Marvel’s first family has had a rough go of it in the cinemas. Their first outing didn’t even get off the ground in 1994, then during the superhero boom in the mid-2000s, they got a playable entry and an even worse sequel. The less mentioned about Fantastic Four from 2015, the better. But those all happened outside of the watchful eye of Kevin Feige and Marvel Studios. So what does that mean for all of us as moviegoers with The Fantastic Four: First Steps?
Hope.
What does that mean for our fight against Galactus and the forces of evil in the film?
Family.
And not the Vin Diesel kind.
Yes, the hopes and dreams of plenty of Marvel Studios employees and fans of The Fantastic Four rode on someone who, to this point was known for being a TV director. Matt Shakman, who directed a good portion of WandaVision and over 43 episodes of another dysfunctional family on It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia, directed this film with a script from Josh Friedman, Eric Pearson, Jeff Kaplan, and Ian Springer. Normally, when there are that many names on a script, something has gone wrong, and here, that partially holds true. However, those issues don’t ruin the overall feelings and aesthetic of The Fantastic Four: First Steps.
The film stars Pedro Pascal, Vanessa Kirby, Joseph Quinn, Ebon Moss-Bachrach, Ralph Ineson, and Julia Garner. There are other actors, but chiefly, this is a story all about the first family of Marvel. And that’s really one of the highlights.
The Good Of The Fantastic Four: First Steps
The center of the film is the relationship between Reed Richards, Sue Storm, Johnny Storm, and Ben Grimm. They’re the only superheroes in this version of Earth, and they went through the same backstory that all the previous Fantastics have gone through. Like Spider-Man: Homecoming and Superman, we don’t need to see the backstory for the fourth time as an audience; we know it by heart. The action jumps right into the team being superheroes on Earth, saving the day from low-level baddies like Mole Man, but Reed is always keeping a watchful eye on the world and space surrounding them. The Fantastic Four are celebrities at this point in an alternate 1960s version of Earth.
The dynamic between Pedro Pascal and Vanessa Kirby is off the charts. Their chemistry is even more than electric. It’s like they’re actually married or something. Pascal, in particular, provides an even different take on the normal braniac superhero character. We’ve had brainy characters in Marvel movies before. Tony Stark is smart, Bruce Banner is smart, Peter Parker is smart, but Pascal takes an even different turn than those performances, giving a new life to what should be a tired-out character. He imbues Reed Richards with this internalized fury and fervor. He’s the smartest guy on the planet; he knows it, but he never feels the need to let everyone else know it, even in a crisis.
Vanessa Kirby is equally smart, sexy, stunning, and just all-around magnanimous as Sue Storm. Even before she becomes a mother in the film, she’s fiery and protective. Whatever previous incarnations of the character you’re thinking of, Kirby tops and does laps around them with her performance.
More Good Of The Fantastic Four: First Steps
Galactus.
We’ve had previous versions of this character on the big screen, and they’ve all completely sucked. Like throw the character away and never try again. I mean, we got a gigantic cloud in Rise of the Silver Surfer. You cannot get worse than that. Luckily, Marvel Studios decided to cast Ralph Ineson as the character, and he gives the oomph to a massive celestial body. The Eater of Worlds is a terrifying title, and he gets every single bit of terror in this film. The Herald of Galactus, Shalla-Bal is also a massive bright spot for the film. She gets some really badass moments in the middle of the film, including surfing on lava. The Silver Surfer is a fan-favorite character for a reason and they knock them out of the park here.
One of the characters that might not get mentioned as much here is not actually a character. Michael Giacchino’s score is a living, breathing being in this film. It touches on all the right moments in the film, triumphant ones, emotional ones, hilarious ones, basically every emotion that Matt Shakman and Co. want you to feel, you feel it through Giacchino’s score. I don’t normally listen to film scores from comic book movies after seeing the movie, but this is one that I’m gonna throw on Spotify and run through again.
Lastly, the 60s aesthetic really makes the film feel special and separate from the current Earth/MCU we know. It all adds together to make The Fantastic Four: First Steps LOOK like a comic book. That might be what’s been missing is a bit of flair and things looking out of the ordinary to kick the genre back into gear.
The Ugly Of The Fantastic Four: First Steps
Sadly, like I was mentioning at the top, there are four people who worked on the script for The Fantastic Four: First Steps, which is easily the weakest part of the film. It’s full of worn-out and well-used superhero and giant monster cliches. Some of the humor in the film doesn’t land as well as you’d think. Johnny Storm in particular, feels like the character that suffers the most. Ben Grimm and Johnny definitely take a backseat to Sue and Reed, which makes sense, but their B plots are pretty thin, overall. I wouldn’t go as far as to say that Joseph Quinn is miscast as Johnny Storm, because he isn’t, but the performance is VERY different from previous iterations. His normal personality traits feel muted.
The script is really what keeps The Fantastic Four: First Steps from being an all-timer Marvel movie. The ingredients are all there, but some of them are more expired than others. Outside of that, the film does feel a bit less action-packed than other recent films from Marvel, but that’s a conscious choice considering that the Fantastic Four are going up against a massive celestial being that swallows planets.
Joseph Quinn and Ebon Moss-Bachrach do give solid performances that add to the film, overall, but the script doesn’t do them any favors with weak sideplots for them. Also, the moment where we finally get “it’s clobbering time” isn’t mixed very well, so the actual line is somewhat drowned out.
Hopeful, Familial, And Visually Exquisite
The visuals, score, and the performances (especially from Pascal and Kirby) are what stand out in The Fantastic Four: First Steps. They all combine with a subpar script that brings in tired tropes to hinder this one from being something truly special. What it ends up as, is something that Marvel can hang their hat on for the future. The thing that fans can hang their hat on is that this is far and away the best adaptation of The Fantastic Four out there. We have never had a movie this good featuring Reed Richards, Johnny Storm, Sue Storm, and Ben Grimm. Hopefully going forward they are massive tentpoles for the MCU like they should be.
The Fantastic Four: First Steps is a visual feast with some great-looking effects, and just enough emotion to keep you invested all the way through. The first family of Marvel is in great hands and this is a Fantastic first step.
The Fantastic Four: First Steps releases in theaters on July 25th.
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