Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer (PG)

The boy who sells Keanu Reeves his first surfboard in Point Break (1991) remarks: "Surfing's the source, man. It'll change your life, swear to God." His observation is literally proven true in this snappily titled sequel.

It reunites the superhero quartet from the 2005 movie. They're a bit like X-Men with a few tweaks: the group leader Reed Richards (Ioan Gruffudd) can stretch his body like a piece of bubblegum; Sue Storm (Jessica Alba) can make herself invisible; Johnny Storm (Chris Evans), the group's publicity-crazed playboy, blazes through the air like a human cannonball; and Ben Grimm (Michael Chiklis) has super-strength and looks like a Sumo wrestler crossed with a gingerbread man.

What none of them can do, however, is whizz around the cosmos on a silver surfboard, turning whole seas into ice, closing down cities and poking gigantic craters through the Earth's surface. Weirder still, the Silver Surfer – voice by Laurence Fishburne, look by shop-window mannequin – may be one of the good guys. What's going on?

Well, the planet is under threat from a series of catastrophes apparently orchestrated by the silvery one – or, as the Californian surfing community might have put it, "Apocalypse, like, whenever" – and F4 must stop him.

Problem is, Reed is getting married to Sue in three days' time and, as every bridegroom knows, it's hard to concentrate on the big day when you also have to design a military-approved sensor that will pick up the signal of an intergalactic surfing dude. Sue's worries – that they will never have "normal" lives while they're planet-saving celebrities – seem rather tame in comparison.

But the battle to save Earth is going fine when, in one of those inexplicable plot developments that superhero movies allow themselves, the F4's nemesis Victor Von Doom (Julian McMahon) reappears, despite the fact he was killed in the previous movie. What's more, he's been appointed by the military to work alongside his erstwhile enemies, a decision that looks dodgy from the start. He's called Von Doom, for God's sake! He dresses in black! He's supposed to be dead! How many more clues do they need?

So chaos reigns, and even London gets it in the neck, first with the near-collapse of the Millennium Wheel, and then the emptying of the Thames. If they'd targeted the Olympic Park they might have done us all a favour.

What is to be said of this latest Marvel creation, other than that it absolutely fails to live up to its name? Yes, it's all quite harmless, the shape-shifting plot does not extend much beyond 90 minutes, and Alba still looks good in a jumpsuit. We've seen it before, we'll see it again. Here are some suggestions for future sequels: The Fair-to-Middling Five, The Satisfactory Six, The Serviceable Seven. Not the most scintillating prospects, I agree, but at least they won't raise expectations they can't meet.