FOUR BETTER OR WORSE

Opening in the multiplexes this weekend:

The Fantastic Four: First Steps--Week before last, in my review of the new Superman movie, I grumbled about the reliance of contemporary superhero movies on devices like interdimensional travel and parallel universes. Now comes this Marvel entry, which is set entirely in a parallel universe, "Earth 828" in the Marvel "Multiverse," the home of the famous super-team. It's a realm of snazzy midcentury modern decor and beehive hairdos and stentorian TV announcers and the like.

Partly because the whole movie takes place in this setting--no universe-hopping--and partly because I'm a sucker for this style of design, I didn't mind it in this case. Director Matt Shakman and the other filmmakers generate a fine atmosphere of nostalgia for a period that never happened, at least not in this universe. Cool as the movie looks, however, it took me a little while to get pulled into the story. 

You may remember the title quartet, created by writer Stan Lee and artist Jack Kirby in 1961, scientists and explorers endowed with superpowers by a trip to space. Reed Richards can literally stretch himself to ridiculous lengths; Sue Storm can make herself invisible and also commands force fields from her hands; her brother Johnny Storm, aka The Human Torch, can make himself a flying fireball at will; and Ben Grimm aka The Thing, is a super-strong and super-durable rock-man.

Despite the title, this isn't an origin story. Our heroes are well-established here, and Sue is pregnant with Reed's baby, when a threat from space turns up. The planet-gobbling giant Galactus (Ralph Ineson) is headed hungrily for Earth, scouted as a suitable snack for him by Silver Surfer (Julia Garner). Even with Sue eight months along, The Four journey to space to intercept Galactus and negotiate with him. Turns out The Big G is more than willing to make a deal, straight out of a fairy tale: He'll spare Earth, in return for Sue and Reed's baby, who he says will absorb his hunger and let him retire from planet-eating.

Or some nonsense like that. Despite the high-powered stars--Pedro Pascal as Reed, Vanessa Kirby as Sue, Joseph Quinn as Johnny and Ebon Moss-Bachrach as Ben--the characters didn't initially pop as vividly as they do in some Marvel and other superhero flicks. Pascal is subdued as the reflective, problem-solving Reed. He and Bachrach and Quinn are all good enough company, and Garner is quite an elegant Surfer, but only Kirby zaps the earlier parts of the movie with energy when she speaks.

Eventually, though, things get lively. I think it was during a scene in which the Four are multitasking on the edge of a black hole that the actors seemed to wake up, and First Steps started to feel kind of deranged, in a good way. By the time Galactus arrives in New York, the movie takes on an agreeable kaiju flavor; the titan looks a bit like the title character of the '60s-era Japanese film Majin, Monster of Terror, and the climactic clash between him and The Four is satisfying. There's real, off-the-wall imagination here, and after an unsteady start First Steps ends up surefooted.