{"id":16035,"date":"2025-07-22T18:17:08","date_gmt":"2025-07-22T18:17:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/16035\/"},"modified":"2025-07-22T18:17:08","modified_gmt":"2025-07-22T18:17:08","slug":"the-fantastic-four-first-steps-review-marvel-trips-over-itself","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/16035\/","title":{"rendered":"‘The Fantastic Four: First Steps’ Review: Marvel Trips Over Itself"},"content":{"rendered":"

As might be inferred from its still-awkward subtitle, Matt Shakman\u2019s \u201cThe Fantastic Four: First Steps<\/a>\u201d is a story about the mortal terror \u2014\u00a0and the profound thrill \u2014\u00a0of walking into the unknown. Here, in a movie that promises to push the Marvel Cinematic Universe<\/a> out of its comfort zone before quickly retreating into a tired version of the same old schtick, only the terror shines through.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

It\u2019s the terror of a Hollywood film<\/a> executive who\u2019s desperate to rejuvenate his sprawling mega-franchise, but deeply afraid of messing with the formula. It\u2019s also \u2014 for the best part of Shakman\u2019s film \u2014 the terror of a brilliant scientist who\u2019s dying to have a child with his wife, but petrified at the premise of an experiment that he doesn\u2019t have the power to control. <\/p>\n

\"Shia<\/a> \"Carlos<\/a> <\/p>\n

While Fantastic Four leader Reed Richards can extend his limbs into any shape imaginable (a radiation-induced talent that \u201cFirst Steps\u201d appears to forget about for appropriately long stretches of time), his sideburns turn grayer at the thought of living with his heart outside of his body. How do you rattle an invincible genius who can wiggle out of any problem with just a blackboard and some chalk? Give him a problem that no formula can solve.\u00a0<\/p>\n

And that\u2019s exactly what \u201cFirst Steps\u201d does with its opening act. The Fantastic Four have already established themselves as the most beloved family on Earth (well, their Earth) by the time we meet them \u2014\u00a0a shortcut that Josh Friedman, Jeff Kaplan, Eric Pearson, and Ian Springer\u2019s script will pay for down the road. Winsomely portrayed by Pedro Pascal<\/a> as a worried egghead who\u2019s shelled inside his own thoughts, Reed may not be the most outspoken member of the superteam (that distinction belongs to Joseph Quinn\u2019s Johnny Storm, even if his flame is dulled to death in this film), but the fact that he\u2019s basically Tony Stark, Albert Einstein, and Bill Nye all rolled into one is still enough to make him the de facto frontman.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Things are a bit shakier behind closed doors. When his wife reveals that she\u2019s pregnant after several years of trying and giving up, it\u2019s Reed who struggles to wrap his head around the known unknowns of what becoming a parent might entail. (Sue Storm is played by Vanessa Kirby, who finds any number of invisible nuances in a one-note part that largely reduces her to \u201cbaby\u201d in the same way that Ken\u2019s entire identity was \u201cbeach.\u201d) Reed fights to make the retro-futuristic dimension of Earth-828 a place where it\u2019s safe for people to raise a child, but he understands his world too well to account for all of its variables; he can invent a teleportation device without breaking a sweat, but delegates the task of building a crib to his helper robot H.E.R.B.I.E. (whose \u201cStar Wars\u201d-worthy design is somewhat wasted on beep-boop comic relief).\u00a0<\/p>\n

In other words, Mister Fantastic is scared. As scared to have his first kid as Joel Miller was to lose his second one. And Pascal\u2019s performance is so raw and refreshing because the actor isn\u2019t afraid to lead with that fear. And for a while, the film around him isn\u2019t either. Indeed, the initial chapters of \u201cFirst Steps\u201d are attuned to Reed\u2019s all too relatable neurosis in a way that makes it seem like the MCU is about to grow by leaps and bounds. Creating life in the face of an existential crisis requires a greater degree of magical thinking than Reed\u2019s brain was built to process, and when a naked metal Julia Garner surfs into Times Square and heralds the imminent arrival of the world-devouring space giant Galactus (Ralph Ineson), the news is like comeuppance for having the gall to bring something beautiful into a multiverse of gods and monsters.<\/p>\n

\u201cFirst Steps\u201d might take place in a bizarro 1960s that\u2019s suspended between RKO and \u201cThe Jetsons,\u201d but its parental anxieties are ripped straight from our 21st century; Galactus\u2019 threat to \u201cEat Reed\u2019s planet slowly while his son watches\u201d is no different or more personal than what I hear every time a fascist opens their mouth on TV. Finally, it would seem, we\u2019re in for a Marvel<\/a> movie with relatable human stakes. A Marvel movie in which a sequel doesn\u2019t feel like the only thing that\u2019s at risk. A Marvel movie in which saving the universe will require its characters to confront \u2014\u00a0and overcome \u2014 their mega-franchise\u2019s stultifying fear of change.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"'The\u2018The Fantastic Four: First Steps<\/a>\u2018MCU<\/p>\n

Spoiler alert: We\u2019re not. <\/p>\n

\u201cFirst Steps\u201d may have the good sense to sidestep \u2014\u00a0or at least speed through \u2014\u00a0the characters\u2019 hyper-familiar origin story, but it still feels like a movie we\u2019ve seen 1,000 times before. In fairness, that movie has seldom looked this good. Superhero films thrive on a vivid sense of time and place, and Shakman\u2019s crew has an absolute field day with the mid-century modernism of Earth-828, every design choice of which radiates the modular optimism of a world that believes in itself.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Imagine Don Draper trying to sell you a five-cent comic book: This New York City is the kind of place where anything\u2019s possible and life moves forward at the speed of a buoyant montage. Flying cars and nifty monorails zip between Bertrand Goldberg-inspired towers above ground, while Paul Walter Hauser\u2019s scene-stealing Mole Man rules over a subterranean paradise below. The skies are Pan-Am blue instead of CGI gray, and each living room comes with its own Lloyd fireplace. From its delightful props (e.g. a baby monitor shaped like an old tube TV) to its turtleneck costumes, \u201cFirst Steps\u201d is the only MCU entry this side of \u201cWakanda Forever\u201d that feels like it actually wants to be looked at \u2014\u00a0not just watched.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Alas, \u201cFirst Steps\u201d loses its footing when it launches into space, loses the benefit of its scenery, and forces our attention on the plug-and-play jizz whizz at its core. The sky\u2019s the limit until the Fantastic Four leave Earth\u2019s atmosphere, at which point they immediately bump into the same low ceiling that makes all of the biggest Marvel movies feel like they have nowhere to grow.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Galactus is quite a large boy, but the spectacle of his size \u2014\u00a0which Shakman can hardly contain in a single frame \u2014\u00a0isn\u2019t the only thing that makes the characters feel small. On the contrary, they shrink a bit more with every weightless action sequence and recycled joke, as the friction between Reed and Sue is subsumed into the stuff of garden variety special effects and \u201cthat\u2019s all we get?\u201d lore (Galactus wants to eat the Earth because he\u2019s very hungry, and the Silver Surfer is somehow even less nuanced).\u00a0<\/p>\n

Absent the visual dynamism of Earth-828, we can\u2019t help but notice that Johnny was barely a character to begin with. Pivoting away from his legacy as a red-hot womanizer, the film tries to paint the Human Torch as a dilettante with something to prove, but it never really settles on what that something should be. (Making it appear as if Johnny is burning himself alive is just another one of the many things this movie is afraid of, and so it settles for a cartoonish fire effect that feels just a few degrees shy of the characters from \u201cElemental.\u201d)\u00a0<\/p>\n

His cool uncle schtick is shared with flaky rock creature Ben Grimm (Eben Moss-Bachrach), who looks great, and brings a faint trace of upper-crust sophistication to a hero known for clobberin\u2019 anything that gets in his way, but leans way too hard on the vague loneliness that he sees in his own reflection. Ben is the strongest of the Fantastic Four, and yet even he struggles to carry the sort of smirking banter that hasn\u2019t been fresh since the first \u201cAvengers\u201d (nothing suffocates the MCU like its sense of humor, which makes it all the more refreshing to see Hauser tunnel a new path towards the Mole Man\u2019s punchlines). Instead of an emotional arc, Ben has a crush on a Hebrew school teacher played by Natasha Lyonne; if only the sight of The Thing wearing a tallit were the strangest thing I\u2019ve had to process as a Jew over the last few years.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Fantastic Four do eventually return to Earth-828 for the second half of the story, but at that point this film is so consumed by the usual song-and-dance \u2014 big stuff coming from above, the heroes have to zip around to stop it \u2014\u00a0that the fear of the unknown starts to feel less like a theme for \u201cFirst Steps\u201d to to explore than an explanation for why it completely fails to do that. It doesn\u2019t help that Galactus is every bit as laughable as he is large (he was so much scarier and more compelling as a giant cloud in 2007\u2019s \u201cFantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer\u201d), or that Shakman is too afraid of how silly his characters\u2019 superpowers look in live-action to have any fun with them, which is a problem \u201cThe Incredibles\u201d solved too well, and with too much comic ingenuity, for this movie to simply try and ignore.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cFamily is about fighting for something bigger than yourself,\u201d Sue insists. But as \u201cFirst Steps\u201d limps to its total nothing of a conclusion, it feels less like a victory than it does a total surrender. You have to walk before you can run, but at this point the MCU is back to crawling on its knees, and at this point it seems like it might be too afraid to ever stand back up again.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Grade: C<\/p>\n

Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures will release \u201cThe Fantastic Four: First Steps\u201d in theaters on Friday, July 25.<\/p>\n

Want to stay up to date on IndieWire\u2019s film\u00a0reviews<\/a>\u00a0and critical thoughts?\u00a0Subscribe here<\/a>\u00a0to our newly launched newsletter, In Review by David Ehrlich, in which our Chief Film Critic and Head Reviews Editor rounds up the best new reviews and streaming picks along with some exclusive musings \u2014\u00a0all only available to subscribers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As might be inferred from its still-awkward subtitle, Matt Shakman\u2019s \u201cThe Fantastic Four: First Steps\u201d is a story…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":16036,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[1554,43,3078,44,209,2627,41,39,42,40],"class_list":{"0":"post-16035","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-film","9":"tag-headlines","10":"tag-marvel","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-reviews","13":"tag-the-fantastic-four-first-steps","14":"tag-top-news","15":"tag-top-stories","16":"tag-topnews","17":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16035","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16035"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16035\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16036"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16035"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16035"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16035"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}