Actually like your regular, average, dopey comic book.

Rating: 7/10 (9 July 2005)

There are your good, bad and average comic books. Just like your good, bad and average movies. I have been reading the Fantastic Four since the beginning (actually since Spiderman, so I missed the first few issues), and while this movie is not great, it does evoke a lot of the confused spirit of the first few years of the comic book. Let's face it: there is nothing wrong with this movie a better director could not have fixed. But for what it is, it does it pretty well. I had a feeling as I left the theater that the producers decided to go a different way with this movie (as opposed to the great Spiderman and X-Men films). To make a light, carefree presentation that does not violate the inherent intent of the book; and speaking as one who has loved and followed the book since the early 1960's, I think that was accomplished. If they were trying to give the public a presentation of a typical average, dopey comic book, I think they were successful. Not every comic book movie has to be a great movie (think Batman Begins, or Spiderman 2), and there is room for a basic entertaining movie that is faithful to the core material that comes off slight.