Retro-Futurism Takes Center Stage in Fantastic Four Reboot

Marvel’s The Fantastic Four: First Steps is exactly what it says it is. A reimagining of the publisher’s first family of superheroes, it’s a glossy, highly nostalgic look at one of Marvel’s earliest creations. With a strong cast, anchored by Pedro Pascal and Ebon Moss-Bachrach, the film revels in its sleek, no-nonsense 1960s-inspired style. But for all of its pleasures, the movie never builds tension or stakes to a meaningful degree.

Producer Kevin Feige called the movie “a no-homework-required” Marvel film. The actor was right on the mark: if you’re looking for a Marvel film that doesn’t require prior knowledge of the multiverse, in-jokes, Easter eggs, cameos, or future spin-offs, First Steps is the one. Marvel’s previous Fantastic Four movies were grounded in an earlier version of the MCU’s continuity. But this new entry in the shared universe flies solo. It’s an excuse to reintroduce Reed Richards, Sue Storm, Johnny Storm, and Ben Grimm, without taking any consideration of other adaptations. The film is a standalone, and in some ways, it’s happy to be that.

The movie opens on a talk show featuring Mark Gatiss, a fictionalized version of a BBC personality. Gatiss tells the story of how our titular four first met. Four years before, a space mission put the team in the path of cosmic radiation. The accident changed the quartet’s DNA. Reed, a scientist played thoughtfully and with a sly humor by Pedro Pascal, can stretch his limbs as if he were made of rubber. Vanessa Kirby’s Sue can turn invisible and project force fields. Joseph Quinn is Johnny, an artist who becomes the Human Torch: he can ignite himself and fly. Ebon Moss-Bachrach plays Ben, a military man who’s trapped in The Thing’s form, a bulky giant with granite-colored skin and immense strength.

In the present, our heroes share a home. From the outside, it looks like a mid-century modern compound in the sky, complete with floating cars, chalkboard equations, and a little robot named H.E.R.B.I.E. who’s child-sized and zips around the house helping the Fantastic Four do housework. The whole world of First Steps could be retro-futurist kitsch in any medium. Square television screens. No cell phones. Neatly trimmed bushes. People zip around in spaceships, but the basic technology of the world is somehow quaint. In this film, the future would look like the confluence of The Jetsons and Lost in Space crashing into a Marvel comic book.

The main plot problem with the film is that nothing much seems to be at stake. The overarching theme of the movie is family. Our heroes share an intimacy and closeness that the film takes pains to highlight. Sue learns early on that she’s pregnant. Reed is both nervous and loving, his affection tempered by the terror of becoming a parent. In a funny sequence, he tells H.E.R.B.I.E. to run a baby-proofing scan of both their house and science lab. Johnny and Ben play sibling-like roles to the two leads, both bantering and ribbing their friends, and both eager to be uncles.

But family time can’t last long: a familiar interstellar menace rears its cosmic head. Galactus, a towering figure in armor and glowing eyes, is on course for Earth. When he arrives, he’ll devour the planet. Before he does, he’ll send a herald to get the bad news across: the Silver Surfer, a slender silver-skinned woman in spandex and a goatee. Galactus’ herald appears in motion capture (played by Julia Garner) and is as sleekly menacing as her name suggests. She’s also a point of fascination (and near-arousal) for the ever-charming Johnny.

Galactus and the Silver Surfer also prove to be the weak point of action: despite the threat of planetary annihilation, the heroes’ battle is relatively tame. As our four heroes chase Galactus through space, the villains jet about or zip through doorways, First Steps stays true to its retro visual motifs. A palette of light beams, flame trails, and choreographed explosions that could pass for illustrations from an issue of the comic. Sue’s climactic realization that she’s in labor—right as the Fantastic Four find themselves on a battlefield in space—feels more surreal than dramatic. First Steps manages the strangest of juxtapositions: birth and planetary destruction, both wrapped in mid-century hues.

The tension of the story’s climax only amplifies the strangeness of tone for the whole film. There are moments of real feeling in this Marvel adventure story, but sincerity and sentimentality get swallowed by the hazy, pastel color grading. The whole thing also never really feels like a life-or-death situation, even when the life of the entire planet is at stake. The result is more kiddie adventure than blockbuster banger.

Marvel’s The Fantastic Four: First Steps is a pleasant nostalgia trip. Fans of the publisher’s retro superhero vision will find it pleasing, and the actors in the leads all do strong work. But in a cinematic universe that’s starting to reach peak event, First Steps eschews danger for whimsy. For viewers with low tolerance for world-ending stakes, that may be just the right recipe. For others, this might be a gift-wrapped box with a beautiful bow that’s a little underwhelming on the inside.