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Sunday, October 12, 2025

A Sense of Doubt blog post #3890 - My Review of the Fantastic Four movie


A Sense of Doubt blog post #3890 - My Review of the Fantastic Four movie

In the lead up to the release of the new Fantastic Four movie in 2025, I posted twice when the trailers were released:

Sunday, March 23, 2025


Thursday, April 24, 2025

These links contain several of my other Fantastic Four posts, demonstrating my love for America's first superhero family, and the trailers themselves, which is why this post is not filled with pictures. Go watch the trailers. Much better than any photos I could post.

I have been sitting on this post for quite a while, obviously, given that the movie came out in July.

Short version: I really liked it.

And although I love the FANTASTIC FOUR more, I liked the Superman movie better for many reasons as I have posted about as well:

Fantastic Four: First Steps accomplished many smart things that made if a very good superhero movie, and the very best Fantastic Four movie to date. One of them was NOT how it fared at the box office. I am not even looking up the stats, but I know it did not fare as well as hoped. I think I saw the word "flop" used.

Of these smart things, one was the retro-Sixties styles and the retro-futurism of the sets, showing the promise of the technology that would issue forth from the mind of Reed Richards and his fantastic family. Let's not forget that Susan Storm/Richards has a PhD.

The movie centralized the focus on the idea of FAMILY because that's the strength of the Fantastic Four: it's a family. That was the concept from which Jack Kirby and Stan Lee proceeded.

Using the birth of Franklin as a central issue and also upending the hero formula as the Superman movie did so well in having the public turn against the heroes for a time, the movie humanizes the conflicts, which are galactic in proportions (I mean, come on, GALACTUS).

Like many superhero movies have done recently, as the Superman movie did, the origin is skipped. Or rather, the movie does not re-tell the origin but uses it as background, memory, flashback. The movie also glossed over a lot of the Fantastic Four history that is alluded to, at least the material that survived the brutal edit to get the film to two hours. (So DVD release bonus goodies could be cool). These are smart decisions because these superheroes are so well-known in the public consciousness that even the most casual fan knows some basics of their story, and so the movie can dive right into the action.

The thing I loved best was the shout out to Jack "the King" Kirby at the end. There would be no Fantastic Four without Jack Kirby and yet Stan Lee is the most well known name and the ONLY name many of the casual fans know. And sure, Stan Lee was important to the creation of the Fantastic Four. But one could argue that Kirby was really the creator, the driving force, and Stan just collaborated as needed. Even if that's not true or not always true, Kirby does not get enough (or any) credit for creating all these Marvel heroes, and this travesty needs to be changed.

SIDENOTE: I am totally fine with the re-casting of the Silver Surfer as female. It added nice character stuff for Johnny Storm AND the original Marvel universe was too white, too male, and too... lacking in diversity shall we say.

Anyway, I loved the Fantastic Four: First Steps, but I am very biased. I am going to love it just for the updates and the cool look and feel of the thing. But I do feel that a lot of the criticism of the film was misguided, but I will not belabor that point.

Following are some snippets of reviews that I felt had good stuff. I excised things I did not agree with.

Thanks for tuning in!

JACK KIRBY THE KING

The quote attributed to Jack Kirby at the end of the Fantastic Four movie is: "If you look at my characters, you will find me.". This quote is followed by a title card that explains that the designation of Earth-828 is a homage to his birthday, August 28th. The quote is meant to highlight Kirby's profound influence on the characters he created, particularly in the Fantastic Four, where he co-created many of the iconic characters. 


Thanks to “The Fantastic Four: First Steps,” Marvel legend Jack Kirby is finally starting to get more recognition for his work.

Consider it a post-credit scene if you want, consider it a tribute, but the latest MCU film ends with a quote from Jack Kirby, the co-creator and initial artist for the Fantastic Four.

“If you look at my characters, you will find me,” the quote at the end of the film reads. “No matter what kind of character you create or assume, a little of yourself must remain there.”

While Stan Lee was front and center for much of the early hayday of MCU movies for his creations, many of the characters getting movies about them were co-created by Kirby. Other characters the artist had a hand in co-creating include Ant-Man, The Avengers, Black Panther, Captain America, Thor, The Incredible Hulk, Iron Man, The Silver Surfer, and The X-Men.

It wasn’t just the quote that gives a nod to Kirby. The Fantastic Four of the MCU are from a different, retro-futurist Earth than most of the movies in the canon. The Earth is designated Earth 828. The final tribute reveals Kirby’s birth and death dates Aug. 28, 1917 to Feb. 6, 1994. 8/28 becomes Earth 828.

“The Fantastic Four: First Steps” is being heralded as a return to form for Marvel Studios after much of Phase 4 and 5 entries were considered rocky. TheWrap critic William Bibbiani called it a first-rate movie for Marvel’s First Family.

In his review he said, “‘The Fantastic Four: First Steps,’ whatever its drawbacks, feels like a real Fantastic Four movie, and that’s no small achievement. It’ll never be as important or influential as the comics but it does feel like an idyllic summer afternoon, sitting under a shady tree and thumbing through back issues of a marvelous series with endearing characters. That’s more than enough. In fact, that’s a heck of a lot.”


https://edwarddouglas.substack.com/p/the-fantastic-four-first-steps-review

THE FANTASTIC FOUR: FIRST STEPS REVIEW

“First and foremost, a love letter to Jack Kirby, but also to everyone who has ever written or drawn these characters.”

Edward Douglas
Jul 22, 2025

Contrary to my feelings about Superman as a comic book character (as mentioned in my review of James Gunn’s movie), I have loved the Fantastic Four for most of my life as a comic book reader, loving the Lee/Kirby era but also plenty of other runs from John Byrne and Roy Thomas. It’s just one of the many genius concepts that Stan Lee and Jack Kirby came up with that added to my great love for the comic book medium, which sadly, is now over. With that in mind, the pressure is on for Marvel Studios to deliver a Fantastic Four movie that can make me forget how much I hated the previous three Fox movies, because I do love the characters so much from the way they’ve been handled in comics and some of the earlier cartoons.

We’re told right from the jump that we’re now visiting Earth-828 (that specific number will explained at the film’s end), a place that seems to be stuck in the 1960s with a version of New York City where there are no Avengers or MCU, but we’re four years into the world knowing of the existence of the Fantastic Four. In that sense, First Steps starts a bit like Gunn’s Superman, which also comes into the story three years after Superman becomes the hero of Metropolis, except this movie doesn’t just presume you already know who the Fantastic Four are, where they came from, or how they got their powers. In fact, we meet Pedro Pascal’s Reed Richards and his wife Sue Storm (Vanessa Kirby) just as they’re learning that the latter is pregnant with their first child, to the absolute joy of Sue’s brother Johnny (Joseph Quinn) and Reed’s buddy Ben Grimm, who piloted the spaceship that got the family cosmically-irradiated in the first place. Soon after the joyous news, the Silver Surfer (Julia Garner) arrives on their earth to herald the approach of Galactus, who is coming to destroy their planet. Instead, the Fantastic Four preemptively head into space to negotiate with Galactus, whose demands are just not something Reed and Sue can agree with. That’s all I’ll say since I do prefer avoiding spoilers, but there are much bigger stakes for Marvel’s first family than just the fact that Galactus is on his way.

It was immediately apparent while watching this new iteration that director Matt Shakman (WandaVision) and everyone involved with making the movie fully understood what works about the Fantastic Four in the comics, going all the way back to the Lee-Kirby era. This begins with the casting, which may be some of the most perfect casting for a superhero movie since Shang-Chi. Pedro Pascal gives the performance of his career as Reed, perfectly paired with Vanessa Kirby, the two of them creating the perfect Reed and Sue that anyone can ask for, the work of two actors doing their finest work to create a credible married couple. As someone who has just grown tired of Pascal as an actor in recent years, his Reed Richards gives me hope that he’s every bit the actor that many claim him to be.

As someone who hasn’t watched much of The Bear, I wasn’t at all familiar with Ebon Moss-Bachrach’s work before seeing him as Ben Grimm. Everything about his performance is absolutely perfect, because Grimm isn’t meant to be this big bruiser, merely because he’s a being covered in rocks. All of Ben’s emotions come through the visual effect including his softer side, especially when he’s with baby Franklin, who is such a fantastic scene stealer, even in a movie that dares to include the robot H.E.R.B.I.E. Quinn’s Johnny Storm is also great in that role, which is impressive considering that he has to follow in the footsteps of popular favorites like Chris Evans and Michael B. Jordan having played Storm in earlier iterations.

For the longest of times, I wasn’t sure about Julia Garner as Galactus’ herald, the Silver Surfer, not because she’s been gender-swapped, but because it’s such a very different look, and we were never really had a very good handle of her personality from her brief appearance in the trailer. There’s much more to her involvement in Galactus’ invasion of earth, which contributes to her being the biggest twist on a popular Marvel character this movie offers.

Next to Dr. Doom, Galactus has always been one of my favorite comic book villains of all time, and that’s mainly because he is such an insurmountable celestial being, literally head and shoulders above even Thanos. As voiced by Ralph Ineson (in the few moments when he speaks), Galactus is depicted in the way he should have always been depicted, and seeing how well the whole Galactus/ust makes me madder at the abomination that was Fantastic Four: The Rise of the Silver Surfer and how badly that botched things up, probably to save money. I can’t say enough about how Shakman and his team nail Galactus, to the point of giving direct visual references to both Kirby and Byrne’s depictions of the character.

In the past five years, I’ve become a bit of a production design groupie, and Kasra Farahani is someone I first became aware of from his work on the Disney+ series, Loki (which I realize I never got around to watching Season 2). His work in First Steps is next level, because he’s not just creating a retro alternative version of New York City, but it’s all the small details that go into the work, things like modelling Yancy Street after the Lower East Side neighbor where Kirby was born and raised (and where I currently live) and Galactus’ home, with visuals straight out of Byrne’s “The Last Galactus Story.” When the Fantastic Four go into space to confront Galactus, it harks back to great space films like 2001: A Space Odyssey and Alien with its visuals.

The Fantastic Four: First Steps is a movie that’s grand and cosmic in the biggest possible way, but also a movie that doesn’t lose sight of the smaller, important things in life. We go from New York City into outer space and back, with both environments leaving the viewer’s jaw agape. And yet, it’s a movie full of the type of emotions you can only get when a family truly works on screen and connects with you in the way the Fantastic Four has done over the years in other media besides film. After years of people claiming Brad Bird’s The Incredibles to be the best iteration of the Fantastic Four, someone at Marvel was clearly paying attention, because First Steps takes what works about Marvel’s first family in the comics and cartoons and creates a version that’s faithful while also being fully palatable to a mainstream (and younger) audience.

The icing on all that cake is the score by composer Michael Giacchino, who gets to essentially work from a clean slate here, allowing him the opportunity to create many new themes, as well as the type of grand score that’s brought so much emotion to other movies, including some of Pixar’s best (including The Incredibles!)

One thing that might bother some is that this is intentionally meant as a stand-alone movie with no direct connections to the MCU. Sure, there’s the ubiquitous mid-credits sequence that teases what we already know is coming, but otherwise, we’re left with no idea how the Fantastic Four will be brought together with the rest of the MCU for Avengers: Doomsday. That might be frustrating to some, but it gives us more time to just enjoy First Steps as a fantastic film that works on its own merits, because it does.

The Fantastic Four: First Steps could very well be of the most perfect transpositions of a comic book onto the big screen, as well as the best “introduction” of a comics character into the MCU since Shang-Chi, although that also had too many connections to other Marvel movies and characters. Oddly, this one ends up working in a similar way as James Gunn’s first Guardians of the Galaxy, except that First Steps has to succeed despite so much more advance baggage in comics, cartoons, and previous movie versions that Guardians never had to face. First and foremost, this is a love letter to Jack Kirby, but also to everyone who has ever written or drawn these characters.

Rating: 9/10


https://cosmicbook.news/fantastic-four-first-steps-review

In Gunn’s Superman, we’re told about Superman stopping a war at the start, but we never actually see it, which probably would’ve been epic. Similarly, and disappointingly, The Fantastic Four: First Steps ditches all the cool cameo scenes. We’re told they happened, but barely any are shown, and the ones that do appear are blink-and-you-miss-it. Just last week, Marvel confirmed John Malkovich was cut as Red Ghost. I’m guessing they cut around 25 minutes of FF battling various villains just to get the runtime under two hours. It’s a shame, because I would’ve liked more FF superhero action beyond just the Galactus fight (same issue with Superman). I also expected more from Paul Walter Hauser’s Mole Man, as he comes off really basic and underwhelming.

The Verdict

The Fantastic Four: First Steps is one of the better MCU efforts in recent years, but it still has issues—mainly some choppy editing, occasional pacing problems, and a few story choices (or lack thereof) that feel like either leftover studio input or course correction (which might not be a bad thing). It looks great, has solid action, and gets a lot right with the characters, but it also plays it safe and leaves some things on the table. I liked it overall, but I also left thinking it could’ve been a lot more. At least I left wanting to see more, not with a bad taste in my mouth. It’s worth seeing, especially if you’re a fan. I was satisfied. 8/10.


Notably, this is essentially a family drama disguising itself as a superhero film. “First Steps” opens with Sue finding out she’s pregnant and follows the family’s preparations and anxieties over the baby’s arrival. It soon leads to more than they’d bargained for: When the crew are face to face with Galactus, he sees a special power in Reed and Sue’s unborn child and proposes exchanging their baby for Earth’s survival.


For the uninitiated, the Fantastic Four are a quartet of people, basically a family, who, in order to beat the damned commie pinko Reds in the Space Race and in the spirit of exploration unique to the Mercury 7 era, take off in a private, homemade rocket, get exposed to cosmic rays, and come back to Earth with superpowers. They have nifty “gosh-wow!” adventures exploring interdimensional realms, subatomic microworlds and outer space, fighting super-criminals, and defending the planet.

The filmmakers keep the “Right Stuff/Atomic Age/Mad Men” aesthetic of the classic comic books in Fantastic Four: First Steps (it’s set in an alternate 1960s). So, at the very least, the movie kicks your eyeballs differently than does recent, gloppy-looking Marvel product like Captain America: Brave New World. It’s refreshing to have that Kennedy-esque “can do!” optimism in a movie that isn’t just gray and brown and washed-out green, especially since “Dark and Gritty!” has been the primary mantra of comic book movies going back to Tim Burton’s first Batman flick. And, though I had problems with it, it’s heartening that this movie and Superman are expanding the look and tone of comic book movies.

Here’s what Fantastic Four: First Steps nabs intact from the comic books that so thoroughly sculpted my brain and imagination as a kid. Like I said, the comics are about a family, and, by extension, their home. It’s a super-duper modern home full of high (’60s) tech, kind of a cross between Hugh Hefner’s place and NASA’s Mission Control. But it’s a home, nonetheless. The Fantastic Four have all kinds of gear in their pad that can, for instance, open portals to other realities full of hostile invaders. And more times than I can count, invaders (alien and otherwise) have ventured to the Fantastic Four’s crib for a throwdown. So essentially, when the Fantastic Four, the members of a family, defend the planet, they’re defending their home. The global becomes domestic, and the domestic becomes global. Hell, the interplanetary becomes domestic, and vice versa. 


Be sure to catch the two post-credit scenes at the end of The Fantastic Four: First Steps. The first credit scene is crucial as it relates to the overarching MCU plot. The second post-credit scene was more for the comic book fans to enjoy, also featuring a great Kirby quote. The only crime this movie committed was how much they baked in the number four to almost everything. A few times is alright, but it kept going with the number four. Additionally, certain CGI shots and characters were not as clean during specific sequences—more towards the end.

The Fantastic Four: First Steps captured the meaning of taking the first steps in various ways. Shakman established a likable quartet that felt naturally like a family first, rather than being a team of superheroes—even if Reed would disagree. This was a film that would make The Fantastic Four co-creators Jack Kirby and Lee proud. If Thunderbolts* did not sell you on Marvel Studios pivoting to better storytelling, perhaps take another step with this one. Oh, and a fun easter egg: Kirby’s birthday was 8/28/1917.   
  
 
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- Bloggery committed by chris tower - 2510.12 - 10:10

- Days ago: MOM = 3755 days ago & DAD = 409 days ago

- New note - On 1807.06, I ceased daily transmission of my Hey Mom feature after three years of daily conversations. I post Hey Mom blog entries on special occasions. I post the days since ("Days Ago") count on my blog each day, and now I have a second count for Days since my Dad died on August 28, 2024. I am now in the same time zone as Google! So, when I post at 10:10 a.m. PDT to coincide with the time of Mom's death, I am now actually posting late, so it's really 1:10 p.m. EDT. But I will continue to use the time stamp of 10:10 a.m. to remember the time of her death and sometimes 13:40 EDT for the time of Dad's death. The blog entry numbering in the title has changed to reflect total Sense of Doubt posts since I began the blog on 0705.04, which include Hey Mom posts, Daily Bowie posts, and Sense of Doubt posts. Hey Mom posts will still be numbered sequentially. New Hey Mom posts will use the same format as all the other Hey Mom posts; all other posts will feature this format seen here.
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