Fantastic Flop: GMing Lessons from a filmic failure
I’ve been a fan of the Fantastic Four, off and on, since the halcyon days of Lee and Kirby. I was there, reading, when the being who would become Adam Warlock was first introduced. I was there for the first appearance of the Inhumans. I was there for the Silver Surfer and Galactus.
Through low-priced black-and-white Australian reprints, I saw Dr Doom shrink the Fantastic Four into the micro-world, saw the Submariner buy the Baxter Building, and saw the first appearance of the Mole Man. And there were what sometimes-seemed-to-be annual battles between the Hulk and the Thing.
Suffice it to say that I had high hopes for the rebooted film franchise, which appears to have been sucked into the Negative Zone in a cataclysmic release of overwhelming criticism since its release a few weeks ago. I’ve been reading other people’s opinions as to –
- what is wrong with the movie (Fantastic Four: Four Things They Did Wrong | Comicbook.com),
- what went wrong in the making of the movie (Was the Fantastic Four Reboot Doomed From The Start? | io9and Why Hollywood can’t get the ‘Fantastic Four’ right | New York Post), and
- whether or not Marvel can and will buy back the franchise (When Can Marvel Get The Rights Back To The Fantastic Four? | Comicbook.com again).
And of course, I’ve been thinking on the subject and analyzing all this critique, and realize that there are a few lessons for GMs out there on handling their campaigns and adventures. Most of it’s reasonably obvious stuff, but – like an iceberg – there are some hidden depths to plumb.
I have to admit that for financial reasons, I haven’t actually seen the movie. Everything I’ve written has been based on other reports and reviews, and I don’t often see eye-to-eye with the judgments of movie critics. But I’ve spoken to people who have seen it, and outlined this article, and they seem to agree with my analysis.
Analyzing The Downfall
It’s clear that both studio and director started off in accord, or they would not have hired him. It was also pretty inevitable that a movie needed to be made and released around now or Marvel could take back the license rights. But it’s also clear that there were a number of items left off the negotiating agenda, and that usually happens when people take things for granted, rush to get a job done by an arbitrary deadline, or both.
In this case, the latter is fairly evidently a factor and the former is possible but unproven. What did happen is that there was a dispute over casting, with the Studio demanding “name stars” and the Director insisting on a cast of relative unknowns. Aside from giving the Director greater freedom to execute his vision with fewer concessions to a cast with more Hollywood clout, this would probably have allowed him to lavish more money on other aspects of the production. Director Josh Trank won that battle, but in the process got the studio off-side. They subsequently cut the budget (obviously feeling that if he wasn’t spending the money on an A-grade cast, he didn’t need to spend as much money at all), and the bad blood between them began to extend to clashes in other areas such as script approval.
Fans began having their doubts when the cast was publicly announced, especially about the choice of Michael B. Jordan in the role of Johnny Storm (with no disrespect to the actor intended) – especially given the fact that the role of his sister was given to Kate Mara, an actress whose work I had previously enjoyed on 24 and Zoom: Academy For Superheros – but who is Caucasian. This choice seemed destined to load the movie with unnecessary social baggage.
I thought at the time that it would have been better to have made Ben Grimm (the Thing) an African American, or even Reed Richards, if you needed a prominent minority representation among the cast. Either of those would have been credible; there have been a great many African-American scientists, Footballers, and Fighter Pilots over the years. Heck, even casting both Johnny and Sue as African Americans would have made more sense.
It felt like tokenism, and sloppily-executed tokenism at that.
Then came the news about the “gritty” slant, and fandom winced.
The news emerged that O’Mara and the rest of the cast had been told not to bother reading any of the source material, and fandom cringed.
About a month after the release date was shifted from a competitive one to a far softer target – always a bad sign – we got told about the radical re-imagining of Dr Doom as a hacker, and finally fandom knew that this movie was centered around a total disrespect for the source material, and began to complain. It was all downhill from there.
Additional sources:
Analyzing The Disaster
This is a movie in which the director seems to have decided “characters don’t matter, it’s just a comic book movie”, and the studio seemed to have decided, “plot doesn’t matter, it’s just a comic book movie.”
Neither respected the source material or the fans of that source material – and those fans were always going to be the people generating the initial buzz, the core of the potential audience. Holding them in contempt is a sure recipe for a catastrophic reception.
Fans would have forgiven the casting, if the on-screen vibe had been right, if the Fantastic Four felt like a family first and a group of co-adventurers / superheros second. Instead, they felt like outcasts, first from scientific respectability and society, and then from humanity.
They would have forgiven the rewriting of the origins of the group as something that made a certain amount of sense in light of more modern physics – “there’s nothing we know of in space that could trigger these transformations, so have the group changed by an environment in which our physics doesn’t apply”. It works, and if they had called it The Negative Zone, fans would have lauded the concept as a plausible way to achieve suspension of disbelief in a more modern world.
Fans might have even forgiven – well, tolerated – the revision to Dr Doom if he had become a technological-genius-by-proxy, a brilliant hacker and robotics expert who stole technological developments by others and put them together to synthesize the iconic suit of armor and weapons systems.
Instead, what happened was this: the family vibe was thrown aside in favor of a pseudo-X-Men union of outsiders, forced to band together because they were ostracized and victimized by their transformations. That required a large part of the movie being set aside to establishing relationships between the title characters, and therefore always meant that the bulk of the film was going to be the origin story. Throw in Doom’s share of that origin story, and there was always going to be precious little screen time left for confrontations. Pacing was inevitably going to be a victim, and it was.
The kindest one-word review I saw on the opening weekend was “uneven”. The next best was “unbalanced”. Studio and director were both taking potshots at each other, making it clear that whatever unity was felt initially, the marriage between them had completely fallen apart early in production. The result comes across looking like a movie that was done for the sake of keeping the license because the potential for an X-Men scale franchise is still there, not because it was a good movie proposal.
It all showed at the Box Office. despite the “softer” competition, Fantastic Four failed to even exceed the week-2 earnings of Mission Impossible 5, which enjoyed a second week at the top of the box office charts. I’ve been told that some cinemas have already pulled the film from their schedules, suggesting that much of that opening weekend and subsequent negative reviews was generated by fans who went hoping for their worst fears to be misplaced, wanting to like the movie despite everything that they had heard – only to be freshly disappointed when the on-screen product was even worse than feared.
A few critics have subsequently emerged who laud the first half of the movie as an attempt to distance itself from the superhero genre. Unfortunately, those reviews come across as pretentious at best (at least the ones that I’ve seen). They attempt to show that there were nodding associations with the source material; there are suggestions that some scenes state that Sue was adopted, explaining the racial difference between siblings, and this can clearly be used to explain the lack of familial feelings between Sue and Johnny, for example. So, at least in the first half, some coherence and consistency in characterization can be found, if you turn over enough rocks looking for it. To me, all this shows is that the same mistake was made consistently throughout the movie.
There were no winners. The cast now have a turkey to live down. The director has lost the trust of a major studio, who are bad-mouthing him and have already pulled his participation in another big-name franchise movie. The studio have lost the trust of the public and yet more stories of “studio interference creating a flop” are doing the rounds, discouraging others from pushing the envelope – and look certain to take a loss on the movie. I don’t agree with those who are suggesting that this means the death of superhero-movie genre, though! The fans miss out, too – it will be years, if ever, before another attempt is made. Marvel might well look to buy back the rights, but their production schedule is full.
In fact, it’s Marvel who are the biggest losers in all this. They had no say in the casting, the script, or the production, but this is still being touted by some as “Marvel’s first stinker”. So it’s possible that they will reclaim the rights, or try to, purely as damage control.
Additional Sources:
An alternative vision
And yet, the potential for success is still there; it simply has to be unlocked with the right script and producer, with the right vision for what it could be. Someone is sure to ask what I think should have been done, so here’s a look at what might-have-been:
First, make it a TV show, not a movie. Not a sitcom, but a family drama that doesn’t take itself too seriously, with the plots largely a sci-fi action/adventure. Make it about the characters as a dysfunctional family who fly apart all the time but come together whenever they have to. Not The Simpsons with superpowers, but leaning a little in that direction. A lot like the first couple of seasons of Buffy but with an SF bent instead of a supernatural one.
Dispose of the origins of the team in five or ten minutes – tops – of the first episode. Keep the “Negative Zone” origin. Make Ben a decorated pilot from the Gulf Wars who signed up post 9/11, abandoning a promising football career, newly retired from the Service. Make Johnny a garage mechanic, make Sue a computer security student, and Reed a scientist. Reed develops machine designs but has trouble building it, so Sue calls in Johnny to help with the more practical elements of the fabrication. Johnny, in turn, knows Ben (who used to be one of his customers) and so does Reed (they went to school together, Ben several years ahead of Reed, but Reed was given early admission into senior classes and Ben protected Reed from bullies). Between the two of them, Johnny and Reed persuade Ben to ditch the airline job he’s taken (it’s boring) and sign on as the pilot and commander of the Transition Vehicle they are building. They finish the machine, and the quartet take it into the Otherworld, where it is attacked and damaged by the monsters that inhabit it; they get exposed to strange energy fields that rewrites and morphs their DNA, and become the FF, barely escaping in their crippled craft.
Then we go into flashback mode for the origins of Dr Doom, or of whatever our menace of the week is. Again, keep this to 5-10 minutes or even less. Look to Dr Who for inspiration – we get just enough of a hint of whatever the menace is to intrigue us, but then discover the specifics at the same time as the FF do.
Keep Dr Doom more or less as he was in the comics – though you might lose the Latverian Ruler element to keep budgets down. In particular, keep his desperate attempts to rescue his mother from Hell (or someplace similar – I’ll get to that in a moment). Make him a brilliant hacker and roboticist, who is first rate at taking other people’s ideas and putting them together to achieve something new – not quite the same as the Julian McMahon version, but similar. Here’s the story: Doom, as a young man, cobbles together some bits and pieces and creates a dimension-lock or teleport field or whatever you want to call it; something starts to come through from the other side, Doom tries desperately to shut down his creation, and then to smash it, but before he can do so, his mother (wrong place, wrong time) is captured by the emerging big bad and pulled back into the other-world. Doom tries to mount a rescue mission but can’t get his rebuilt device to work. He needs further education in higher physics to understand what happened the first time.
Reed, a student at university, is studying the theory and exploring the potential of creating a dimension-lock, work that will eventually lead to the origin story we have already witnessed. He and Doom are fellow students, and have several run-ins. Doom recognizes Reed’s work as exactly what he needs, and steals his designs and unfinished research paper, but Reed discovers the theft because Doom didn’t completely erase his tracks, and Reed’s girlfriend, Sue, is studying advanced computer security and is no slouch at this stuff, either. Reed goes to confront Doom, discovers Doom’s half-built replica of Reed’s machine, recognizes that Doom has made a dangerous mistake, and puts aside his own anger to warn Doom – but Doom won’t listen, and fires up the half-built machine believing Reed is about to alert the university authorities. Explosion, Doom scarred both physically and mentally, blames Reed, expelled from the University.
Unshown on screen at the time, Doom becomes a “professional” hacker, living an underground life, perpetrating various cybercrimes for cash.
Shifting our point-of-view back into the modern day, he cracks Sue’s security and discovers that Reed finished his machine and that he and the others were transformed. He tries to get the plans, but Sue is still no slouch at this stuff and discovers the hack while it is still in progress, tossing Doom out. He realizes that if he wants the machine, he’s going to have to take it by force. He uses his money and expertise to construct his armor and build in various experimental weapons systems and defensive gadgets, first to enable him to steal the device from Reed, second to enable him to survive the transition to Other-space unharmed, and third to enable him to defeat the evil monstrosity and rescue his Mother at last.
Instead of seeing this, we see the FF coming to terms with the impact of their transformations on their everyday lives. Reed is searching for a way to undo Ben’s transformation and is worried about the psychological effects of what happened on them all. They are recluses for the most part. It’s been a year or more since their transformations, so a lot of the adjustment has already taken place, and they have already had a few adventures together that have made them a group.
Doom, using robots, attacks as a distraction, then invades their lab to get the device – but Reed needs it for his attempts to cure Ben. Conflict. Doom gets the device, activates it, and bad things start trying to get through into our world, something he doesn’t care about. He prepares to go after his mother, but the FF arrive and Reed smashes the machine to prevent the mass escape of horrors into the world – sacrificing Ben’s chances at a normal life, something Ben finds hard to take. Doom escapes.
Reed realizes that he can’t build another machine, the risks are too great; he will have to search for a cure the hard way. Doom is now obsessed with the concept of Reed as his enemy; twice (in Doom’s mind), he has been denied by Reed. All the (imagined) pain that his mother suffers from now on is on Reed’s head. However, even above revenge, his goal henceforth will be to force Reed to rebuild his machine – by force, by deception, by blackmail – by whatever means it takes. End episode one, and away the series goes from there.
In subsequent episodes, a 30-second recap of the origin story leads into the menace teaser, which leads into the title sequence, which leads into the main plot, starting with the ordinary lives of four extraordinary and slightly dysfunctional people who have been forced together by continually-strained bonds of friendship and love. Johnny can invent things, build things, etc; Reed can discover strange phenomena; Sue can investigate curious happenings reported on the net; and Ben can try and build a life around his unique disfigurement. And every now and then, Doom will emerge from the shadows to try again, moving further away from the one strategy that might succeed with every defeat – admitting that he needs Reed’s help, and why. His ego, already wounded and maimed by his disfigurement, won’t bend that far.
The Lessons
Okay, so moving on from that piece of whimsy. There are some definite and fairly important lessons for GMs from the crash-and-burn Fantastic Four, 2015 version. Some may be obvious, others subtle, but they are all important and useful.
Respect the characters
The character concepts need to respect, and work in harmony with, the theme of the campaign. The central questions are always, “why are these people together? What’s their motivation? How does that motivation express itself in their relationships, and in the plotlines?”
Define interaction modes between the characters
Each character should have one or more subjects or activities or “interaction modes” which bring them together with one of the other featured characters. They don’t have to agree, or have a mutual goal in terms of that interaction mode – they simply need to have a relationship with each other that manifests within the domain of that subject. Two of them might have an interest in sport – but like wildly different sports, or back opposing teams. Two of them might be interested in politics, but one is conservative and the other progressive – and neither of them is completely right, or right all the time. One might be a conspiracy theory buff, while the other enjoys debunking conspiracy theories. One likes dance music and another likes ballet, or opera. One’s mischievous, and another’s a straight man (and perpetual easy target).
This sort of thing rarely happens by accident, and even more rarely happens without deliberate encouragement by the GM. There are two ways to achieve it: before the fact (during character generation) or after the fact (post-play). It’s easiest during character generation, when you can tweak designs and personalities to create the desired interaction modes; after the fact, it’s more square pegs into round holes, though it’s still possible. The best approach is to get the players to talk to each other and the GM about their characters, actively looking for interaction modes.
Once the modes have been defined, the GM has to make room in his plans for their expression; he needs to use them to give the players space in which to roleplay each character relating to the other characters. He needs to plant barbs and subplots and conversational or activity hooks that populate the interaction modes with topics of conversation, or accord, or disagreement.
Respect the genre
Players, Characters, and the GM need to all respect the genre and the conventions that go with it. These should be violated only with great care, and usually because some sub-genre element overrides the central genre in this particular respect. The campaign and characters should fit comfortably within the scope of the primary genre.
All this comes down to the GM understanding both the Genre and the campaign, and ensuring compatibility between the two. If your campaign is a spy drama, don’t make Cthulhu the chief villain. If Sci-fi is your game, don’t involve too many inexplicable phenomena – magic doesn’t fit very well. If you’re running a Western, leave out talking dogs. High Fantasy should emphasize the fantastic.
Good plots
An awful lot can be forgiven or ignored if you have good plotlines. James Bond in a high-fantasy setting in which rival deities are continually plotting against one another? It can be done.
On the other hand, no matter how well-matched characters and setting might be, no campaign will survive if the plots are dull, insipid, boring, or confused. An awful lot of campaign planning and development is aimed – without actually saying so – at creating an environment that inspires you, as GM, to come up with interesting plots.
Style pointers
Be especially wary of contradictions. “Home Alone” doesn’t work as “Grim and Gritty”, the Fantastic Four don’t work as outcasts, the X-men don’t work without the political and social issues over “Homo Superior”.
Don’t try to make anything into something it’s not
Most of these pointers can all be summed up in this one statement. If some element is desired within your campaign, your style, your characters, find a way to make it fit naturally. There’s usually a way, if you look hard enough.
Respect Your Audience
Last, but by no means least, don’t ever – ever – take your audiance for granted. Don’t look down on them. Don’t assume that they are not as smart as you. Don’t assume that they don’t matter.
We all know these things, but sometimes, we get caught up in our own cleverness and forget it.
If the characters are your cast, the players are your audience. And they will forgive just about anything – if you don’t take them for granted. That is the most obvious and most important lesson to be learned, and it doesn’t matter if Fantastic Four is as bad as everyone says, or if it is a gem that no-one else appreciates but you; no matter how good or bad a film it is, it can remind you of this most important lesson. And that makes it pretty Fantastic in my book.
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August 30th, 2015 at 3:12 pm
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