Story
In the opening scenes of the film we find 10-year-old Reed Richards (Owen Judge) and his best friend Ben Grimm (Evan Hannemann) pooling their resources in a bid to build a bio-matter transport machine. By the time Reed (Miles Teller) and Ben (Jamie Bell) reach high school, several years later, the two friends have perfected their transport machine, transporting small toys to unknown locations and back again. When Dr. Franklin Storm (Reg E. Cathey) from the Baxter Institute sees Reed’s machine at a school science fair he is so impressed by Reed’s invention that he offers Reed a full scholarship to the Baxter Institute in Manhattan.
When Reed arrives at the Institute he is introduced to fellow students Johnny Storm (Michael B. Jordan), Sue Storm (Kate Mara) and Victor Von Doom (Toby Kebbell), who have also been working on a teleportation machine without Reed’s level of success. The Institute students have, however, discovered that what is sent through the machine does not reappear in an unknown location somewhere on Earth, but reappears in another dimension. The four young inventors work together and before long have managed to build an Interdimensional Bio-Matter Transporter.
Reed, Ben, Johnny, and Victor use the machine to travel to another dimension where they encounter a strange energy source which threatens their lives and consumes Victor. When Reed, Ben and Johnny return to their own dimension they find themselves, along with Sue Storm, changed forever. They now acquire distinct superpowers and become the Fantastic Four, but are soon put to the test when Victor returns from the other reality bent on destroying the world.
Themes
Superpowers; interdimensional travel; world destruction
Violence
Fantastic Four contains action violence (at times intense) throughout, some mass destruction, multiple deaths, occasional brief depiction of graphic blood and gore, some gun related violence, brief images of battle-like violence and a dangerous car chase. Examples include:
- A teenage boy slaps his younger brother hard across the head and face. The boys' mother enters the room, stops the older boy and slaps him across the head and face.
- We see images of a man with superpowers engaged in battle with soldiers, hurling army tanks through the air like toys.
- A man with superpowers kills a multitude of people with his thought. In one instance he uses his powers to burn a man alive inside his protective suit. We see the man’s skin turn red blister and bubble and his head explode inside his helmet with blood and gore splattered against the visor. We see the same man attack and kill other people, their heads exploding and blood and gore splattering against a wall.
- A man with superpowers kills another man by burning him alive. After the attack the man remains alive for a short while. His skin is burnt black and has a mummified appearance about it.
- A beam of energy shoots up into the sky from another dimension, creating a black-hole on Earth that causes mass destruction by sucking in people, cars, trains, buildings and the surrounding landscape until a large crater is left in the ground.
- The Fantastic Four fight with Victor. We see one man buried beneath a large pile of rocks, a second man pinned to the surface of the planet and a third man knocked unconscious with fire, while the woman is trapped and crushed in a force field. Eventually the Four break free and join forces to suspend their attacker within a beam of energy that kills him; we see his body disintegrate.
Sexual references
None of concern
Alcohol, drugs and other substances
There is some use of substances in this movie, including:
- Three young men drink from a hip flask containing strong alcohol. The three become partially intoxicated, slurring their words slightly and engaging in rash behaviour that has dangerous consequences. One of them makes the comment that ethanol kills brain cells.
Nudity and sexual activity
Fantastic Four shows characters flirting very mildly.
Product placement
Fantastic Four shows brand-named cars, phones and soft drinks.
Coarse language
The film contains medium level coarse language and name calling scattered throughout. Examples include:
- damn it; what the hell; oh my God ; dick; shit; you’re an arse; bullshit
Ideas to discuss with your children
Fantastic Four is a science fiction action movie from Marvel. It features young versions of popular comic book characters and is likely to appeal to teenagers.
Although Fantastic Four has less violence than most other Marvel superhero movies, it still has brutal and bloody violence and deserves its M rating. It also has some gruesome scenes of transformation, injury and death, which could disturb children under 13 years, as well as some younger teenagers.
These are the main messages from this movie:
- By working with other people, you can achieve far more than if you work alone.
- You can’t change the past, but you can influence the future.
You could talk with your children about how the movie shows the consequences of the three young superheroes getting drunk.