The MCU’s definitive iteration of Reed Richards made his debut in The Fantastic Four: First Steps with a grand plan that was, quite frankly, flawed from the beginning. This is despite the character being the most intelligent in the entire cinematic franchise, assuming Marvel Studios intends to adapt his comic book counterpart faithfully.
Thankfully, this hasn’t significantly harmed the overall success of The Fantastic Four: First Steps, which swiftly became the most critically acclaimed adaptation of the titular team upon its release in July. Nevertheless, as the team is poised to enter the mainline MCU from their alternate universe of Earth-828, hope remains that Reed Richards cooks up a better plan in their fight against Doctor Doom.
Reed Richards Intended To Teleport The Entire Planet
The Fantastic Four: First Steps also debuted the MCU’s Galactus, a cosmic, godlike entity whose entire MO is to consume planets in an infinitely futile attempt to satiate his voracious hunger. After being notoriously underserved in his cinematic debut in 2007’s Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer, Ralph Ineson’s comic-accurate rendition was a welcome addition to the inordinately successful cinematic franchise, complete with a comic-accurate portrayal of his planet-consuming methods. Specifically, Galactus utilizes his gargantuan vessel, Taa II, to disintegrate planets before absorbing their energy.
Inevitably, Galactus sets his sights on Earth after Earth-828’s Silver Surfer, Shalla-Bal, heralds his arrival and prompts Earth’s protectors, the Fantastic Four, to seek out and beseech the eldritch being to refrain. When Galactus refuses, offering to spare Earth only in exchange for Franklin Richards, the Fantastic Four are forced to consider alternative options to save their world. This is when Reed Richards suggests teleporting the entire planet out of Galactus’s reach.
He strove to achieve this through using his latest invention, the Bridge. The Fantastic Four: First Steps took significant creative liberties with this particular contraption, as the Bridge in Marvel Comics was initially used to visit alternate universes, giving rise to the Council of Reeds, who were ultimately destroyed by a rampaging cohort of Mad Celestials. Still, while the MCU’s version of the Bridge was simplified in its function, the same can’t be said for its intended scale, which was, frankly, ridiculous.
Reed Richards’ Plan Was Frankly Ridiculous
Image via Marvel Studios
For his plan to work, Reed was forced to draw from an impossibly large energy source, successfully convincing the entire planet’s nations to conserve energy to power the teleportation towers that now littered the globe. Achieving this was believable enough, and highlighted the Fantastic Four’s benevolent influence on the global stage, but it’s difficult to overlook just how impractical the plan was as a whole. Ultimately, a litany of considerations raises questions about Reed’s supposedly incomparable intelligence and exposes some considerable plot holes.
For example, the Bridge is introduced as Reed uses it to teleport an egg from one device to another, suggesting a need for a Bridge at the destination. In the absence of a scene that shows the team installing a receiving set of towers in the solar system they intend to travel to, the audience is seemingly expected to overlook this early plot point, instead attributing it to Reed’s overall intelligence and capacity to mitigate new challenges.
The risks of teleporting the entire planet also strain believability. The Earth is in a remarkably unique position in the solar system, precisely in the right spot with the right sun necessary to support life as we know it. Locating the exact same place in an entirely different solar system and subsequently moving the entire planet to that spot from light-years away seems a little too ridiculous, even in a movie that features a planet-gobbling space god.
Then there is the glaring issue that The Fantastic Four: First Steps itself demonstrates towards the final act. Relying on the safety and functionality of dozens of teleportation towers scattered across the globe is simply untenable, as the plan ultimately falls apart when the Silver Surfer swiftly zooms around the planet, destroying each one along with humanity’s hopes for survival. Even if the immensely powerful Shalla-Bal didn’t step in, it seems feasible that one of the Galactus-loving cults that sprang up after the Silver Surfer heralded him might have also concocted a plan to sabotage these towers.
Reed Richards Could Have Cooked Up A Much Better Plan
Ultimately, the Fantastic Four are forced to resort to the secondary plan of luring and then teleporting Galactus himself away from Earth, using the one remaining tower to achieve this. Considering the team was successful, albeit at the eleventh hour and at the expense of Sue Storm’s life, it begs the question of why this wasn’t the original plan all along. After all, if it is to be believed that the team could orchestrate the construction of several towers worldwide, then it is just as believable that they could have transported these towers to meet Galactus in space.
This would have negated the risks of having Galactus set foot on Earth, and would have even given them more time to play with had their initial attempt failed, given that Galactus took a considerable amount of time to reach Earth to begin with. Alternatively, as many had speculated in the lead-up to The Fantastic Four: First Steps’ release, the Bridge could have been a more comic-accurate device that allowed Reed Richards to evacuate Earth’s inhabitants to a new universe entirely.
Alternatively, constructing an armada of evacuation vessels akin to the Future Foundation’s Life Raft in Marvel Comics’ Secret Wars might have been a more tenable solution, and well within the confines of the genius’s abilities. After all, the Future Foundation boasts its own deep-space-compatible rocket and a faster-than-light docking station, enabling journeys deep into the cosmos in search of life-sustaining planets similar to Earth.
There is, of course, the device that would have been more faithful to the comics: the Ultimate Nullifier. Although it didn’t end up featuring in The Fantastic Four: First Steps, this curious device was pivotal in repelling Galactus during his first encounter with the Fantastic Four in Marvel Comics. The small yet immensely destructive device was created by a Watcher, the likes of whom have already been introduced in the MCU, and was ultimately discovered in Taa II by Johnny Storm. Although it might have felt somewhat cheap to deploy this plot device on-screen, it would have been no less believable than Reed’s initial plan.
The Fantastic Four: First Steps Risked Tarnishing Reed’s Reputation
The Thing, Mister Fantastic, Invisible Woman, and the Human Torch appear in The Fantastic Four: First StepsImage via Marvel Studios
As one of Marvel Comics’ most beloved characters, The Fantastic Four: First Steps was under significant pressure to accurately and appropriately characterize Reed Richards, one of the smartest characters in all of Marvel Comics. This pressure was intensified by the Fantastic Four’s not-so-stellar cinematic legacy, with the sour taste of 2015’s Fantastic Four still lingering ten years later. Thankfully, The Fantastic Four: First Steps and Pedro Pascal largely achieved this goal.
The MCU’s official Reed Richards is accurately portrayed as being captured by his work, often at the expense of his own family. His vast intelligence also leads him to make regrettable but necessary decisions for the benefit of humanity as a whole. This evoked the difficult decisions he and other super-intelligent superheroes had to make during the Time Runs Out era of Marvel Comics, where he conspired with the Illuminati to destroy alternate worlds to preserve their own (although they ultimately refused to follow through).
Nevertheless, his incredibly drastic plan to teleport the entire planet away from Galactus, merely buying it more time as Galactus inevitably pursues them, risks jeopardizing Reed’s traditional reputation as the world’s most intelligent man. Although it is fair to say that he worked with what was available, especially in the absence of an Ultimate Nullifier or a similar device that would threaten Galactus, and all his decisions worked in service of the movie’s plot, it’s hard to overlook the slew of choices that he could have made.
Thankfully, there is still plenty of time for Marvel Studios to secure Reed as its smartest character yet. Reed and the rest of the Fantastic Four are due to play central roles in the upcoming crescendo of the Multiverse Saga in both Avengers: Doomsday and Avengers: Secret Wars. This will presumably involve Reed Richards concocting more believable but no less intellectually demanding plans in the fight against Dr. Doom. Given what the Thunderbolts* post-credits scene displayed, this will likely begin with his mastery of multiversal travel as the team makes their way to the MCU’s Earth-616.
Release Date
July 25, 2025
Runtime
115 minutes
Director
Matt Shakman
Writers
Jeff Kaplan, Josh Friedman, Ian Springer, Eric Pearson, Kat Wood, Jack Kirby, Stan Lee
Producers
Kevin Feige
Pedro Pascal
Reed Richards / Mister Fantastic
Vanessa Kirby
Sue Storm / Invisible Woman