Continuing the trend of new geeky trailers coming out recently, this weekend brought us the new trailer for the 20th Century Fox reboot of The Fantastic Four (or Fan4stic, as the posters are awkwardly displaying it to us). The reboot is directed by Josh Trank (Chronicle) & stars Miles Teller (Whiplash, Divergent), Kate Mara (House of Cards), Michael B. Jordan (Fruitvale Station) and Jamie Bell (Billy Elliot, The Adventures of Tintin) for a release on August 7, 2015. Here is the second trailer for your viewing pleasure;
In my write up about the previous trailer, I mentioned that the lack of character interaction really did hurt my interest in this franchise reboot, especially since the main draw of the titular foursome is their comradery as a team. Well, it seems as if Fox listened to those complaints because the first half of this trailer does a solid job of showing us these characters clowning around and having genuine chemistry with each other, even if they’re younger than their comic book counterparts usually are. I particularly enjoyed seeing stuff like the Reed/Johnny awkward fist bump moment that shows off the right kind of nerdy idea that the character should have and the few fleeting moments of chemistry between Reed and Sue that hint at their eventual romance. The only member of the team that still worries me is Jamie Bell as Ben Grimm, who seems to be rather closed off and mopey that doesn’t fit with the more jovial pre-rock monster Ben Grimm of the comics or even the youthful fun loving tone of the other three in this trailer. Still, it’s the first indication that this entry won’t completely melt into “dark & gritty superhero” territory as we feared from all the earlier reports, which is nothing but good news.
That all being said, the second half of the trailer does seem to hint more at the brooding darkness of it all. Seeing these characters deal with alternate dimensions and the powers they gain from it are definitely worth considering on a darker psychological level given the trauma that would occur, but the rest of it feels like a very lifeless and underwhelming battle rather than something rousing to get behind our heroes on. Then again, that all could easily be due to how awkwardly cut that second half of the trailer is. On the other end that editing couldn’t hide the disappointment that is the brief glimpse we get of Doctor Doom, with his transparent shiny mask that looks even worse than something out of the 1994 Fantastic Four film from Roger Corman, if that was ever possible. This doesn’t help the fact that Toby Kebbell’s version of the character will also be a computer hacker instead of the oncoming leader of Latveria as stated in the comics, though we’ll have to wait to see about any potential reveals that integrate that nation into this version to be sure of “Victor Domashev” and his lineage.
But what did you think of this second trailer? Does is inspire more hope in The Fantastic Four or does it reek of failure? Post your thoughts below!
