The 4

Rating: 5/10 (3 November 2006)

The supposed bread and butter of this film's premise as promised is the Fantastic Four doing battle with Doom. That occurs for like ten minutes at the tail end of the movie. What we get are a modicum of visual effects that are moderately successful. Lots of cars get thrown around in this movie, that's for sure.
The synopsis, or what there is of it, consists of five people going into space(it's that easy when you are wealthy like Julian McMahon to just up and go to space when you feel like it)to find cures and stuff for disease. They encounter some sort of life force entity which gives each of them powers beyond what mortal man can possibly imagine.
Ioan Gruffudd is Reed Richards, the nerdy shy scientist whose job at NASA sent him into bankruptcy with pal Michael Chiklis as Ben Grimm..always watching his friend's back through all the heartache. Jessica Alba is Sue Storm, Reed's ex who still carries a torch for him. She has been working under the millionaire Victor Von Doom(what a name, huh?), played by Julian in all his menacing glory. Julian is indeed the only real thing this film has going for it with the exception of the harrowing bridge sequence caused by a man who planned to jump off of said bridge. To close out the group is Chris Evans as Johnny Storm, a cocky, self-assured pretty boy who is to pilot the ship to space. I'm surprised he had enough brains to pilot his car on Earth much less some ship into space.
Anyway, after the crew encounters the anomaly in space, Reed's limbs become tender and he can now stretch them for miles and miles, Sue can make her entire body invisible, Johhny can turn his body into a flying fireball, and poor Ben forms into this huge rock creature. Victor's body is slowly growing into steel while also carrying a unique ability to shift electrical current with his hands.
Victor, who loses money from his company for his funding the space fiasco, lets lose on his boss who tells him he's finished, and once he sees that Sue, who he has a thing for, is still in love with Reed, DOOM will soon come upon The 4.
The film opens sappy story lines like the whole love angle between Reed and Sue, Thing's unbearable hardship with how he looks, and sister trying to stop fire torch brother from enjoying his unique abilities. Reed is trying desperately to solve the riddle behind how to change everyone back to their original normal form, but brick walls seem to always stand in front of him. Meanwhile, Doom likes his increasing power and will tool his resources to try and unleash a flurry of rage against those who sent him into financial ruin.