The First Family Returns Again

We have discussed, at length in the past, how Marvel needs a win. Phases IV and V effectively ran the Marvel Cinematic UniverseWhen it first began in 2008 with a little film called Iron Man no one suspected the empire that would follow. Superhero movies in the past, especially those not featuring either Batman or Superman, were usually terrible. And yet, Iron Man would lead to a long series of successful films, launching the most successful cinema brand in history: the Marvel Cinematic Universe. into the ground, to the point that Marvel even noticed it. Ballooning, bloated budgets happened on films that no one cared about, and the whole sense was that Marvel had lost their way, overproducing and underdelivering on a series of projects that all proved to be narrative dead ends (see: Eternals, Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, The Marvels). To get things back on track Marvel would have to reformat how they did things, push towards smaller scale with more focused projects, and really show the fans that they’d been heard, that Marvel had listened, and they were going to do things right.

With the effective start of Phase VI, Marvel is trying to put their best feet forward and show they’ve learned their lesson. Their new launching point is Fantastic Four: First Steps, the first time any version of the classic “First Family” has been seen on screen since 2015’s reviled Fantastic Four (often called Fan4stic); and no, an appearance of off-brand Mister Fantastic in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness does not count. Marvel clearly wants to show everyone that the cinematic universe can change, that they can do better by their characters, and to do that they went with a bunch of characters that haven’t been seen in the MCU before, set in a universe disconnected from the main MCU. It’s… a choice, to be sure.

I kid of course, but there is a grain of truth in there. To reboot their process and show that they could treat the MCU properly, Marvel effectively said with this film, “let’s ignore everything going on and start a different universe instead.” It’s not a completely terrible idea, especially when Deadpool & Wolverine showed people are fine with multiversal stories so long as they’re done well. The devil is in the details though, and for everything that Fantastic Four: First Steps gets right, there are some glaring flaws that keep the film back from true greatness. It’s still a solid Marvel adventure, better than most of what the company has put out in the last few years, but that’s a low bar that isn’t really that hard to climb over.

The film is set over on Earth-818 (not that the film specifically states what world it takes place on). There the Fantastic Four have been operating as heroes for years. As we learn in a quick montage, Reed Richards (Pedro Pascal) put together a mission to head into space and chose the team to go on that mission: himself, his girlfriend Sue Storm (Vanessa Kirby), his girlfriend’s brother, Johnny Storm (Joseph Qunn), and his best friend Ben Grimm (Ebon Moss-Bachrach). These four went up into space but Reed didn’t realize a cosmic storm was rolling through, and the group was hit by space magic, giving each of them super powers. Since then, they’ve acted as the defenders of the world, stopping threats foreign, domestic, and underground, all while becoming the most beloved celebrities on the planet.

Things, though, were about the change for the First Family. Sue discovers that she’s pregnant, and while this is great news for her and Reed (and Johnny and Ben are happy to), things further get complicated when a herald from outer space, the Silver Surfer (Julia Garner), flies down to Earth. She brings with her the news that the conqueror Galactus (Ralph Ineson) will arrive soon to devour the Earth. That’s not a metaphor as Galactus will literally destroy the Earth from the inside out, consuming the rocky remnants via his massive ship. To stop this threat to the Earth, and to protect their family, Reed and Co. put together a plan to fly to Galactus and stop the beast, once and for all. Things, though, don’t go according to plan.

As with DC’s Superman, which just released a couple of weeks before this film, Marvel’s Fantastic Four: First Steps makes the decision to avoid any kind of origin story. It doesn’t spend long on how the heroes became heroes, and it breezes right past many of their early adventures in news clippings and reports, all so we can get to the true meat of the adventure against Galactus. This works in some ways since by now everyone should basically know who the Fantastic Four are (having had two prior origin stories told in 2005 and 2015, not to mention multiple TV shows) so we don’t need to get told all this information again. However, due to the film cutting out all the origin story bits, we also don’t get to spend time with these versions of these characters so we can understand them as people.

Part of seeing these characters learn about their new status quo is seeing how it affects them and changes their characters. Johnny is a hot head, so him becoming a literal hot head (the Human Torch) would change him some, right? Ben Grimm turns into a walking rock monster, and this does powerful, devastating things to his psyche, which should resound in his character, yes? And yet we get versions of all four characters that have been heroes for years, and they’ve already gotten through all their character drama. They’re comfortable with who they are, and happy to just keep doing what they’re doing.

To be blunt, the characters in Fantastic Four: First Steps are kind of bland. That’s not the fault of the actors, who all do good work trying to bring life to their roles. I’m not even sure it was a problem with the script, since reportedly there was a lot of footage that was cut from the final film and it’s entirely possible a lot of the character drama, the meat dynamics and all that healthy character growth, ended up on the cutting room floor. The problem is likely in the edit, and Marvel worked this film over and over to get something under two hours that would also present their First Family in as smooth and easy to digest a product as they could sell.

This film feels sanded down, honed and rubbed raw until all that was left was the plot and action. People told Marvel that the studio needed to start making more focused, more coherent stories and Fantastic Four: First Steps feels like that movie if it were designed by committee. “People don’t like it when characters fight, so let’s not have that in there,” was probably a studio note, and while it keeps the characters from bickering it also leaves out anything that might make you care about the characters. The only character that has drama, and feels like a real, living person, is Kirby’s Sue Storm, but that’s only because she gets to play “momma bear” for her kid, which effectively becomes her one trait. Kirby does great acting to give Sue life, but her character is defined as “the mom” (even before she has a kid, being mom to these three guys) and that is all she gets to do.

Not that any of the characters really come across well. Reed is supposed to be the smartest man in the world, but this is something that’s told to us, not shown. In practice, Reed fucks up a lot and often can’t do anything right. He keeps getting his family into trouble, over and over, and only pulls their balls from the fire at the last second, time and again, through techno-babble and sheer happenstance. Johnny is supposed to be a great scientist, but the film frequently says he does nothing and pokes fun at him for not being that smart. He does manage to learn how to communicate with the Silver Surfer in her own language, which points to him being smart, but this is literally the only smart thing he does, and mostly he just sets himself on fire. And then there’s Ben who… doesn’t really do anything. Ben is also in this film.

It’s a pity that the characters don’t come to live here because the world feels so rich and textured. The world of Fantastic Four: First Steps is a 1960s throwback, with that mid-century modern aesthetic. Everything about the film feels retro and lived in at the same time, creating one of the most distinct and interesting worlds Marvel has given us since the MCU started. I want to see more adventures in this world, and I would have loved to see everything the heroes did before this film took place. Fights with the mole men, battles against sorcerers, maybe a conflict with Latveria, all of that would help to flesh out their history and make them more interesting characters. But all of that is in their past, and we had to move ahead with them so they can be big heroes down the road.

I will also compliment the film for doing a solid version of Galactus that actually feels like a threat. My big complaint here is that Galactus is more threat than villain for two acts of the movie, and while his final conflict with the heroes is solid, with real weight and gravity to the scenario, Galactus is less a villain than a vehicle for potential apocalypse. He’s a concept more than a character, and while he looks great and functions well for his little bit of screen time, as with the heroes I just needed more.

I have a feeling there’s a very long cut of the film that addresses all my complaints. It’s a pity Marvel doesn’t do director’s cuts of films because I would love to see that version of Fantastic Four: First Steps. The version of the film we get has the ingredients to make a solid film, but what is presented are all the smoothed and sanded parts of the story that won’t offend anyone. It’s a film very focused on its story, much to the detriment of everything that would give that story life. I didn’t hate it, but I also wasn’t in love with it. Say what you will about Superman, which was messy and had way too much going on, that film had life. Fantastic Four: First Steps is far more focused and contained, but it loses all the joy and wonder that should be brought out in a film like this. I’ll choose a messier film that can’t help but be enjoyed over this watered down take any day.

In the end it still feels like Marvel is doing damage control and they compromised their newest film in the process. Fantastic Four: First Steps could have been a great new starting point for the MCU as Marvel prepares to reboot everything post Avengers: Secret Wars. Instead this feels like a symptom, not the cure. Marvel needs to get back on track, but Fantastic Four: First Steps shows the studio still has a long way to go to get there.