Every summer I watch a good deal of the Wimbledon tennis championships, which this year were particularly plagued by rain, forcing continual delays. Repeatedly ESPN2 would show the sky overhead, as ominous clouds moved into view. And this year I found myself thinking, oh, look, it’s Galactus. The version from the new movie Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer, that is.

Why, this is the worst extraterrestrial threat to Wimbledon since the giant alien blancmange from Monty Python’s Flying Circus .

Last weekend I visited the Brooklyn Museum and stopped by my favorite painting in its collection, Albert Bierstadt’s “A Storm in the Rocky Mountains, Mt. Rosalie” (1866). Take a look for yourself. If the moviemakers were going to cast a cloud as Galactus, why couldn’t they have made it look as threatening as this thunderhead?

But as I explained last week would have preferred that the movie had given us the Stan Lee and Jack Kirby Galactus, that awe-inspiring god of wrath, rather than a puff of smoke with no dialogue, character or point of view.

In their greatest multi-part story, the “Galactus trilogy” (Fantastic Four Vol. 1 #48-50, 1966), Lee and Kirby presented three godlike beings: Galactus, the benevolent but normally passive Uatu the Watcher, and the Silver Surfer, a science-fictional version of an angel, who becomes a self-sacrificing Christ figure. Last week I dealt with the first two, and this week I address the problems in the movie’s treatment of the third.

One problem is that the film attempts but fails to resolve satisfactorily the contradiction between the conception of the Silver Surfer’s personality in Lee and Kirby’s “Galactus trilogy,” and the conception of the Surfer that Stan Lee evolved in the character’s series later in the 1960s.

In the trilogy the Surfer initially seems utterly alien, devoid of empathy for the lives of ordinary mortals, and of any other emotions. The Surfer does not question the morality of Galactus’s intended destruction of the human race, nor does the Surfer feel any guilt upon his own role as Galactus’s accomplice. The Surfer seems to share his master’s opinion that humans are lesser beings than themselves, with no more value than ants. “Earth is but a twinkling dot. . .a paltry pebble. . .in the vastness of space,” the Surfer says. How could its inhabitants have any significance?

By an incredible coincidence, which nonetheless fits the logic of a fable, the Surfer crash-lands into the home of Alicia Masters, the blind sculptress who was the girlfriend of Ben Grimm, the Fantastic Four’s Thing. It is the literally blind, metaphorically angelic Alicia who figuratively opens the Surfer’s eyes to the value of humanity. She argues on behalf of the human race’s worthiness to exist. But it is Alicia herself who is her own strongest argument. She treats the Surfer with kindness and concern when he falls into her home; he is impressed by her bravery in standing up to him. “Never have I heard such words. . .sensed such courage. . . or known this strange feeling. . .this new emotion!” the Surfer exclaims in wonder. “ There is a word some races use. . .that I have never understood. . .until now! At last. . .I know beauty!” The context indicates that he does not simply mean Alicia’s physical beauty; it is her personality that he finds beautiful. And in their meeting, Alicia is the spokeswoman and representative for the entire human race. In recognizing Alicia’s beauty, the Surfer perceives the “beauty” of humanity.

Earlier Alicia had shown pity to the Surfer: “Your face!” she exclaims as she touches his visage; “Never have I sensed such unimaginable loneliness in a living being!” Perhaps when the Surfer was talking about Earth’s insignificance in the universe, consciously or not he was voicing his own sense of the meaninglessness of his existence. But now, through his interaction with Alicia, the Surfer discovers his empathy for the human race: “never have I felt this new sensation. . .this thing some call. . .pity!” Stan Lee’s line may strike you as purple and corny, but it captures the Surfer’s struggle to comprehend this new emotion awakening within him. Alicia not only opens the Surfer’s eyes to humanity’s worth, but also to his own capacity for emotion and even nobility. “Then you are not just a soulless monster!” she tells him. “You too have emotions! I knew it! I felt it from the first!” Earlier the Surfer told her that the concept of “nobility” was meaningless to him, but you can read it in the poetic quality of the language that Stan Lee gives him. By the end of Fantastic Four Vol. 1 #49, the Surfer is acting on that nobility, willing to challenge his master on behalf of a race of mortals who to him are represented by that one blind young woman.

It is significant that it is Alicia who converts the Surfer to the side of humanity, not, for example, Fantastic Four leader Reed Richards. She is a woman, who in this story represents traditional “feminine” values, including compassion, mercy, and the life force. Moreover, whereas the Fantastic Four are warriors, Alicia is an artist. How fitting that an artist should open the eyes of this alien warrior to the concept of beauty.

Except for the final issue, Stan Lee collaborated with artist John Buscema, not Jack Kirby, on The Silver Surfer comics series of the late 1960s. In it Lee radically altered the Surfer’s backstory. He revealed that the Surfer was once a mortal humanoid named Norrin Radd who lived on the paradise-like planet of Zenn-La, where he was passionately in love with a woman named Shalla Bal. In order to save his homeworld from Galactus, Norrin Radd agreed to become his herald, and to lead him to other worlds to devour; Galactus therefore transformed him into the Silver Surfer.

The Surfer of the Galactus trilogy has never before experienced “pity.” The Norrin Radd of Silver Surfer Vol. 1 #1 feels “pity” and empathy for his fellow Zenn-Lavians that he gave up his world in order to save them. The Surfer of Fantastic Four #49 had not known what “beauty” is, but Norrin Radd of Silver Surfer #1 idealizes the gorgeous Shalla Bal. The Silver Surfer whom readers meet in Fantastic Four #48 seems devoid of emotion, and yet Norrin Radd in Silver Surfer #1 is a man of intense emotion, still longing for his lost love.

In the Galactus trilogy the Surfer learns to aspire towards the virtues of humanity: he recognizes that the human race possess qualities that are missing from his own existence. The Surfer proves willing to sacrifice his own life in order to save the lives of this race of mortals he has learned to admire. In contrast, in Lee and Buscema’s Silver Surfer series, the Surfer seems morally superior to humanity, and is continually bemoaning the sins and failings of the human race. In the Galactus trilogy humanity, as represented by Alicia, is the Surfer’s teacher; in the Lee-Buscema Silver Surfer series, the Surfer is a moral paragon who has much to teach humanity.

How can these two approaches to the Silver Surfer be reconciled? At Marvel it was finally established that “over time Galactus subtly altered the Surfer’s mind, submerging Radd’s emotions and repressing past memories” which were reawakened by Alicia.

Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer puts the Surfer in the same position he occupies in the Galactus trilogy (as Galactus’s herald who ultimately rebels), but allows him to retain his past memories: at one point he identifies himself as Norrin Radd and says that he had to serve Galactus to save his own planet. Can we imagine the idealistic, highly sensitive Silver Surfer of the Lee-Buscema series waiting until the last third of the movie to decide that planetwide genocide is a bad thing? Could that version of the Surfer live with himself after helping Galactus destroy a long series of planets, as the movie informs us he did?

These questions are especially important in that in the movie, rebelling against Galactus turns out to be no big deal. After all, the onscreen Galactus is just a cloud, and the Surfer manages to blow him up relatively easily and still succeed in surviving, apparently unharmed.

But let’s say that the filmmakers regarded the Surfer as having so little conscience that he was willing to help destroy other planets as long as his native world was spared. So what brings about the Surfer’s decision to rebel against Galactus?

In the movie the Surfer never encounters Alicia. That’s unfortunate, since it would have given Alicia (and Kerry Washington, the actress who plays her) a bigger, more significant role in the movie, and it is important in the Galactus trilogy that it is an ordinary person, not a superhero, who convinces the Surfer to spare the human race. Instead, the Surfer principally talks with Susan Storm, the Invisible Girl, a good alternate choice for representing traditionally “feminine” values.

But there is no equivalent in the film to the persuasion scenes between Alicia and the Surfer in the comics. I hope that you can tell from my description of them, and the quotations I’ve excerpted, that Lee’s dialogue for these scenes has the potential for great dramatic power. They would have provided insight into the complexity of the Surfer’s personality and made clear why he switches sides. Furthermore, Alicia’s embodiment of the finest attributes of humanity and the awakening of the Surfer’s conscience could have been both moving and inspiring. Their scenes together could have been the heart of the film.

But this was not to be. Although the filmmakers cast Laurence Fishburne as the voice of the Silver Surfer, they give him surprisingly little dialogue. In the comics Alicia can sense the Surfer’s nobility from the elevated language that Stan Lee gives him; I doubt that audiences can detect any such nobility in the sparsity of the movie Surfer’s dialogue. Lee was aiming at Shakespearean effects when he write for the Surfer; if only the screenwriters had similar ambitions.

Indeed, the Lee-Kirby Surfer suffers a tragic fate. In the comics Galactus is far more difficult to overcome than a storm cloud. I see that Jack Kirby explicitly referred to the Surfer as a “fallen angel”. In the Galactus trilogy the Surfer is like an angel rebelling against God. But in this case, Lucifer’s counterpart, the Surfer is in the right. Unlike the Biblical Lucifer, the Surfer is humanity’s friend and defender, and Galactus, in the role of God, is out to destroy humanity. Despite his best efforts, the Surfer cannot defeat Galactus, just as Lucifer had no chance of overthrowing God.

God punished Lucifer’s revolt by casting him from heaven into hell. Galactus punishes the Silver Surfer’s revolt by casting him from the heavens onto the Earth. Galactus removes the Surfer’s ability to travel through outer space. Lee and Kirby later altered this idea: the Surfer could still fly through outer space, but Galactus had erected an energy barrier around the Earth, attuned to the Surfer’s powers, imprisoning the Surfer there. For the Surfer, a creature of the heavens, this was like crippling a bird’s wings.

Moreover, the Surfer’s fate can be interpreted as an intriguing variation on the position of Christ in the Gospels. In Christianity, God the Father and God the Son were in accord: the Son willingly lived on Earth as a man among other men, and willingly acceded to his crucifixion and death to redeem humanity. In the Galactus trilogy, the Surfer’s confinement to Earth, to live among humans, is presented as a terrible punishment. Indeed, the Surfer becomes more obviously a Christ figure in the Lee-Buscema series: a literally unearthly figure of spiritual purity, who seeks to do good, but meets with incomprehension, fear, and even hatred from much (but not all) of mankind.

Does Rise of the Silver Surfer depict the Silver Surfer as a tragic figure? No. Does the film explore the Biblical analogies underlying Galactus and the Surfer? No, again.

The filmmakers also miss the point when they have the Surfer defeat the Galactus cloud. It is significant that Lee and Kirby did not allow the Surfer to overcome Galactus. Rather, Lee and Kirby’s point was that it was humanity itself which ultimately had to stand up to Galactus, the god of wrath, and to force him to acknowledge its right to exist. The Surfer provides aid, but the human race must win its own battles. In the Galactus trilogy, the Surfer battles heroically but finally falls before Galactus. It is Reed Richards, armed with Galactus’s own weapon, the Ultimate Nullifier, who finally compels Galactus to leave Earth.

Here is yet another problem with the Fantastic Four films. Pandering to American culture’s anti-intellectualism, these movies continually mock Reed Richards, a. k. a. Mr. Fantastic, the scientific genius who leads the team, as a nerd and a dork. In Rise of the Silver Surfer Reed finally asserts himself and tells off a general who has been pushing him around. But I cannot see the movies’ version of Reed summoning up enough of a sense of authority to successfully confront Lee and Kirby’s nearly omnipotent Galactus. Lee and Kirby might have Ben Grimm kid Reed from time to time, but they portrayed Richards’ towering intellect as worthy of admiration. Lee and Kirby depicted Reed Richards as a great leader and hero, never a fool, and at the climax of the Galactus trilogy, Richards effectively becomes humanity’s representative and leader, forcing their most formidable enemy to back down. A human being stares at God, and this time God blinks.

As the Watcher, who can be interpreted as the benign aspect of God, tells Galactus, these “children”–the humans–have earned their right to live on this planet. The Galactus trilogy is a parable about humanity rising from “children” who live in fear to adults who take charge of their own lives. But in Rise of the Silver Surfer, it’s the Surfer who confronts Galactus, not any of us humans, and so the point is lost.

Last week I stated that Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer adapts three classic storylines from the comics. The third is the serial that runs from Fantastic Four Vol. 1 #56 through #60 (1966-1967), in which Doctor Doom steals the powers of the Silver Surfer. I’m particularly fond of this saga since Fantastic Four #58 was the first Fantastic Four comic I ever read. This storyline would have made a fine sequel to Rise of the Silver Surfer, but, no, the filmmakers cram it into Rise and bungle yet another classic Lee-Kirby story.

As in the Galactus trilogy, this storyline includes a memorable persuasion scene. Remember that the Lee-Kirby version of the Surfer was entirely alien, without knowledge or experience of the ways of humanity. He was an innocent, who, among other things, did not comprehend the concept of deceit. Hence, upon arriving at Doctor Doom’s castle, he naively believes Doom’s spiel about being a benefactor of humanity, or at least gives Doom the benefit of the doubt. Lee and Kirby have fun with the scene, as Doom goes over the top: he wouldn’t deceive any of us, but the unearthly Surfer has no experience of lying. But the scene soon turns very serious: Doom grants the surfer a telescopic view of outer space, and while the Surfer is rapt with joy at the sight of his lost paradise, Doom attacks him from behind, using his technology to forcibly absorb the alien’s cosmic energies. (Now that I’m writing about it, I realize this is like a metaphorical rape scene.)

If Galactus is God, and the Surfer is either Christ or a fallen angel, then Doctor Doom is metaphorically the Devil, who deceives and conquers the innocent Surfer. (Stan Lee would continue this theme, making it more explicit, when he introduced the Surfer’s literally demonic archfoe Mephisto in Silver Surfer Vol. 1 #3 in 1968.)

The metaphorical premise of the rest of this storyline becomes: What if the Devil became all-powerful? What if Evil proved to be unstoppable? Fantastic Four Vol. 1 #58, my first issue, demonstrates that the Fantastic Four cannot defeat Doctor Doom, whose power now overwhelms theirs; the following issues show Doom wreaking havoc across the entire world, whose nations are likewise helpless to stop him. Ultimately it is Reed Richards, through his great intellect, who brings about Doom’s defeat by finding a way to turn the power of Galactus (that energy barrier enveloping Earth) against him.

In Rise there is no such dramatic persuasion scene: Doom does not trick the Surfer out of his power. In fact, in Rise the Surfer has no cosmic powers: the powers are said to be in his surfboard. All that Doctor Doom needs to do to steal those powers is hop on board. Thus the filmmakers diminish the Surfer. In the comics, by stealing his powers, Doctor Doom usurped the power of a god, while reducing the Surfer to the level of a helpless mortal. In the movie, the Surfer never had any innate godlike abilities to begin with. Presumably FF mailman Willie Lumpkin could have become cosmically powered if he stepped onto that cosmic surfboard. (Hey, now there’s a cameo role for Stan Lee that I wouldn’t mind seeing as a DVD special feature!)

The movie also fails to establish that the FF could not defeat a cosmically-powered Doom through physical force. The running gag in which Johnny Storm temporarily absorbs his teammates’ powers finally pays off dramatically when he uses those extra powers to battle and defeat the cosmic Doctor Doom. (I get it: Johnny and Doom are both using someone else’s powers.) In effect, Johnny becomes like the Super-Skrull, the Lee-Kirby villain who possessed all the same powers as the FF. But that still shouldn’t be sufficient to stop someone with the full powers of the Silver Surfer circa FF Vol. 1 #48-60. Thus the movie muffs the idea of Evil as omnipotent and invincible.

If you want to see that idea done right, watch for the final two episodes of the third series of the new Doctor Who, currently being telecast in the U.S. on the Sci-Fi Channel. Executive producer/writer Russell T. Davies’ epic, suspenseful, and thrilling series finales for Doctor Who should be required viewing for every director and screenwriter of superhero movies (See Ken Plume’s interview with Davies here.)

The worst problem with the film’s Doom storyline is Doom himself. With the possible exception of Darkseid, Doctor Doom is the greatest villain of the superhero genre, and yet in these two FF movies he comes across as a lightweight. Early on in Rise we see, through deep shadows, that Doom’s face is scarred, as is in the comics, but soon his face gets fixed. At least Doom is apparently no longer made of organic metal, as he was in the first film, but the scarred face, symbolizing his soul, is essential to the character. Since he has no scars, it doesn’t make sense for him to war that metal mask later in the film. Moreover, though the movie states Doom is from Latveria (So why doesn’t he have an Eastern European accent?), it doesn’t establish that he is its monarch, dwelling in a medieval castle: hence, Doom’s suit of armor and medieval costume make no sense, either. Actor Julian McMahon is simply miscast: his voice isn’t resonant enough for Doom, and he doesn’t project the character’s genius, obsessiveness, regality, charisma, and sheer menace.

How hard can it be to cast, write and direct a major supervillain correctly in the movies? There are so many examples of successful performances of megavillains: Ian McKellen’s Magneto; Christopher Lee’s Dracula, Saruman, and Count Dooku; Donald Pleasence’s Blofeld; and Anthony Hopkins’ Hannibal Lecter; and Peter Cushing’s Baron Von Frankenstein and Grand Moff Tarkin, to name just a few. There are those of us who think that Darth Vader was partly inspired by Lee and Kirby’s Doctor Doom. Would that the Fantastic Four movies would use Darth Vader as an inspiration for how to play Doctor Doom!

First, the Daredevil (2003) movie squeezed Frank Miller’s long “Elektra Saga” into a single film and drained it of intelligence and passion. Then X-Men: The Last Stand (2006) botched Chris Claremont and John Byrne’s “Dark Phoenix Saga” (see “Comics in Context” #134–135). Now Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer screws up Lee and Kirby’s towering achievement, the Galactus trilogy. Why does this keep happening? It’s understandable that filmmakers are drawn to some of the greatest storylines in Marvel Comics history, but the resulting screen adaptations show no sign that anyone involved truly comprehended what made them work in the comics.

I like to think that there are directors, screenwriters and producers out there, or people who will someday become directors, screenwriters, or producers, who know the original comics and are disappointed at how poorly the movies adapted them. Warner Brothers started its first series of Superman movies in 1978 and its first string of Batman films in 1989: both series degenerated into camp by the third installment. Now, in the first years of the new century, Warners has begun its Batman and Superman film series anew, in the hands of filmmakers who are intent on treating the material with understanding and respect and avoiding the mistakes of the past.

Perhaps in fifteen or twenty years there will be new series of Fantastic Four, Spider-Man and X-Men movies for a new generation. Maybe there will be a new film adaptation of the Galactus trilogy, either in live action or animation, that will be faithful to Lee and Kirby’s masterpiece. Possibly two decades hence we will listen to the commentary track on that film’s DVD (or whatever format is current then), in which the director and writers explain how disappointed they were with Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer, and how they were determined to get the Galactus trilogy right this time.

It’ll be a long wait, but I’d like to think this would happen. Hey, did any of us back in the 1960s think that there would ever be a live action movie of the Galactus trilogy, even a bad one?

As you may recall, I didn’t like the 2005 Fantastic Four movie, either (see “Comics in Context” #93). But I finally found a good reason for finally acquiring the FF DVD (besdides the superb documentary about Jack Kirby on the new “Extended Edition”).

One was that I realized that watching the FF movie by itself is like eating a peanut butter and jelly sandwich without the jelly. The Fantastic Four movie is incomplete unless you are simultaneously listening to the RiffTrax audio commentary track that is designed to go with it.

Like Quick Stop editor Ken Plume and other individuals of discerning taste, I was a devoted fan of Mystery Science Theater 3000 (www.mst3kinfo.com/), the award-winning television series which ran on the Comedy Channel, Comedy Central and the Sci-Fi Channel in succession from 1988 to 1999. (Reruns continued on the Sci-Fi Channel into 2004, and many episodes are now available on DVD.)

MST3K specialized in transforming cinematic sow’s ears into postmodernist silk purses. Upon the foundation of an utterly godawful movie, usually an obscure, low budget genre film, MST3K’s stable of writers built a dazzling structure of witty commentary, clever allusions to high and popular culture, jazz-like comedy riffs, and an appealingly ironic worldview. Thus the MST3K writer/performers converted the detritus of moviemaking into a dependably entertaining, and very often brilliant satire on American pop culture.

In recent years MST3K head writer and longtime performer Michael J. Nelson has resurrected the show’s comedic sensibility through RiffTrax (http://www.rifftrax.com/). These are MP3 commentary tracks, written and performed by Nelson and often some of his former MST3K cohorts, mocking various movies. For an inexpensive fee, you can download a RiffTrax MP3 from the site, and then play it on your computer or iPod or whatever while watching a DVD of the film that is RiffTrax’s chosen victim. When the MP3 and the DVD are properly synchronized, the comments by Nelson and his colleagues will pop up in between lines of dialogue in the film that is under attack.

Since this format doesn’t require obtaining the rights to the film being skewered, Nelson and company have been able to move upward to a better, bigger budget class of bad movies to heckle.

Sometimes RiffTrax selects a target that is actually a good movie, like The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001), but still imposes a perspective on it that turns it humorous: it had not occurred to me before listening to the Rings RiffTrax MP3 that Galadriel looks like an attendee at a Lilith Fair, or that the Balrog resembles Rowlf the Muppet if he had been set on fire.

But RiffTrax, like MST3K, is at its best when its target is eminently deserving of being riffed to shreds. I have recently had the privilege of watching Fantastic Four with the appropriate RiffTrax commentary, and now I cannot imagine wanting to experience the film any other way.

It’s like the way many individual issues of comic books these days provide unsatisfactory reading experiences because they’re ultimately meant to be collected and read in trade paperback form. Now I realize that the Fantastic Four movie wasn’t finished until Nelson and his colleague Kevin Murphy had recorded their commentary. If you listen to the FF RiffTrax MP3 without watching them, you won’t appreciate the jokes. If you watch the FF movie without the RiffTrax MP3, you probably won’t appreciate the movie. Put them together, and the magic happens.

Except for a reference to Marvel’s What If. . .? comic, the FF commentary doesn’t indicate knowledge of the FF comics, which is a bit surprising since the full crew of MST3K writers were renowned for their seemingly encyclopedic knowledge of pop culture. Still, all that Nelson and Murphy need for this film are their well-trained eyes for absurdity. I needed their commentary to keep reminding me that Doctor Doom’s fearsome mask starts out in the movie as (believe it or not) a humanitarian award! (So charity isn’t pretty?) My favorite bit in the entire track is the comment on the cameo performance as FF mailman Willie Lumpkin by a certain familiar figure. But what I am most grateful for is that Nelson and Murphy share my feeling that the FF movie makes Johnny Storm, the Human Torch, utterly obnoxious, and they never let up on him. “Is Johnny really supposed to be the most loathsome character in all of fiction?” Murphy wonders aloud at one point.

You can find out more about RiffTrax from Ken Plume’s Quick Stop interview with Michael J. Nelson, which includes the tale of Ken’s legendary bet with Avi Arad about the first FF movie, and one of Quick Stop’s holiday shopping columns. And Nelson, Murphy and MST3K veteran Bill Corbett (interviewed by Ken here) are also joining forces as the “Film Crew” to heckle various movies on DVDs released by Shout Factory. I won’t be attending this year’s San Diego Con, but if you go, you can see them there at 5:45 PM on Saturday.

Meanwhile, I am looking forward to listening to the RiffTrax for the Daredevil flick and the first X-Men movie. And I hope there’ll be a RiffTrax treatment of Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer to help us while away the years until a movie does the Galactus trilogy right.

–Copyright 2007 Peter Sanderson

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