Fantastic Four is set to either wow the world or underwhelm audiences yet again. With only a little over a week to go until our super powered allies make their first revamped appearance, it's as good a time as any to get acquainted with said powers. Hence the video you're about to see below.
Courtesy of the film's official Twitter feed, we were able to watch the preceding video, disguised as a Department Of Defense briefing on the "tragedy" involving Reed Richards and his team's work on inter-dimensional travel. Though, to be honest, only one out of the four team members really has a tragedy to speak of – as Ben Grimm / aka The Thing (Jamie Bell) is a man made of solid rock. That rock, according to the video above, is "literally impenetrable," and has the DoD excited for the practical applications of such a material. Ben might not be the most maneuverable member of the team, but he's strong enough to do some real damage.
As for the rest of the team, their powers are also pretty much in line with previous incarnations of their crime fighting antics. Sue Storm (Kate Mara) still has the power to become invisible, and her brother Johnny (Michael B. Jordan) is still as hot as ever with his fire powers. In fact, the only real change to the Fantastic 4's power set is a minor but promised tweak to Reed Richards' stretching powers. This new look still has Reed stretching to move around, but this time his flexibility is tempered by a more grounded approach. The small clip of footage showing him catapulting with the use of his super powered arms, and while the stretch they certainly hold up better than the stretching effects the previous Fantastic Four incarnation.
The more grounded approach towards the Fantastic Four also reaches out to the costume design. We see this mostly through Reed, Sue and Johnny's costumes, which also double as "containment suits" that will undoubtedly help focus their newfound energy in the most effective way possible. Or, at the very least, they'll make the three of them look more believable than any blue spandex jumpsuit ever could. Shifting back to the subject of the powers of the Fantastic 4, there is one slide that seems to hint on the possible introduction of Doctor Doom into the picture.
At 02:35, under the slide "Untapped Potential," the second section talks about investigating what long term exposure to another universe could do to a person. While the Fantastic Four only get a short burst of energy, it seems to be a safe bet that Victor Domashev will be going through the Quantum Gate without as much luck as his counterparts. Which means that the Department of Defense might want to think long and hard before they decide to do any further testing.
Fantastic Four is already a hard sell for audiences around the world, but at the very least it looks like they're designing/powering the characters with enough intrigue to lure younger viewers into a new and improved team. You'll be able to judge for yourself when the film opens on August 7th.
