The first crack 20th Century Fox made at starting up a Fantastic Four film franchise back in 2005 was a pretty muddled affair (though at least considerably more watchable than the horrendous Roger Corman ashcan movie from over a decade previous). At the time, they were doing pretty well, holding the likes of the successfulX-Men movies close, whilst other studios tried to get their own comic book projects off the ground. The release of this film, starring Ioan Gruffudd, Jessica Alba, Chris Evans, Michael Chiklis and Julian McMahon, was to be the start of a similarly profitable franchise. Unfortunately, despite being a financial success, it was a critical joke, lamented and lambasted in equal measure. It certainly didn't help when that same year saw the release of the darker comic book movies Batman Begins and Sin City(the latter also starring Alba). A sequel did arrive, though without too much fanfare and the series was unceremoniously scrapped after two films.
The primary roles for the Fantastic Four have been filed as: Miles Teller as Reed Richards, aka Mr Fantastic; Kate Mara as Susan Storm, aka the Invisible Woman; Michael B. Jordan as Johnny Storm, aka The Human Torch; and Jamie Bell as Ben Grimm, aka The Thing.
See? As a cast, it's... interesting. Obviously, the first thing to jump out is the across-the-board youthful looks of the team. Sure, all the actors are in their mid-to-late 20s, but they all still look young. Certainly younger than what many will have in their head for the characters, be it from reading the comic books or from the previous movies.
Now, Michael B. Jordan as Johnny Storm is the one piece of casting we already knew about since Jordan had worked with Trank on Chronicle and was the director's first and really only choice for The Human Torch. Jordan is a pretty solid choice as he is certainly a talented actor, so this is a decent choice.
Kate Mara pushes the boat even further out there, taking the role of Susan Storm. Aside from the fact that they have, once again, not cast a blonde in the blonde role, there will perhaps need to be an acknowledgement of the fact that Susan and Johnny are siblings. Nevertheless, Mara is a very talented actress, who has received more exposure thanks to her role on House of Cards.
Then, there's Jamie Bell as Ben Grimm, who most people are latching onto as the biggest shocker of the line up, mainly because when you see Bell, you don't immediately associate him with a giant orange rock monster. It would seem clear that, if this casting is true, we'll be looking at a predominantly motion capture performance, which Bell will at least have experience after his mo-cap performance as Tintin three years ago. Nevertheless, the image isn't one that marries up easily.
That's ultimately the big surprise over this casting line up: no one is a particularly easy sell for their respective roles, and for various reasons. Perhaps Trank is trying to intentionally subvert expectations, drawing four young(ish) actors who are generally recognised as talented, but not really big names just yet, making this all somewhat risky from a studio point of view. We'll obviously get to see further casting decisions made this year (perhaps they'll continue to buck the trend and follow through with the rumoured female Dr. Doom) as we lead up to the film's ETA of 2015. Guess we'll all just have to wait and see.