‘The Fantastic Four: First Steps’ Is Missing Something That Isn’t Its Actresses

The title “first steps” of the Marvel Cinematic Universe‘s first Fantastic Four film are more like baby steps than Neil Armstrong’s, but that doesn’t mean the movie isn’t trying. After gaining powers from encountering cosmic rays four years before the start of the film, the eponymous Fantastic Four—Reed Richards, aka Mr. Fantastic (Pedro Pascal); Sue Storm, the Invisible Woman (Vanessa Kirby); her brother Johnny Storm, the Human Torch (Joseph Quinn); and Ben Grimm, The Thing (Ebon Moss-Bachrach)—find themselves beloved celebrities in a universe alternate from the main MCU. When a mysterious woman, known to comics fans as the Silver Surfer (Julia Garner), appears, “heralding” the arrival of Galactus (Ralph Ineson), an entity that swallows worlds whole, the Fab Four must band together to devise a way to save their Earth from destruction.

Fantastic Four suffers from the opposite problem of its summer crosstown rival, James Gunn’s Superman. If the latter is overstuffed and too zippy, First Steps feels too plodding, too easily summed up in a Wikipedia article. The interstices of it–the family bonding, the humor, the small details–don’t quite add a vivid musculature to help the film run as it needs to. I got a great night’s sleep the night before, and I’ve never in my life fallen asleep at the movie theater, but… my eyes shut for a brief moment for the first time.

What I can say about this film is that the Silver Surfer is excellent, both in Julia Garner’s portrayal and in the way the film situates her in the story. Garner’s voice (“I herald his beginning! I herald your end!”) pierces through her scenes while still allowing her to sound so young, almost innocent. I wish her role was more expansive. That she was a major player rather than a pen that highlights Galactus.

On the flip side of the Surfer, this movie feels like it has a Johnny Storm problem. As a youngin’ in 2005, I went through a Ioan Gruffudd phase that led to an inevitable viewing of Tim Story’s Fantastic Four. I knew then what I knew now: it wasn’t a good film. I now realize it wasn’t a good film, but Chris Evans was having the time of his life, and gifted us with an early-CGI-era comics goof. Although trying to reduplicate this with Joseph Quinn would have been a mistake, and comparison very much is the thief of joy, I can’t help but feel like this character is a bag with a hole in the bottom. The bread and butter could be here, but they seemed to have escaped, leaving us with a pliable shape but no substance. In A Quiet Place: Day One, Quinn gives one of my all-time favorite horror performances. I know he can act, and we know from Stranger Things that he can be fun and charming. So what’s missing? Without spoiling too much, his brief engagements with the Silver Surfer and her lore are not only his best moments of characterization, but some of the best parts of the movie.

If only the film had leaned into these moments, into the weirdness of its world, the unusual ways this family–who knows one another very well–could interact with the unknown around them with more curiosity and courage. We would have had a very different experience.

There is a star of the show, however, and it’s Vanessa Kirby. Sue Storm is the queen of hearts, opposite Wanda Maximoff (Elisabeth Olsen elsewhere) on the playing card. If Wanda’s trauma leads her motherhood down a path of villainy, Sue’s indescribable stress transforms her into a mother not only of her child, but of the planet. I don’t want to compare Wanda and Sue that closely, as I believe Wanda goes through far more explicit horrors, and her uneven (and unfair) writing throughout the MCU’s history is a testament to the franchise’s difficulty in tracking its multimedia narratives. But that’s another story. As for Sue, the movie comes closest to shining when she is allowed to be perceptive and insistent. The final 20 or 30 minutes of this film are actually really good! And it’s mainly because Sue gets to be a major player, a force of supernature.

We are all having a Pedro Pascal summer, but I’m not sure that Reed Richards is. I am not saying Pascal was miscast, but perhaps misdirected with a script that could work better for him. The chemistry we get from him and Kirby isn’t at the level the film needs to feel resonant. I wanted Pascal to be in the MCU for years, and although this seems like the most logical place to put him based on the IP left to cast, something isn’t working here. I almost wish he were playing Doctor Doom, as this would have been a surprise and a career stretch for him.

Last but not least: Ben Grimm. I wasn’t sure what to expect from this iteration of the character, but I found his quiet and steadfast nature to help the film feel a little more even. I left the theater with him as my favorite of the four, and later it shifted to Sue after more thought.

I was always a little worried about this film, but as someone who enjoys all five of these actors (including Garner) and who follows along with the MCU as best as I can, I kept hope. There were certainly things I liked here, but overall, this felt more like an exercise than an adventure. Everyone who said the production design was great is right! Everyone who loves everything Michael Giacchino composes is also right! I don’t want to say great-looking sets, a whimsical score, a cool metallic woman, and Vanessa Kirby trying to save the world aren’t enough, but… they won’t be for everyone.