The Adventures of Captain Otter

I don’t know what you guys thought of the Fantastic Four movies, but I wasn’t thrilled.  They were just so mediocre, and the stories were weak.  The goofier tone wasn’t even the biggest problem.  There were just no real fights or solid action.  At this point, Fox is preparing a reboot for the franchise.  But what about the other big hero from the movies?  The Silver Surfer?  Fox had wanted to do a spin off movie for the Herald of Galactus, one that would pick up right where FF2 left off.  The writer, J. Michael Straczynski, recently talked about the project.  It would have been a darker movie, that also covered the origins of the character.  Wow, if I had a nickel for every time I heard that phrase.  Actually, I would probably 50 cents or so, which isn’t that much really.  Anyway, it looks like the project is dead.  The franchise is done, and it looks like the Silver Surfer spin off died with it.

Eh, I can’t say I’m upset.  First of all, I don’t like this description of what it would have been about.  Origins stories usually arn’t that great, with a few notable exceptions, and if you don’t have to tell them then you should just go straight to the best conflicts and story arcs.  Also, I think a good Surfer movie would be very hard to pull off.  The character hasn’t had a good ongoing series in a long time, and usually works best as part of larger crossovers or with Galactus.  You have a character with so much power, and it can difficult giving him some good fights.  He can blow up anything he wants without a second thought.  It’s the Superman syndrome, but at least the big blue boyscout has some brilliant villains he can go toe to toe with.  The Surfer just never appealed to much to me, and once you get over the initial “coolness” factor of his design there isn’t too much else.

However, this doesn’t mean that the Silver Surfer is gone from movies forever.  Only that the spinoff is dead.  Fox could use a different script that goes in a different direction.  I’m not sure why exactly though.  How many different Silver Surfer approaches can you take?  My guess is that, like the long rumored Fantastic Four reboot, this won’t happen for a quite a bit.  I would rather that Marvel themselves handles the character.  I’ve enjoyed both of their movies so far, and think they are making nothing but great choices with directors and actors on their upcoming projects.  I have much more faith in them that Fox, that’s for sure.

So this Fantastic Four reboot is far away, but that doesn’t mean we can’t start thinking about who we want to see in it.  Me and a friend of mine had a pretty long discussion on who should play who, and came a little closer to finding a dream cast. 

First up is the leader of the bunch, Mr. Fantastic.  I never cared too much for Mr. Fantastic, and always felt that he was hard to relate to.  He’s a character who’s entire personality is based on being insanely smart, and it feels like his intelligence dominate his character.  He was just kind of a tool.  Recently this has changed after I started reading the most recent run of the series, and how Reed Richards can have this cool 1950’s scientist vibe.  He doesn’t have to be goofy, he just has to be dedicated to the point where he might lose sight of things.  I want to see some of those old school sci-fi elements thrown in, and that’s why Jon Hamm has to play Mr. Fantastic.  After watching how awesome Don Draper is on Mad Men, I knew the guy had to play some kind of superhero.  It was my friend who put two and two together, so I guess he kind of deserves the credit.  But he doesn’t have a blog, so he gets nothing.  I want to see a Mr. Fantastic with some Don Draper-esque moments of unholy awesomeness.  I want a scene to go something like this:

Sue:  “But Reed!  We have major relationship issues that must be dealt with!”

Reed: “Listen Sue, I’m a scientist, dammit.  It can wait.”

3 minutes later, Reed saves the world and then immediately makes out with Sue.  Again, exactly like Don Draper would do.  Sure, is this scene a bit out of character?  Maybe, but the results speak for themselves.

There were a couple of other candidates for Mr. Fantastic, but none of them can come close to beating this guy.  I’m going to save these losers the embarassment and just remind you that Don Draper is Mr. Fantastic. 

As for who should play Johnny Storm and Ben Grimm, I almost want Chris Evans and Micheal Chiklis to return.  This won’t happen, but they did a pretty good job.  I think if Chris Evans were given some stronger material, he could do an even better job.  He’s proven he’s a good actor in movies like Sunshine, but there’s no point in thinking about that.  So who do I want for the Human Torch?  I don’t know too many young actors, so I’m going to go with anyone who is like Chris Evans.  One actor who might be worth looking at is Charlie Hunnam, who can be seen on the show Sons of Anarchy.  He was considered for Thor, and he might be a good fit.  Not too confident in that though.  We never got any great ideas for the Thing and Susan, but we know that whoever designed the big guy’s costume should have been fired on the spot.  The actor needs to be someone fun to watch, and usually the Thing comes off as the most likeable character.  And for Sue Storm, we couldn’t help but list names like Kate Beckinsale.  We arn’t too good at casting female scientists apparently.

Then when it came to casting Dr. Doom, we ran out of luck.  Dr. Doom has this larger than life menace that only a few actors can bring.  No big names come to mind, and they might want to look for a stage actor.  The two things they need are the eyes and the voice.  We should never see Doom’s face, so his eyes are going to have to do alot of work.  So, the opposite of what they had to do with Dr. Manhatten.  Throw in an authoritative voice, and you got yourself an evil dictator.

Needless to say, this “list” has alot of holes.  Come to think of it, we only offered one real casting choice.  This is where you guys come in.  Have any ideas on who should be casted?  Think you can come up with a better choice for Mr. Fantastic?  Maybe with your help I can make a real cast.