Fantastic Four

I've learned many things since I've started to play poker on a regular basis. One of the most important things that I've learned is the value of trusting your initial instinct or read of a particular situation. Simply put, your gut is usually right. The more you think through a situation that you are faced with, the better the chance that you are going to make a bad decision.

And although this seems like logical advice, I wish I could say that I follow it.

A few months ago I caught the trailer for the Fantastic Four. My initial reaction was that it looked like utter dog shit. Ben Grimm looked like a burn victim, Reed Richards and Sue Storm seemed horribly miscast, and Doctor Doom seemed way too American. It seemed like Johnny Storm, The Human Torch, was the only character that they had gotten right.

My initial read of the situation told me that I would be better off spending my 6 bucks on something else. I seemed content to pass it by when it opened and was able to sleep at night having not seen the Fantastic Four.

This past Saturday though something happened. I woke up and with nothing planned for the day and my last trip to the theatre two weeks in my rear view, I decided to go see the Fantastic Four. After all why shouldn't I see it? Who cares if my initial gut reaction said to stay away. Being the big comic book fan that I am though, I felt that I would be doing myself a disservice if I didn't see it. Plus it was an excuse to get some Nathan's fries.

From the get go I cursed myself for not trusting my read. The movie stunk. Like most comic book movies it suffered from having to get the origin story out of the way. Unlike good comic book movies though (Spider-Man, Hellboy) the Fantastic Four never got past this part of the story. I guess that I was frustrated knowing the characters already and what there powers were. Beyond that though the plot of the evil Doctor Doom didn't seem grand enough. He only seemed out to off the Fantastic Four and that just doesn't seem interesting enough to me.

I also thought that the movie suffered from poor editing with apparent gaps in the story popping up at an alarming rate. The special effects came off as cartoony at points. Never was this more obvious than in the stretching abilities of Mr. Fantastic. His skin tone didn't look natural and appeared to be very "digital."

With all that said, I'm sure that based on the box office that a sequel is inevitable, and if the filmakers can make certain adjustments they might have a winner on their hand next time. I guess in movies, like in poker, you can't win them all.