Ben pick opposing viewpoints on it.
However, none of this high level sci-fi discourse
is even attempted in the Tim Story films.
It's just a superficial version of conflict.
Case in point, Sue Storm in Rise of the Silver Surfer being
upset at Reed for dancing with some flirty girls
during his bachelor party or Ben Grimm
being sad because he's a monster,
blaming Reed for his situation.
However, the movie does a horrible job
at milking or stoking that conflict
because we need to fight a bad guy, so let's move along.
The Josh Trank Fantastic Four has so many problems,
who even knows where to start?
Let's just begin with saying the Fantastic Four should not
be a body horror film.
That's just not what it is.
But also, on a very basic level, they're not a family.
Sue and Ben barely even have scenes with each other.
None of the characters have an adoptive family mentality.
You were my best friend.
I'm not your friend.
Let's just boil it down to this.
At very specific times in the life spans of the comic book
movie, Fox attempted to mold the Fantastic Four into a mirror
image of what was really successful at the time instead
of opting to do a faithful adaptation of the source
material.
The Tim Story movies are trying desperately
to mimic the success of the first Spider-Man film.
Josh Trank's film is desperately attempting
to be taken seriously by mimicking
a grounded and Nolan-esque approach.
Just like the title would suggest,
the four members of the titular sci-fi adventuring team
should be at center stage in any Fantastic Four movie.
Their character dynamics and frictions
are what make the week to week escapades of traveling
to other worlds, dimensions, and times so fun.
This dynamic of the clearly defined familiar roles
and the high concept of sending them on an adventure
is the true heart of the Fantastic Four.
It's the Batman's parents got murdered
in an alley or the Spider-Man is responsible for his uncle's
death story engine that propels every one of the Fantastic
Four's best stories.
It's not as easily summed up in one sentence,
but ironically, it's something that should translate really
well to film and TV.
And yet, it hasn't.
Why?
Partly because of wrong time, wrong people.
Corman never intended to make a real movie.
Story didn't have the sci-fi chops
or the deeper understanding of the characters.
And sure, Chronicle was cool, but Josh Trank
should just never have been allowed anywhere
near Fantastic Four.
At the time these superhero movies were being made,
everyone was trying to figure out
how to perfect the superhero movie on screen.
Now we've done that, people are attempting to figure out
how to reinvent it.
Winter Soldier is a superhero story
by the way of an espionage thriller.
Guardians of the Galaxy is a superhero film
by the way of Star Wars.
Wouldn't it be ironic if the comic book property that
reinvented the comic book medium could reinvent
its cinematic successors?
Gotta say, it's fantastic.
Yes it is.
Thanks for checking out this fantastic video.
But now I want to talk about something
else that can save the day.
The Extra debit card.
Did you know that there are over 100 million Americans who
don't want or can't get a credit card?
But there are very few alternatives
for establishing your credit.
Extra's mission, and it's a heroic one,
is to make credit building safer and more accessible
for everyone.
So here's how it works.
Extra connects to your bank account,
so there's no credit check.
That's big.
The other great thing is the rewards.
You earn up to 1% in redeemable rewards points
for purchases you're making that you
can use to reimburse awesome rewards in Extra's
exclusive rewards shop.
To be honest, credit has always been
a bit of a struggle for me, and working with this card
really helped me out.
So sign up for Extra with the link in the description
and start building your credit with this awesome debit card.
And that's all we have this week.
What do you think?
Will there ever be a good Fantastic Four film?
Let us know in the comments below.
And as always, please subscribe in order
to stay up to date with the Nerdstalgic channel.