REVIEW: ‘Fantastic Four: First Steps’ introduces a new (corporate) family
Ebon Moss-Bachrach, Vanessa Kirby, Pedro Pascal and Joseph Quinn star in Fantastic Four: First Steps.
Describing the new Fantastic Four movie, more than one Letterboxd user pointed out that “family” gets invoked so often that they expected Dominic Toretto of the Fast universe to pop up and join in the fight. And with the ever-burgeoning size of the Marvel roster and the seemingly invincible Fast characters, would it really be a stretch to include him?
Matt Shakman’s movie embraces the so-called “First Family” idea of the foursome so frequently that it almost becomes tiresome — they are an unshakeable unit, sharing Sunday dinner every week, helping each other out with their projects. Except for the occasional sarcastic quip, they barely even argue with each other. It couldn’t be a more different setup than the squabbling Avengers teams in past films.
Family is also the driving force of the plot. When Sue Storm (Vanessa Kirby) gives birth to her first child with Reed Richards/Mr. Fantastic (Pedro Pascal), the baby becomes the target of a seemingly unstoppable force: a god-like being called Galactus (Ralph Ineson). The Fantastic Four are presented with an impossible choice: give up the boy and Galactus will spare the Earth from being devoured, or refuse and watch him chew through the planet and everyone on it.
At a briskly-paced 114 minutes, First Steps delivers on its title in two ways. It focuses on the infant Franklin Richards and his role in the interconnected Marvel stories, and on a meta level, it presents an efficient entry for the characters into the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Before this movie, the heroes were stuck over at 20th Century Fox alongside the X-Men. Having bought Fox in 2019, Disney has been carefully laying the groundwork to fold the characters into their existing pantheon. Rumours abound that Pascal’s Mr. Fantastic might end up as the leader of the Avengers. If true, it’d be a suitable matchup with the studio’s new top baddie, Dr. Doom, played by none other than Robert Downey Jr. in a somewhat cynical play for the hearts of superhero nerds.
Ben Grimm/The Thing seen in the retrofuturist kitchen of the Baxter Building, the team’s headquarters.
Even if the Fantastic Four are somewhat well-known to Millennial audiences and older, the filmmakers take some pains to differentiate these iterations for all the new audiences. This includes the folks who could have cared less about superheroes before Marvel made it cool. Gone is the self-loathing Ben Grimm/The Thing from the 2005 and 2007 versions (Michael Chiklis), bemoaning his rocklike skin. The new Thing (Ebon Moss-Bachrach) is at home in his body, and shown to be an expert pilot, pulling off a black-hole-defying manoeuvre that would make Cooper from Interstellar proud. Johnny Storm/The Human Torch (Joseph Quinn) is given a few more layers as well, and comes across as less of a loose cannon. Here, he’s a skilled linguist whose translation of an alien tongue ends up being a key part of opposing Galactus.
Shakman was also apparently keen to rebuff one of the frequent complaints about the studio’s output: the look. Since this movie is set in a parallel universe to the one occupied by the MCU so far, Earth is shown in a 1960s-inflected, retrofuturist style. Flying cars zip between Jetsons-style buildings, the fashion leans formal, and the Fantastic Four are helped out by a cute robot butler who has programming loaded in on tape cassettes. Everything in this version of Earth feels cohesive and logical, unlike some of the multiverses glimpsed in the Doctor Strange sequel from 2022.
The storytelling, though, leans pretty conventional. The heroes learn about the major threat, they try a few things to oppose him, and eventually prevail when it seems like all hope is lost. The charm here is mostly in how the cast and crew execute on a familiar Marvel structure. Every thread is tidily woven in, even if that means not giving some actors much to do, like Natasha Lyonne, who plays an elementary teacher that Ben gets to know.
Julia Garner as The Silver Surfer.
As the main villain, Ineson is in comfortable territory, having also played a monolithic opponent in David Lowery’s The Green Knight. Galactus (as least in the form he takes in the climax), never feels all that frightening, and it almost seems like he’s holding back his destructive powers. The Silver Surfer (Julia Garner), Galactus’ chief servant, gets a decent amount of screen time but feels thinly written. She’s either delivering exposition or being exposited to, and the set pieces she’s involved in feel simplistic.
Compared to Superman, the other big superhero reboot this summer, Fantastic Four: First Steps seems to have less lofty things on its mind. There are fewer references to real-world politics and culture, and less of an obvious social message in the story. Maybe that makes sense for a movie that isn’t trying to carry the burden of restarting a franchise, and is merely expanding a long-running series with some new characters. But perhaps some brighter, less traumatized heroes is all it will take to slow or reverse the post-Endgame slump in audience interest.
Lots of reasons have been floated for “Marvel fatigue”, from an overabundance of TV “homework” shows, unfinished scripts entering production, and shoddy VFX. But I’d also suggest that Marvel hasn’t been tapping into the goofier side of its source material, and First Steps is proof that there’s a deep vein to be mined there. How well this will blend with the established Marvel universe remains to be seen, but couldn’t we all use a little more family unity?
Fantastic Four: First Steps gets three stars out of four.
Stray thoughts
As stylized as the film is, there are still some “yikes”-inducing effects shots, especially with inserting The Thing into some scenes or with the baby during the aftermath of the big battle.
Paul Walter Hauser is a delight as Mole Man.
The movie almost seems embarrassed to show Reed Richards using his stretchy abilities.