The typical sequel pulls off watchable but still hurts the series

Rating: 6/10 (1 July 2007)

As stated at the end of my Fantastic 4 review it was practically a given that a sequel would follow the 2005 film and sure enough it did. But can you make a sequel to an already average superhero film that bases itself more towards kids and campy cartoony super powers?? Well certainly they were going to try and much to my surprise for the most part they pull off a better than expected sequel considering they had no origin to deal with. They did so by bringing in The Silver Surfer who turns out to be the best part of this average sequel and a very cool character who probably could have held his own film. Tim Story returns to direct the sequel which was also a plus because he knew the direction to take it and the characters and how to properly set everything up. That being said you can't build a stellar sequel off of an already very average film so that sequel ended up being a little more average.
All of the original cast returns...some better than others. Ioan Gruffudd, Jessica Alba, Chris Evans, and Michael Chiklis are the Fantastic Four respectively. Chiklis is still the highlight as the overwhelming brute strength 'Thing' or 'Ben Grimm.' Jessica Alba did her best to look a little more like the Sue Storm that comic book goers enjoy after getting some flack because she 'looked nothing like her.' She does a decent job and in fact gets some great lines and scenes and pretty much steals the show. Evans returns as Johnny Storm who really was a forefront character in the original but they toned him down a little for the sequel, he still gets a lot of scenes including the first fight with The Silver Surfer but he's not quite as large and loud as he was in the original. Gruffudd kind of gets most of the script and screen time as Mr. Fantastic (Reed Richards.) He is just very bland and with his powers being the most cartoony and kid like it doesn't exactly help to take his character seriously. He doesn't really impress me in the role or throughout the film. Julian McMahon returns rather forcefully as Victor Von Doom and I mean forcefully because it was like they had to really push themselves to find a way to bring him back. His terrific performance in the original film made for a great bad guy and they kind of moved him to the back burner for the sequel but made sure he was there just for the sake of being there and that's unfortunate. The incredible Doug Jones who is not very recognizable because he is using his incredible talents to portray monsters, beasts, imps, zombies and creatures of all kind plays the physical Silver Surfer while Laurence Fishburne does the Surfer's voice. Jones is just an awesome talent and does such a terrific job with very specific movements and body language and is not afraid to hide his visage behind make up or CGI or anything else. He very well may be one of the acting greats in this capacity. Fishburne's voice definitely suits the Surfer and is terrific.
The Silver Surfer visually and with plot line single handedly makes Fantastic 4: Rise of The Silver Surfer worthwhile. Sadly the Fantastic 4 themselves really doesn't add anything to the film and the visual effects are impressive but still sub par considering the short story and everything happening so fast. Maybe as many critic suggested they are trying to turn themselves more into a kid franchise and that makes sense and young kids probably will enjoy it more than an adult but magnificent children's epics like Harry Potter, Chronicles of Narnia, and even Pixar films this still falls short of anything more than average. It's a renter for the kids or maybe even wait until it appears on Television because seeing it in the theater doesn't make it any more impressive. Average all around. 6.5/10