COULD have been pretty decent. (Long post)
The general idea of this film is actually a pretty good concept. Nothing ground-breaking but not a deal-breaker, either. It just needs a lot of work.
What disgusts me about this movie is that they had something potentially great and went the worst direction with it. Even little kids like more serious super-hero films. I'm not saying go "Dark Knight" with it, but at least the maturity level of "Spider-man".
The problems I found with this movie are... infinite. The people behind it just don't know how to make a movie, at least not of this genre. I say that because just about everybody I know could have done a better job, and they're not film makers. I'm going to list some big issues with this film that MOST people would never make the mistake of doing.
1. Tim Allen was a very bad choice. He's not a very good actor to begin with and I really doubt many of his fans are into the super-hero thing anyhow, especially a kiddy one like this. He's also not a very 'current' star but rather a 90's star. The only appeal I can see coming from Tim Allen would be to kids who loved the "Santa Clause" series. Problem with that is I was a kid when the FIRST one came out, and I loved it THEN. Didn't like it even five years later. The three SC films are so far apart that the kids who were fans of each of them wont' be kids when the next comes out, so very few people out there liked all three. He's not super-hero material, either. Very poor idea. He didn't do the role well at all. I'd have rather seen Vin Diesel play Zoom, and I'm not a fan of him. Frankly I wouldn't have minded seeing Keanu Reeves in the role of Zoom. He CAN pull of a decent semi-serious action role, and he's old enough to play a washed up super-hero retiree. His acting level also perfectly suits that kind of genre. I'm sure there's a better choice, but I am curious.
2. The team needs work. First of all, the team shouldn't have been a group of nobody children in the first place, it should have been high-school kids. The two oldest ones were good choices, honestly, but even they needed to step up their game a bit. But the two youngest... just sucked. Not just their acting, which was bad, but their role and the concept of them was pretty much ridiculous. The movie would have been better all together removing Mega Boy, who's name SHOULD have been "The Incredible Bulk" if they HAD to keep him. The kid was terrible, the character was awful, and the power was just lousy. The little girl's character could have been okay but they relied too much on the "little girl, huge power" gimmick. I'd have rather seen a nerdy high-school girl have that power, and be cast be a decent actress. The concept of "super-strength" is plenty necessary for a team, at least in some form, but they did it very poorly.
3. Conner/Concussion: I LOVED the guy playing him. He had the perfect look for a villain who was intended to be in his age range. His power was also very convincing and devious. A sick mind with that power would be a huge danger. I even like the idea that he's Zoom's long-lost brother who was turned evil, took out the entire team, and got locked away in another dimension where he didn't age. The only problem here is that the guy needs work on his acting. He's got potential, and he was the biggest appeal to me. His costume was excellent, his look and personality were perfect. He just needed work on being more... serious and more dynamic. He had all the potential in the world to be, actually, an epic villain. But I think his sort of early level of talent paired with a terrible writing staff held him back from showing what he could have been.
4. The general silliness needs to go all together. The movie SHOULDN'T have been a family/kid film, it should have been a serious super-hero movie with some young-adult appeal and no pathetic, slapstick silliness added in. The entire moment when they tortured Chevy Chase with the skunk and all that was a bit unnecessary and really hurt the film for me. That, and when they used the flying saucer to pick up fast-food.
5. The supporting cast... COMPLETELY sucked. Not a single supporting role was ANY good in this movie. Courtney Cox can act sometimes, but she was just a bad choice for this all together. Her character was annoying and unlikable. Her power was silly and cliche... she was just a bad choice. Then there's Chevy Chase. If any actor cast in this film was a worse choice than Tim Allen it was Chevy Chase. What were they thinking? First of all what kid is familiar with him in any way, and for that matter what kid is going to look and be happy to see him? Secondly, what ADULT likes Chevy Chase? He was okay in the Vacation movies but that's as far as it goes I'm afraid. Not to mention he's over the hill by two decades career-wise. How many people went to see this because he was in it weighed against the people who AVOIDED it because he was? On top of that, Tim Allen really isn't very popular and probably had more people avoid it than see it, and then the general IDEA behind it worked the same way. It's like they picked well-known stars to draw in the adult crowd but picked ones that nobody WANTS to see anymore.
6. The climax. I didn't like how they settled the movie. I don't like that they perfectly succeeded in just converting this guy back to normal, and on top of that the military didn't try to arrest him. He was under dark influence but legally he's still a multi-murderer and would have been arrested. And even though he's too powerful to be taken in against his will, he'd have had to kill people to get away in all likelihood and the only reason he had EVER killed anybody was 'cuz he wasn't himself. So being himself I really doubt he'd go as far as to resist by risking lives. The area was also a poor choice. It was in the middle of nowhere, I'm guessing, because since it's a kid friendly movie they didn't want to have ANY civilians nearby in harm's way. But this is a movie that shouldn't have been a kid's flick, and could have been very good had they, ya know, none what sells and what potential it truly had. I'd have liked the finale to take place in a city. A bit cliche but that's the point of super-hero films, to put a large number of people in danger. The only people at risk here were the team themselves. Yes, if they had failed he'd have done more damage and killed innocent people, but the finale should be dynamic and a bit threatening. The heroes, especially with a team, should be challenged to try to protect the innocent while defeating this great evil force.
Can you imagine how epic it COULD have been in that final showdown? Not only would the team have to protect innocent people and defeat this super-powered tyrant, but they'd have had to at least TRY not to kill him and TRY to get him back. Whether or not they succeeded in the last point isn't involved here. That final conflict COULD have been great.
And imagine how much more dangerous Concussion's power could be if there were a lot of buildings nearby. In the middle of nowhere it's pretty much just going to throw people around, but in a cramped city it could be catastrophic. This is the very problem Fantastic Four's finale had. Dr. Doom is one of the greatest super-villains ever, and it even took place in a city. BUT, for some reason, absolutely no innocent people were in the path of evil. That, and as soon as the real fight began it was already over because "science" solved the problem and saved the day.
That, and here's a problem a lot of 'team' super-hero situations share. NO situation in a storyline should EVER be created just to give a character's powers a purpose. If you can't give them a logical purpose, don't give them the power. In Fantastic Four they did it constantly with Mr. Fantastic, giving him completely out of left-field situations that have no real logic behind them just so he could DO something. And Zoom did the same thing with both Courtney Cox AND "Mega Boy". Mega Boy is a character who shouldn't have existed! Don't throw in obstacles just to give him something to do. If you can't come up with a good point in the plot to involve him, don't make him a STAR in the movie.
I just... I've watched this movie twice on Starz, and... I really, really want to like it and I see so much potential. They just didn't know what they were doing when they wrote or cast it.