Another silly adventure from the less than fantastic four, writes Michael Dwyer
The summer of sequels continues with the second Marvel Comics spin-off (after Spider-Man 3) in seven weeks. Released two years ago, The Fantastic Four proved such an unexpectedly big hit on cinema release and on DVD that another outing for the superhero quartet was inevitable. And after the vastly over-extended recent Spidey and Jack Sparrow yarns, this sequel is mercifully short.
The gang's all here. Tim Story is back in the director's chair, reassembling the original cast. An enigmatic force is sweeping our planet - freezing a bay in Japan, causing a snowstorm at Giza and depriving Los Angeles of power - but Reed Richards (Ioan Gruffudd), the elastic- limbed contortionist and smartest man in the world, is going ahead with his much- postponed wedding to Sue Storm (Jessica Alba), who leads a double life as Invisible Woman.
Sue's cheeky, cocky brother Johnny (Chris Evans), who bursts into flames and flies around as the Human Torch, is checking out lucrative promotional tie-ins as assiduously as the film's 12 producers sought out product placement. And Ben Grimm (Michael Chiklis), known as The Thing since a cosmic bombardment turned him into a hulk of orange-coloured rock, continues his affair with blind sculptor Alicia (Kerry Washington).
Enter the Silver Surfer, a computer-generated intergalactic herald who has come to Earth with destruction in mind, and the nuptials are put on hold as the superheroes diligently embark on a globe- trotting mission to save the world yet again. Copious captions note their itinerary as they travel from their New York headquarters to London (where the Eye is stalled precariously and threatened with collapse), Siberia, "Black Forest, Germany" and Latveria.
Actually, they made that one up. Latveria is the homeland of the quartet's cunning, smarmy nemesis, Dr Victor Von Doom (Julian McMahon). When Dr Doom seeks a secret rendezvous with the Silver Surfer, he certainly picks an out-of-the- way place: a Greenland glacier.
Despite all the hi-tech visual effects, the movie is essentially an old-fashioned adventure peppered with mildly amusing incidental details.
