There was a time, shortly after the Comics Code Authority was established, when DC Comics, after being attacked by psychiatrist Fredric Wertham and the Senate, was forced to make more campy, child-friendly stories for their most iconic heroes: Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman. As a result, sales plummeted, and fans of comics were looking for something more meaningful and relatable. Enter Stan Lee and Jack Kirby’s The Fantastic Four!
What Kirby and Lee did with Marvel’s Fantastic Four would eventually lead to some of the most iconic characters in pop-cultural history. From their success came the creation of Spider-Man, The Avengers, and The X-Men, but more than that, Lee and Kirby realized that they didn’t have to settle for the campy direction DC was taking at the time. They could tell human stories about real families and real individuals with real problems, but in a fantastical world of monsters, science, and space-age technology. They wanted the pages of their comics to reflect the troubles of the youths reading them, but also convey an optimistic, futuristic feel of wonder.
This is exactly what director Matt Shakman is paying tribute to in his gorgeously-realized adaptation The Fantastic Four: First Steps. Shakman is obviously not the first person to adapt Lee and Kirby’s beloved characters to the screen. There was the Roger Corman 1994 film, Tim Story’s duology from 2005 and 2007 starring Chris Evans, Michael Chiklis, and the late Julian McMahon, and the 2015 Josh Trank mishap. None of these were really satisfying as Fantastic Four films, failing to capture the charms of the comics, and making ordinarily terrific actors look like they were lumbering through for a paycheck. It fills me with so much joy to say that finally, someone got it right!
The story of First Steps is ultimately one of family and survival. In Earth-828, The Fantastic Four have achieved celebrity status as the heroes and leaders of this optimistic world. Sue Storm and Reed Richards find out Sue is pregnant. Their timing couldn’t be worse, as a cosmic being known as The Silver Surfer arrives to their Earth to announce that her master Galactus is coming to devour their world.
The Fantastic Four: First Steps is the movie Fantastic Four fans have been waiting for all their lives. It’s joyful, but also heartfelt and touching, The familial emphasis is felt thanks to the dynamic chemistry of its incredibly talented cast. Most importantly, it inspires a sense of awe when seeing what Shakman is trying to do, which is transport you completely away to a world we’ve never seen or experienced in any comic book film. And in doing so, much like a fateful wonderous journey to space, Shakman has managed to change the Fantastic Four forever.
On paper, it’s a very simple story. What I’m not sharing, however, are spoilers that elevate the simple story into something more emotionally complex. While I don’t think First Steps gets as complex or mature as its sister release Thunderbolts, it certainly doesn’t skimp on emotion and warmth. This movie is charming in every sense of the word. Prior to this, the closest thing we had to a perfect Fantastic Four film was Pixar’s The Incredibles, which was heavily influenced by the early Fantastic Four comics. In an ironic twist, in terms of both tone and spirit, The Fantastic Four: The First Steps actually feels like a live-action Incredibles. And that’s exactly what it needed to be.
Shakman and his team introduce us to Earth-828 in spectacular fashion. From the production design, the architecture of the sets, the costume design, and the vibe Shakman creates, choosing to shoot the film as if it were a heightened ‘60s sci-fi feature, everything feels not only timeless, but also like we’re seeing this for the first time. And in essence we are, having never spent an entire MCU film in a specific Earth outside Earth-616 before. Even when recalling how different MCU films prior to First Steps attempted to transport us to new worlds within the multiverse, the results practically looked and felt the same (Looking at you, Multiverse of Madness, Quantumania, and Deadpool and Wolverine).
With Earth-828 we’re taken to a world of tomorrow, in which Shakman inspires us to feel a wonder and awe we’ve never seen or felt before in an MCU movie. The lines and designs of the buildings are inspired by Jack Kirby’s artwork. The wardrobe worn by extras and the Fantastic Four themselves feels influenced by icons like Jackie O and Steve McQueen, from the jackets and knee-high boots to the fedoras and suits. The vibrant colors and designs of the vehicles are angled and sleek. It really is the epitome of taking a 60s space-age sci-fi comic book and translating it to real life. And that makes The Fantastic Four: First Steps so incredibly special and unique. The modern era of comic book filmmaking has put pressure on these movies to feel “relevant, modern, and cool.” First Steps dares to say “these comics were always cool!”
It’s not just the look, however, that sells us on this timelessness. It’s also the sense of wonder and optimism exhibited by the primary heroic quartet and the people around them. One of the things that made the Fantastic Four so unique as heroes was their celebrity status. We see this reflected at the very start of the film, as an ABC broadcast introduces a fourth-anniversary special about the day the Fantastic Four were transformed by cosmic rays and came back down to Earth. From then on, the world looked up to them, as The Four changed everything, seemingly unifying their planet under a single viewpoint of hope. Everyone feels brighter and happier given that they have these guardians to watch over them, with a couple who specializes in both scientific knowledge and (in Sue’s case) empathy.
There is a scene — maybe several scenes — that made me yearn for a world like this today. Sue gives a sincere and impassioned speech about the value of family to her, as well as the parallel value of the citizens of Earth-828 to her, and the crowd around her is moved and supportive. This doesn’t happen in our world today. There’s a montage of all countries around the world pooling the globe’s resources to build devices for the betterment and preservation of Earth-828, with nary a sign of conflict. Again, this doesn’t happen in our world today.
All of this is how Shakman transported us into a world we’ve never seen before, and why I was filled with awe and emotion seeing this vision of how things could be, both artistically and ethically/politically, brought to life on the big screen.
Moving on to the performances in the film, I have to say, that after the events of this movie, you’ll want more of The Four. Pedro Pascal leads the charge with a strong, heartfelt performance that will convince the staunchest of naysayers why he was a great choice for Reed Richards. Much of what Pascal brings to Reed feels inspired by his father figure performance as Joel Miller from The Last of Us: loving father, willing to make necessary choices to survive, but ultimately put to the test of having to choose between his family and the world. Pascal works beautifully in the role, mixing a sense of desperation and longing, with a bit of the callous overthinking scientist we know Reed to be.
The highlight among the team, however, is Oscar nominee Vanessa Kirby. Kirby’s Sue is maternal and nurturing, yes, but her strength as her greatest attribute. It’s a powerful performance from a character often overlooked as one of the most powerful characters in the Marvel Comics canon. Kirby is funny and charming, but empathetic and compassionate. She exudes confidence and determination, persistence and grace. This version of Sue is shown to have brokered peace with adversaries like the Mole Man (a short, scene-stealing performance from Paul Walter Hauser). She proves herself to be the strongest of the team and the ensemble, getting us to believe that she can knock over gods.
Rounding out Marvel’s First Family are Ebon Moss-Bachrach as Ben Grimm and Joseph Quinn as Johnny Storm, both terrific. Moss-Bachrach is the perfect Thing. While it’s in the character’s nature to lament the physical situation he’s in, Moss-Bachrach plays this a lot more subtly than what we saw in Chiklis’s interpretation. This is a version of the Thing that has made peace with what he is, and Moss-Bachrach brings that confidence. In subtler moments, he shows us that he misses what he used to be (kudos to the stellar motion capture and the VFX team). His banter with Johnny is straight out of the comics. His tenderness in interactions with Sue and Reed are what define this character, and Moss-Bachrach gets this.
Quinn’s Johnny is not portrayed in as much of a comedic light as Chris Evans’ or Michael B. Jordan’s takes on Human Torch. His high-energy performance definitely provides comic relief, but Quinn makes Johnny Storm deeper than the goofy smartass playboy we’ve seen in other iterations. In Quinn’s performance, we see a Johnny who is often overlooked for not being as intelligent as his sister or brother-in-law. There’s a desire to prove his worth to the team, apart from the flying and flaming on, and Quinn convincingly is able to pull off scenes where we see how Johnny Storm’s smarts. Yet he also infuses the character with the boldness and courage from the comics, along with the same signature impulsive energy Evans and Jordan brought to the role. It’s a pretty perfect portrayal of Johnny Storm.
Much also has to be said about Ralph Ineson’s Galactus and Julia Garner’s Shalla-Bal/Silver Surfer. Ineson’s booming voice and cold, steely demeanor are absolutely intimidating. The CG on Galactus is completely flawless, translating the character perfectly from the comics, and making him a very imposing, creditable threat to this world. We’ve waited forever to see this, and we ate with what Marvel Studios’ VFX team and Ineson have done here! Garner’s version of Shalla-Bal/Silver Surfer is also excellent. The sequences with the Surfer chasing the Fantastic Four through space are among the most thrilling we’ve seen in the MCU. Garner brings a calmness to her role as herald of Galactus that is disarming, soothing while also conveying menace. My only complaint is we didn’t get enough about Shalla-Bal to make some of her beats feel earned. Garner is terrific, but we could have used a lot more Silver Surfer in this movie.
If there’s one thing this movie doesn’t do as well as it should, it’s elaborating on who these specific characters are and what makes them unique within the MCU. We get a sense of it, but I wanted the screenplay to go deeper with this, the way Thunderbolts dug into its characters. It makes for a very solid and fun initial entry. Sometimes the world feels more fleshed-out than the characters, with the exception of Sue Storm and Reed Richards. I definitely wanted much more time with the Thing. There’s a subplot with a romantic interest played by Natasha Lyonne, but it doesn’t really go anywhere.
Additionally, some may find the story to be a bit on the simple side, especially following this year’s Superman and Thunderbolts. However, that’s fine here. Keeping the story small but the stakes high is really what we needed in a Fantastic Four movie, allowing the emphasis to stay on the family. Introducing Franklin as a MacGuffin was a genius choice, because it makes the dangers personal and relatable to the family, while also cleverly setting up what’s next for the MCU, given the impact Franklin Richards has in the comics (we see what you did there, Kevin Feige). From this simplicity comes unity and optimism, which assists the world-building while strengthening our connection to these characters. It also makes everything feel more like a classic Fantastic Four adventure from the 1960s. So I’m happy the story is able to do everything it needs while not being as complex plot-wise as other superhero stories.
On a technical level, the movie is so well put together. The cinematography is courtesy of Shakman’s frequent collaborator, Jess Hall, who also worked on WandaVision and Monarch: Legacy of Monsters. Hall does absolutely brilliant work by combining the aesthetics of both projects: the period-piece authenticity of WandaVision, and the scale and epic grandeur of Monarch. It was a terrific choice for Shakman to bring him into the project, given that’s exactly what a “Fantastic Four vs. Galactus” story needs. The vibrant colors and beautifully-framed shots emphasize why this may be the most unique-looking MCU film to date.
We cannot talk about this movie without discussing the incredible score of the film, courtesy of MCU mainstay composer (and Werewolf by Night director) Michael Giacchino. He was a brilliant choice given what he did with Incredibles (hence one of the reasons for the comparison), and he brings similar energy here. Given the stakes should be higher in First Steps than what’s set in the Incredibles series, Giacchino doesn’t rehash that score. He gives The Fantastic Four: First Steps its own incredible theme, but also a sense of grandness and excitement, combined with tension and danger as the film progresses, making it feel darker than his work in The Incredibles and closer to the work he did on Star Trek (2009). It’s an absolutely genius composition, giving the film its own unique identity within the MCU library.
The Fantastic Four: First Steps is 100% unlike anything Marvel Studios has ever done. Shakman has crafted a movie about wonder, awe, and family, and you feel that warmth, curiosity, and brightness in every frame of this film. Utterly charming, bright fun, and packed with amazing spectacle! What Shakman does with scale and color is absolutely incredible, and it stands as a wonderful tribute to the Lee/Kirby works of the 1960s. The performances from the whole cast are stellar across the board, especially Vanessa Kirby, who is completely magnetic! It is going to lose some points with me for negating or ignoring its lead actor’s Hispanic heritage, but I honesty can’t stay mad at a movie that captures the spirit of the Silver Age comics that put Marvel on the map! Given the trifecta of Thunderbolts, Superman, and now The Fantastic Four: First Steps, I have to say, it has never been more marvelous to embrace the goofy 6-year old comic book fan that lives in my heart. As they say in the movie, “Thank you, Fantastic Four!”
Overall Score (on an entertainment level): A-
Overall Score (on a representation level): B-
Also, H.E.R.B.I.E is the best! The Fantastic Four: First Steps hits theaters this Friday, July 25!
