Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer
Reviewed by Samuel Osborn
Director: Tim Story
Screenplay: Don Payne, Mark Frost
Cast: Ioan Gruffud, Jessica Alba, Michael Chiklis
MPAA Classification: PG
It's sad enough when a sequel fails to live up to the quality of its
predecessor. But it's an entirely different tragedy when the
predecessor, in this case the first Fantastic Four movie, contained no
hint of quality to begin with. Its sequel, Rise of the Silver Surfer,
is not just unnecessary, but achieves a woeful demotion from the comic
book regurgitation of the original. That's right, it's even worse.
Besides the obvious financial potential of a Fantastic Four sequel,
the only plausible reason for Rise of the Silver Surfer to be granted
the greenlight by its studio is by way of its title character. The
Silver Surfer (voiced occasionally by Laurence Fishburne) is
admittedly pretty awesome. He careens from outer space as a meteor
into Earth's atmosphere, zipping around the globe and impacting the
land with various craters in preparation for the planet's destruction.
Never mind his humane intentions and fluffy nice guy interior; the
Silver Surfer is a certifiable badass. Composed entirely of candied
CGI goodness, he looks like the figurine version of Terminator 2's
metallic T-1000 propped up on a chrome surfboard. His sequences are
the only fantastic thing about this film, making his supreme lack of
appearances all the more disappointing. Instead, we're given the likes
of Victor Von Doom (Julian McMahon), who still leads the contest for
most stupidly overwrought name for a villain. Von Doom soaks up screen
time like a diseased sponge, blocking out any opportunity for the
Silver Surfer to perform his titular rise.
Returning to save the world from interplanetary surfers are the
aforementioned four. Dr. Reed Richards (Ioan Gruffud) again leads the
spandexed quartet, now mysteriously engaged to Jessica Alba, playing
Sue Storm. Michael Chiklis and Chris Evans return as the big orange
rock, Ben Grimm, and the cocky flamer, Johnny Storm. Each actor's
performance lives up to the mediocrity of the first Fantastic go-
round, with the exception of Michael Chiklis whose delivery has become
as lifeless as the rocks he's composed of. Ms. Alba also loses some of
her conviction, which probably is just an effect of the difficulty
involved in manipulating a face lathered in entire bottles of golden
bronzing.
Anyway, the ride isn't very lengthy at a cool 89 minutes and thus
can't irritate to its full potential. It's a harmless dry heave of a
sequel, amazing sometimes in its technical prowess and also amazing in
its complete ineptitude for telling a story. I'd make a sly finishing
pun about how un-fantastic Rise of the Silver Surfer is, but I'm sure
by now the point is made. This film is bad.
Samuel Osborn
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