Ever since Captain America: Winter Soldier and And Man (and also Logan), I've been eagerly awaiting Marvel Studios to be able to make a Fantastic Four movie. Winter Soldier and Ant Man were both genre pieces (a spy thriller and heist film, respectively). And, of course, Logan (not made by Marvel) is a western. The success of those movies as both comic book films and also genre films had me excited for the potential of a Fantastic Four movie that would be a science fiction genre film.

After all, the Fantastic Four differ from most other comic book heroes in that they don't just save the city or the world from bad guys, but they are also scientists and exploders. Many of their comic book adventures involve them flying their rocket ship into space to explore new planets and phenomena, and interacting with cosmic and celestial beings.

It took a long time for Marvel to re-acquire the rights to Fantastic Four (by its parent company, Disney, outright buying the previous rights-holder, Fox). In the meantime, Black Panther kind of beat Fantastic Four to the punch as Marvel's "sci-fi" genre piece. But that didn't lessen my anticipation.

This is the first Marvel movie in a long while that doesn't feel like it requires homework. It stands alone, and is a welcome breath of fresh air. It also feels much more in line with the good movies from phases 1 and 2, in terms of both its quality, and also in its lack of baggage. It's easily the best Fantastic Four movie (and I'm someone who thought the first 2 from the early 2000's were just fine), and it's probably the best Marvel movie since Infinity War.

Silver Age Sci-Fi

But is First Steps a "science fiction" movie?

It certainly has a lot of the trappings of a science fiction film. First and foremost is its wonderful 1960 retro-future aesthetic that feels like it's pulled straight from a 60's-era silver age comic or science fiction pulp. Much in-line with science fiction, the central problem of the movie (and, in fact, many smaller problems as well) is treated more like a scientific or engineering problem that the four have to solve. This is in contrast to most other super hero movie that simply requires the hero to play "detective" to figure out where the bad guy is going to be, and what their weakness is. And of course, there's a healthy dose of outer space adventure in the middle of the movie.

Unfortunately, the space-faring adventure is just that: adventure. There's little in the way of exploration or discovery.

Image ©: Walt Disney, Marvel

There is a stand-out space-faring chase scene.

The outer space scenes do make for a pretty spectacular set piece though. I particularly loved the way that the heroes use the gravitational time-dilation of a neutron star to help them resolve a problem, and then have to calculate a sling-shot maneuver to seal their own escape. It's the sort of thing that you would see in a sci-fi pulp story, or even in an episode of Star Trek (though this movie involves a lot more visual spectacle).

I keep being drawn to games developed by the Chinese Room, despite always being disappointed by them. Their games always represent the things that people dislike most about "walking simulators". But since I don't have any inherent dislike for walking sims, I keep giving The Chinese Room another chance. Still Wakes The Deep caught my attention by being described as "John Carpenter's The Thing set on an oil rig". The Thing is a masterpiece of horror, and one of my favorite movies ever.

I had visions of Still Wakes The Deep being a story about inter-personal paranoia in the claustrophobic and isolated setting of an oil rig that is gradually being overtaken by a Lovecraftian alien threat. That's only partly true though, as Still Wakes The Deep plays up the cosmic horror element, while downplaying the paranoia element and replacing it with simpler themes about interpersonal relationships and the artificial walls that people tend to put up between themselves and the people they care about.

An oil rig is a great setting for horror, combining dark claustrophobic corridors with the terror of being stuck at sea.

Alone, together, on an oil rig

The setting of an oil rig is an interesting one for a psychological horror story or video game. The environment is completely enclosed and claustrophobic, with little-to-no escape. People are forced to live and work together in close quarters, and their survival is largely dependent on one another. Being stuck in such a setting, with people who you can't trust, would surely be terrifying.

The short length of Still Wakes The Deep does hurt it a lot. Specifically, the inciting incident happens very early and suddenly, with little-to-no build up or transition between "normal" and "everything's gone to shite". I never felt like I got a chance to really get to know any of the supporting characters, to the point that I wasn't even sure what their names were, or which character was being referred to when a name came up in a document or conversation. Similarly, when I find any given body or corpse, I have no idea who it's supposed to be. I had a brief opportunity to snoop around in a few characters' cabins at the start, but all that really told me was that the boss is a hard-ass, and there's one other character who might be a racist, neo-fascist prick. Other than that, there's like one opportunity to have a brief exchange with each of the main supporting characters, and it's all optional, and most of it is more about the state of the rig anyway.

There's hardly any time to explore the rig or get to know the crew before the inciting incident.

The brief intro, and fact that the rig goes to shite so quickly and suddenly, means that there's also never an opportunity for the player to get a feel for the setting itself. I got about 20 minutes to walk through a couple hallways, some crew cabins, the mess hall, and the main deck, and then it's right into the horror, with the rig literally falling apart around me. From here on out, it's hard to ever get a sense for where, exactly, I am on the rig, or how the different sections fit together or relate to one another. When floors and walls literally start collapsing, I can't tell one hallway from another. This is despite the fact that the game loops the player around through the same mess hall and lounge, that we saw in the intro, like 5 or 6 times throughout the game. Despite revisiting this same location multiple times, I never really recognized it until I was inside the lounge or mess hall. Every set piece just feels like a semi-random series of corridors and obstacles in which all I have to do is push forward on the analog stick to get where I need to go. There's no open-ended exploration whatsoever, no hidden secrets, and no alternate paths.