The world is ending again, and no one seems to care. Least of all the film itself.
Marvel’s Fantastic Four: First Steps is beautifully shot, impeccably styled, and almost entirely free of tension. It is the cinematic equivalent of museum-quality wallpaper. You can admire the production design all you want — the 1960s retro-futurism is deliciously obsessive, right down to the NASA jumpsuits and newsreel voiceovers — but after an hour and a half of watching impossibly photogenic people walk through perfectly lit hallways, you begin to wonder when the story is going to start.
The premise should be enormous. Galactus, a planet-eating god with the gravitas of a Greek myth and the subtlety of a wrecking ball, threatens Earth with total annihilation. But somehow, even this apocalypse feels like a scheduling conflict. The Fantastic Four jet off into space to plead with Galactus, deliver their “No, you can’t have our baby” line, and return to Earth in time for a press conference. A few journalists raise an eyebrow at Reed Richards’ casual mention of refusing to trade his newborn child for the survival of the species. It all gets resolved with a heartfelt speech from Sue Storm, and humanity — bless their cooperative hearts — just… gets on with saving the planet.
Where is the conflict? Where is the resistance? At no point does anyone so much as stub a toe, let alone face a real moral or physical challenge. The threat is theoretical. The resolution is bureaucratic. This might be Marvel’s most collectively polite film. Everyone does what they’re supposed to, and that is exactly the problem.
You can feel the committee notes on every scene. Don’t make it too dark. Don’t scare the kids. Don’t risk real consequences. The result is a narrative without tension, an ending without catharsis, and a movie that looks expensive but feels weightless. In trying to avoid controversy, First Steps ends up avoiding character, too. These aren’t superheroes — they’re brand ambassadors.
The fact that the film is a box office success is no surprise. Nostalgia sells, and so does predictability. The visual design is genuinely compelling, the cast has strong chemistry, and there are flickers of cleverness in how the story references Cold War politics. But a good idea is not the same as a good film. This is Marvel doing a period piece cosplay, and forgetting that actual drama needs stakes.
If you’re wondering whether the critics noticed, the answer is… sort of. Reviews have been tepid to positive. Some praise the ambition, others the aesthetic. But even the positive write-ups, like this one from Variety, admit that the film struggles to justify its own scale. Forbes, meanwhile, calls it out for what it is: a stunningly boring MCU entry that wants applause for showing up in costume.
And maybe that’s the problem: First Steps never risks anything. It doesn’t stumble into narrative messiness like Captain America: Brave New World did — a film that at least tried to be about something, however chaotically. Instead, First Steps floats through its own plot like it’s afraid to leave a mark.
So no, First Steps isn’t bad. But that’s not the same thing as being good. Marvel has made a lot of movies. This is one of them.
