Fantastic Four 2: Rise of the Silver Surfer (spoilers)

[GoodKingJayIII]

I think it's fair to judge this within the categories it falls. This isn't Casablanca or The Bridges of Madison County. It's a genre flick. A popcorn movie. How could anyone expect something else?

I will judge it based on its own merits and shortcomings.

 

[DonTadow]

You wouldn't know that from the reactions in this thread. It's kind of like people are DARING anyone who liked it to post a 500 page dissertation on the precise reasons WHY...it's nuts. Now I can't like a movie because some people I never met might think I'm dumb...I'm losing sleep on this...honest.

NOt saying that put put an approrpiate rating. If you liked the movie but no it was bad, give it a 5 or 6. SAve the 7s and 8s for movies you really liked and 9s and 10s for movies you think were supurb.

 

[WayneLigon]

Well, if the story had glaring plot holes and didn't make too much sense, what more is there to like but the special effects? Which makes me think that most people seem to come on here and review the movie based on special effects.

I find that usually people who complain about minor plot holes are either nitpickers or simply were not paying attention to the movie; in their head they were already writing out their awesome internet post about how the movie sucked rather than pay attention to what they were being shown and not shown.

To wit:

Then it shows up, doesn't do anything,

So you missed all the scenes of imminant destruction as the thing bears down on Earth and is stopped in the nick of time? The 'not doing anything' means Earth is still here and the Surfer stopped it in time.

we have no idea what the holes were for,

It's quite clear what the holes are for; they allow Galactus to bypass the crust and go for the interior of the world to rip it apart in order to consume it's life force. The cloud/machine tendrils are clearly shown going for the holes. We see this several times at the end and partially at the beginning.

we have no idea how this thing destroys planets ... We see no real power from this creature,

You missed that whole first part where he destroys a planet on screen?

he passes over every planet in our solar system.

Galactus only feeds on planets that have life on them. Dead worlds like everything else in our Solar System don't interest him. He consumes the life force of a planet as well, that thing - what ever it is - that allows a planet to generate and sustain life.

Another thing: we don't know if the Surfer destroyed Galactus or simply dispelled him. But this idea touches on another point. Two points, really.

In the original series, the Surfer rebels but Galactus is ultimately driven off by the appearance of the Ultimate Nullifier, which Johnny gets when the Watcher on the Moon decides to interfere. I defy anyone to present that sequence of events to an audience and have them follow it.

Other times, Galactus has been swayed by pity for the life forms he must consume. We'd hear howls over this, too, 'oh noes, the mighty Galactus defeated by the power of LUV!'.

The Surfer is a creature that has despaired. He saved his planet but became this thing that has led to the deaths of countless other worlds. He may have had the power all along to break his servitude but could not.

See, in good fiction real characters are often their own worst enemeies. They don't behave like automatons, always chosing the 'smart' path. This is why we are able to empathize with them, because they are not perfect. I often see this kind of reaction among people who have little real world experience or who are not very empathic; they're people who 'don't understand people'. Well when it comes to fiction, that's a crippling disability because that means you're unable to understand the motivations and foibles of well-drawn characters.

I can live with the ending quite well enough; because Sue awakens memories of his former life in him, the Surfer can reach down within himself and do what must be done. He finds the will and desire to briefly become something much more than a set of statistics. It's Dramatically Appropriate, and people who can't reconcile with that are missing something inside themselves.

Just seems that a couple years ago, people actually had more to say on here about the movies that came out.

I usually try to hold my tongue as the level of pure stupid from the various naysayers (who seem to have been suckled on the teet of AICN talkback) is just too daunting. The bashing and nitpicking has really soared to a level that makes me yearn for the eyerolls smilie. No film or book is perfect, but the people that rail on and on about plot holes and all the various other armchair director antics has just gotten silly. I mean, jeez, is there anything these people like at all?

Let me let the persistant naysayers in on a little secret. When you think everything is crap, it's not the 'everything' that has something wrong with it. It's you.

Yeah, there are some truly bad movies out there; I've done my own reviews of some really amazing stinkers but the stuff I see more and more of are people railing on and on and on about stuff that is decent. Millions of other people think it's pretty darn decent as well.

 

[Holy Bovine]

Well that pretty much sums up my position - thanks Wayne!

 

[Rackhir]

The movie did commit one of the cardinal sins of a comic book movie. Namely that of not having Dr. Doom wear the dammed outfit throughout most of the movie. IT'S A DAMMED COMIC BOOK MOVIE! COMIC BOOK CHARACTERS WEAR THE DAMMED OUTFITS!

I thought it was stupid that in "Judge Dred" the movie, that Sylvester Stallone didn't wear the Judge Dred outfit, but when you're a Hollywood money man and you're paying $20 mil for Stallone, I can at least understand wanting to see his dammed face.

However the guy playing Doom is a nobody. He's in a basic cable TV show, a moderately popular one, but so what? It's not like it's even as popular as Monk. Why the HELL did they have him out of the outfit for 2/3rds of the movie? In the first movie at least they were doing the origin and he wasn't "Dr. Doom" yet, but they don't even have that excuse this time.

 

[Hand of Evil]

6.5 for me and while better than the first, just a popcorn 90 minute flick, McD's happy meal to feed to the general masses.

There were holes in the plot, the actting just on level of a bad TV show. Special effects were great, I would have loved to see Galactus, come on, how many of the viewers would know the differance.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

there's an attitude that genre (sci-fi, fantasy, supers) stuff gets a more than a bit of a pass. <snip> It's unfortunate <snip> giving sub-par movies a pass because they're genre means we keep getting more crappy movies.

Amen!

 

[Dinkeldog]

(Moderator mode) Lots of things to say here.

1) No one really has a right to force, or verbally call out someone that puts an abbreviated post. Provided that this is not a perpetually thing or a postcount++ style continual annoyance, which the moderators look out for, allow that someone might be posting a quick comment in their 30-seconds or so browsing while at work or feeding the baby (which is also work--you try shoveling applesauce into a moving target).

2) No one really has a right to force someone else to continually justify their opinions, or insist that their rating scale is the correct one. We're all individuals. I might consider a certain level to be a "7 or 8" while someone else considers that a "5 or 6". Uh, so what? This isn't world peace we're after--we're discussing things from our own points of view.

3) If you disagree with someone, fine, they're opinions, not discrete facts. Let it go rather than chewing on something like a dog on a bone. Speak your peace and move on. Continually calling out other posters is not an endearing trait. Civility is the hallmark here.

(Moderator mode off)

Now, having said that, as a strictly personal aside (and noting that I won't get to see this for a few more days, probably), one might point out that "Citizen Kane", widely regarded as one of the finest movies ever made, if not the single best movie ever made rests entirely on a plot hole. With any movie made, there is a certain amount of suspension of disbelief (let's start with the plot hole that a burst of cosmic radiation wouldn't give astronauts superpowers, but instead leave them with lethal cases of radiation poisoning). There's an amount of deus ex machina going on in most movies. Insisting that a fantasy adhere to reality takes the power from the fantasy. While Aristotle might argue that things need to be plausible, or at least internally consistent, there's already a level of internal inconsistency with fantastic (heh, I made a pun) adventure movies. The end result of any fantasy, after all, is to use a condition that is impossible, or at least, highly implausible, to explore some aspect of the human condition in a new way.

Now, on my own rating scale, I might say a 7 or 8 is an enjoyable enough romp that isn't too campy (which nearly always annoys me) but doesn't reach a fundamental exploration of the human condition. An 8 or 9 gets to the exploration of the human condition, but doesn't go as far as I believe it could possibly go. (Edit: I put Spidey 3 here because I think that we reach a good exploration of Harry Osborn's character. On charitable days, I might say it's a "9", on less charitable days, I might go with an "8".) A 10 reaches new aspects in the exploration than I have ever imagined and makes me rethink my entire personal paradigm. You may not like my scale. If not, then please refer to #2 above.

Anything else that one might take an issue with in red above, I'll refer to e-mail or PM discussion--not for discussion in this thread, but the yellow is fair game. (Provided my Comcraptastic internet doesn't fail for another day and a half, I'll cheerfully discuss with you.)

Edit: The grammar! It burns us!

 

[Dinkeldog]

However the guy playing Doom is a nobody. He's in a basic cable TV show, a moderately popular one, but so what? It's not like it's even as popular as Monk. Why the HELL did they have him out of the outfit for 2/3rds of the movie? In the first movie at least they were doing the origin and he wasn't "Dr. Doom" yet, but they don't even have that excuse this time.

Before he was on that basic cable TV show, he was a regular on a fairly successful as these things go 4th network show. I don't associate him, especially in this role, with Nip/Tuck, but with Cole from "Charmed". Maybe not Stallone caliber, but definitely face-recognition worthy.

 

[Dire Bare]

I find that usually people who complain about minor plot holes are either nitpickers or simply were not paying attention to the movie; in their head they were already writing out their awesome internet post about how the movie sucked rather than pay attention to what they were being shown and not shown.

<snip>

I usually try to hold my tongue as the level of pure stupid from the various naysayers (who seem to have been suckled on the teet of AICN talkback) is just too daunting. The bashing and nitpicking has really soared to a level that makes me yearn for the eyerolls smilie. No film or book is perfect, but the people that rail on and on about plot holes and all the various other armchair director antics has just gotten silly. I mean, jeez, is there anything these people like at all?

Let me let the persistant naysayers in on a little secret. When you think everything is crap, it's not the 'everything' that has something wrong with it. It's you.

Yeah, there are some truly bad movies out there; I've done my own reviews of some really amazing stinkers but the stuff I see more and more of are people railing on and on and on about stuff that is decent. Millions of other people think it's pretty darn decent as well.

WayneLigon, I think I'm in love with you. In a totally non-gay way of course. Not that there is anything wrong with being gay, but . . . .

Ah, hell! You've summed up my mounting frustration with cranky message board genre fans perfectly. There's nothing I can add.