Exposed to cosmic radiation during a space mission, inventor, astronaut and scientist Reed Richards, his ex-girlfriend Susan Storm, and pilots Ben Grimm and Johnny Storm, are torn apart and reformed atom-by-atom. Soon after they return to Earth, they each manifest fantastic superpowers. Richards can stretch his body to inhuman lengths; Susan Storm can become invisible and create force fields; her brother Johnny Storm can ignite his body into living flame and soar through the air; and Ben Grimm's human features have been erased - now he wears the rocky form of a super-strong, invulnerable 'thing'. Outsiders to the human race, the group remain together and try to stop a madman named Dr. Doom who wants to reshape the world into his own twisted image.

I can already see why people aren’t going to like this movie and there reasons for distaste are probably why I did like the movie. It is pure fluff; it is a movie that can be only enjoyed for its entertainment value and nothing more. The movie doesn’t try to be serious, it doesn’t try to be what a comic book, all it aims to be is a pure “popcorn flick.” The story is pretty simple five individuals find their lives altered forever by a freak accident that gives them super hero powers, now all that is left for them is to decide what to do with those super powers. For four of them it means a life of fighting crime and doing justice, for the last one it means taking whatever he wants with the power granted to him. How else would you do the movie, you can’t make it like Spiderman where he turmoil’s over his hidden identity because these heroes have no secret identities. You can’t do it like Batman because none of these heroes have any vengeance to seek. You can’t do it like Superman because none of them were born with their powers and learned to cope over the years. They did the movie the only way you could do it, utterly silly, insanely inane. That’s why I liked the movie for what it was and for what it didn’t try and be.

If I wanted to find something wrong with the movie for me it would have been the casting. Chris Evans was perfect as the Human Torch as he is everything I would imagine Johnny Storm to be, cocky, arrogant and in the end a true hero deep down. I also enjoyed Michael Chiklis as the Thing as he really gave emotion to the character and while he was the one who looked least like a human he is the one with the most humanity. But I have to question Ioan Gruffudd as Mr. Fantastic as I always saw and see Reed Richards as an older more fatherly figure who imparts his wisdom on those he caused to be altered. Also while Jessica Alba is nice to look at she can’t act to save her life. Julian McMahon rounds out the cast and does a good job at Dr. Doom as well as he seems like the cocky megalomaniac that power would so easily lead to evil. The movie surely has its faults and you could banter them around all day but the movie for me was fun and that was more than I expected.

The movie asks a very important question what does power do to oneself. A famous quote once said Ultimate power leads to Ultimate corruption This can be true in many aspects of life, Dr Doom is the side of us that gives into the power and ultimately corruption. The Fantastic Four are the altruistic side of us that given so much power we would use it for good. Most of the Marvel comics look at life through that of the superhero, they are fun and they distance us from our own choices all the while asking the question: What If?
3.5 stars out of 5