Fantastic Four: First Steps – A Review

The Fantastic Four have finally made their official Marvel Studios debut with their aptly titled First Steps and the stakes couldn’t be higher. Several false starts have soured audiences to Marvel’s First Family, but some stellar casting and an accomplished director in the chair have many hopeful. I’ve seen the film and can safely say that our hopes have been invested wisely.

Truly Fantastic!

First Steps stars the ubiquitous Pedro Pascal as Reed Richards, Vanessa Kirby as Sue Storm, Joseph Quinn as Johnny Storm, and Ebon Moss-Bachrach as Ben Grimm. Rounding out the cast are Julia Garner as the Silver Surfer, Ralph Ineson as Galactus, Paul Walter Hauser as Mole Man, and Natasha Lyonne as Rachel Rozman. The film takes place on Earth 828, a retro-futuristic version of Marvel’s core universe that has enjoyed the protection of the Fantastic Four for the past four years.

By beginning in medias res, we are able to truncate their origin story through news footage, as well as many of their previous altercations. It allows us to bask in the warm reception that their Earth has crowned upon them. This superhero team has the adoration of the masses along with the blessing of the world’s governments, erasing any of the grey morality of many of Marvel’s previous cinematic outings.

The Four That Came Before

This team is loved universally not for their power but for their contributions. Sue has launched the Future Foundation. This “FF” brought peace to the entire world with her own version of the United Nations. The main difference between her foundation and the UN is that her conference actually includes everyone. Even Latveria has a seat at the table, though their delegate is suspiciously absent during a segment of the film’s most important meeting.

Reed and Sue are respected, Johnny is idolized and sexualized, and Ben Grimm is a celebrity of the highest order. Gone are the conflicted tears of Michael Chiklis or Jamie Bell. This Thing isn’t a Quasimodo that lashes out at his creator; in fact, he often reins Richards’ guilt in for him. This Fantastic Four is truly embraced as something fantastic – a gift to the world celebrated by all.

BEST FF PERFORMANCES EVER!

Our heroes do not take their appointments lightly. That is one facet of the film that far exceeds its predecessors. Ioan Gruffudd seems like a nice enough fellow but just didn’t embody Reed Richards’ debilitating intellect. He seemed smug at times but never so burdened by incredible purpose the way that Mr. Fantastic is so often shown to be in the source material. Chris Evans is a delight in every way but his Johnny Storm rarely seemed to back up his bravado with efficacy. Sue was wasted in Tim Story’s films – an opportunity to ogle Jessica Alba rather than give the character her own agency.

Chiklis’ Ben Grimm was wasted on wrist-wringing. To poke holes in Josh Trank’s 2015 version is, in my opinion, unfair. Coming off the success of Chronicle, which demonstrated the pitfalls of immense power, one can’t imagine Trank was given much choice in the tone he’d take with Fant4stic. They were never going to be the heroes the world needed or wanted, and they’d certainly never be a family.

While Tim Story’s films showed a found family of questionable facility, Josh Trank’s gave us none at all. Matt Shakman’s version of Marvel’s First Family truly understood the assignment: these people are fantastic as a foursome, and their bond is present in every scene. No one doubts another, no member is excluded, and any animosity is either self-imposed or immediately addressed.

This is likely the healthiest team we’ve ever seen on film in terms of honesty, cohesion, and frank communication. If the retro-futuristic vibe didn’t satiate your desire for comfort already, watching these four live, work, and care together will rinse your soul of the cynicism that we’ve been wallowing in for the past nine years, at least.

You’ll Believe a Man Can Rock

Marvel has been criticized recently for its poor CGI output, farming its visual effects across too many contractors and failing to oversee the cohesion of the final project. While this film isn’t perfect by any means, many of the visual effects present truly cut the mustard. Most notable is Ben Grimm’s form as The Thing – he never looks out of place alongside the rest of the principals on screen. Not once. If Superman made you believe a man could fly, Fantastic Four: First Steps will make you believe that a rock man can exist alongside you. 

Fantastic Four: First Steps does something for the residents of the Baxter Building that earlier incarnations failed to do, and that is depict them as a functional, foundational family. Thanks to the blueprints leading towards Avengers: Doomsday, this outing also avoids the pitfall of taking their first outing to pit them against their most pervasive enemy.

To be fair, Galactus is a (literally) huge threat, alongside The Silver Surfer, but he’s not as recurrent as Doctor Doom. If you’ve ever read a comic book, seen a film, or watched a cartoon, you know how the Fantastic Four deal with the Silver Surfer, so I’ll let you draw your own conclusions on how that plays out.

Confession

This is a great time to tell you that I’ve read very little Fantastic Four in my day. When I started reading comics in the late ‘80s, I gravitated towards Spider-Man and Wolverine. I never watched the original run of the Fantastic Four cartoon nor the revival that aired in 1994. I did see all three films (four if you count Roger Corman’s, which I still posit is not a complete waste of time) but most of what I know about the Fantastic Four comes from contextual clues, conversations with fans and detractors, and The Venture Brothers.

FANTASTIC FOUR STORIES TO CHECK OUT!

The general consensus is that Mr. Fantastic is one of the smartest men in the Marvel Universe and is subsequently haunted by that knowledge in a manner that makes him a danger to those he loves. Gruffudd gave us none of that in Story’s films, and Miles Teller’s Reed Richards was more akin to the worst version of Tony Stark in the woods without his tech than anything else.

Pascal’s Richards shows us hints of his darkness. He is perpetually analyzing the world around him, finding kinks in the armor of phenomena that needn’t be vilified. As he says to Sue at a pivotal point in the film, “I think terrible things so terrible things won’t happen.” (I’m paraphrasing, of course).

I heard something similar to this in earnest when I interviewed Max Brooks about his work at the Modern War Institute at Westpoint. This is a glimpse into the burden of knowledge and great purpose. This will likely be quite important as the Marvel Universe comes together and Richards, the best of his world, comes to interact with the predecessors of the MCU.

WHY ARE THE FF SO SPECIAL?

This brief glimpse of conflict is a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it-moment in a film that is saturated with good vibes and pleasant feelings. Fantastic Four: First Steps stands apart from the rest of the Marvel Cinematic Universe not only because it transpires in an alternate dimension (which thankfully still has Chet Baker), but in that it evokes a wholly new emotion: Confidence. Not the confidence of the braggart, but that of heroes with conviction. First Steps is closer to Captain America: The First Avenger than any of the dozens of films between them. It flirts with time, purpose, and compassion. 

Tiny Gripes

If I have any complaints, it would be a fear of how the characters of this ultimately joyous film will inevitably change when Marvel’s First Family lands on a world more akin to our own. Will we ruin them with our disenchantment or will they drive us mad with their optimism? Another complaint, and it’s the slightest and likely singular, is Paul Walter Hauser as Harvey Elder, aka Mole Man.

While there’s nothing wrong with Paul Walter Hauser as a person, he’s just shoehorned into everything lately and I don’t know why and didn’t ask for it. He’s like Ike Barinholtz – another one of those actors who just shows up in everything like he came with the studio space. “You can shoot here but you have to watch Paul and Ike while you’re here.” 

Those tiny gripes aside, Fantastic Four: First Steps is a great film with an imaginative world and real tension as the film progresses. I was literally on the edge of my seat for many sequences, and not just because the IMAX screening got cancelled due to heat and humidity and I was relegated to a tinier theater with tinier seats. The film doesn’t pander to its audience, allowing the viewer to accept many truths without hollow exposition that serves to place us in its conceit.

The dynamic of the core four is inspiring and credible, the world around them imbued with personality and sincerity. We all knew this would be a different type of Marvel movie going into it, but color me surprised that this film has seemingly taken a page from Superman and made a film that feels like a comic book. If Fantastic Four: First Steps’ intent was to save the Marvel Universe, then step aside Deadpool – we’ve got our own Marvel Jesus, and it’s a holy quaternity. 

Ranking: 8/10

Let me know your thoughts on “Fantastic Four: First Steps” in the comments below. Thanks for reading.