Fantastic Four Review Round-Up: Style Over Substance

Fantastic Four: First Steps kicks off the sixth phase of the MCU. Depending on who you ask, those titular strides came off as either a bold, confident march forward or the haphazard lumbering of a robot that’s still not sure how to walk. But generally, the first wave of reviews describe the latest MCU blockbuster as a stylish and fun summer comic book capper that makes the Fantastic Four cool again, or at least more entertaining than their last three Hollywood outings.

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As of today, July 22, Fantastic Four: First Steps is reviewing better than most recent MCU movies, with an 88 percent on Rotten Tomatoes that puts it in line with Thunderbolts. But where that modern ensemble flick was grey and grimy, Fantastic Four is a hyper-chic spin on the meta-human family channeling the glamor and hopium of Silver Age comics. Starring Pedro Pascal as Reed Richards, Vanessa Kirby as Sue Storm, Ebon Moss-Bachrach as Ben Grimm, and Joseph Quinn as Johnny Storm, the surrogate family is forced to save a retro-futuristic Earth-828 from Silver Surfer and Galactus, Devourer of Worlds (and wallets).

Fantastic Four has the style, but can it break from the MCU’s overly studio tested, increasingly cookie-cutter formula that impedes some of its other films from feeling substantive? William Bibbiani at The Wrap thinks it does just enough. “And in capturing the vibe of the Silver Age — if not its actual spirit — Matt Shakman has done something Marvel Studios doesn’t do very well anymore,” he writes. “He’s made a superhero movie that embraces the ‘super’ part. And the ‘hero’ part. And the ‘movie’ part.”

David Ehrlich at Indie Wire was less impressed. “’First Steps’ 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,” he wrote. “The sky’s the limit until the Fantastic Four leave Earth’s 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.”

Critics seem to at least agree that Fantastic Four is a visual feast and way better than the first three movies Fox made. As someone burnt out on the MCU since Thor: Love and Thunder, I’ll take clearing the low bar over getting walloped in the face by one higher up. Here’s what other reviewers are saying:

What a pleasant surprise then that the opposite proves true in “First Steps,” which centers almost entirely around a threat from Marvel’s biggest villain to date, the planet-sized Galactus. The Fantastic Four are already famous when the film opens, appearing on an Ed Sullivan-style variety show to celebrate four years of protecting the world from all manner of human-scale villains (relatively manageable pests like Mole Man, who resurfaces here in the form of Paul Walter Hauser, or Red Ghost and his Super-Apes, name-checked early on in a nod to the vintage comics). — Peter Debruge

here is much incidental fun to be had in luxuriating in the film’s hallucinatory 60s production design, down to the imaginary movies being shown in cinemas in Times Square: The Emperor’s Twin from Disney and an Alistair MacLean-type adventure called Subzero Intel. Then when the baby is born, Ben Grimm earnestly brandishes his copy of Dr Benjamin Spock’s Baby and Child Care, a permissive book which conservatives were later to blame for raising a generation of undisciplined slackers. Certainly, Kirby’s Sue Storm looks very good for a sleep-deprived new mother with no childcare staff other than one small goggle-eyed robot. As for paterfamilias Reed, he always wears his tie, though sometimes tucks it into his shirt. Overall a very silly movie – though it’s keeping the superhero genre aloft. — Peter Bradshaw

“Fantastic Four” makes space seem large and ineffable. There is a lot of time devoted to them boarding and operating their spacecraft. I appreciate that “First Steps” is set in a gorgeous, sleek universe of miracle technologies, and the filmmakers, through subtle editing and wide camera angles, allow us, the astonished viewers, to sit and take it all in. It’s nice to actually be impressed by a superhero movie’s visuals. — Witney Seibold

Fantastic Four: First Steps feels like a brief reprieve. It’s wildly uneven, but it’s also light and unencumbered by backstory and unnecessary lore; it doesn’t require homework, either before or after. Setting it in a half-imagined past avoids all the baggage Marvel movies come with nowadays, here at the ass end of Phase Five or whatever. It likely won’t last. The Fantastic Four, we are assured, will return in the upcoming Avengers: Doomsday, and there will inevitably be some timeline-shifting that occurs then. But for now, we can bask in this movie’s elegant, cathode-ray chic and not have to think too hard about anything else, confident in the colorful delusion that studio executives, much like our benevolent superheroes, have our best interests at heart. — Bilge Ebiri

Every member of the Fantastic Four deals with the apocalyptic crisis in their own way, with the warm, sympathetic performances powering the characters shining brightly amid the special effects at play. This is a film that projects an unflinching sincerity and optimism, and the first in the MCU, a franchise that has brought much of Marvel Comics’s wildest flights of fancy to life, to really channel the spirit of Kirby’s creations and how that first endeared them to audiences. — Justin Clark

This is a production that expects viewers to absorb and understand the world it creates just by paying attention. And that’s the source of much of its charm, because the story takes place in a dazzling world that resembles a jumbled-up amalgamation of things we’ve seen and things we’ve only dreamed of; it’s such a treat to look at that “The Fantastic Four” might’ve been worth seeing even if the rest of the production were merely OK. — Matt Zoller Seitz

There’s a lot to like about the world of The Fantastic Four: First Steps, from the mid-century kitsch to the progressive social ethos to its generally upbeat demeanor, but the movie itself lacks the nerve to carve out a memorable personality. Bespoke costumes and vintage Lucky Charms boxes are the empty props of a timid movie. — Alonso Duralde

The failures of Fantastic Four speak to the lingering problems that Marvel faces. For those of you not keeping track, we are now in the sixth phase of their ongoing project, and the period setting of this reboot should have given the filmmakers leeway to experiment with tone, taking big swings along the way. (Think: the revelation that was Guardians of the Galaxy when it first came out.) Instead it is all played very safe. There’s now an entrenched base to please, and Marvel isn’t going to mess with that. But at least that bathroom looks fabulous. — Esther Zuckerman

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