I think many would agree that the MCU hasn’t been the same since the epic conclusion to the Infinity Saga with Avengers: Infinity War in 2018. Iron Man is gone (but Robert Downey Jr. isn’t), Black Widow is dead, and Kevin Feige and company are more committed to Disney+ exclusive TV releases. With slow box office performances for the movie releases of the past few years, a directionless Phase Four and Five, and a last-minute big bad switch, the MCU has been failing to top itself for the best part of the past decade.

2025 has seen somewhat of an uptick. The less said about Captain America: Brave New World, the better, but Thunderbolts (subsequently named The New Avengers), powered by an irresistibly charming lead performance from Florence Pugh, was the pumping of fresh blood into a stale franchise. The box office may not have responded accordingly, but it still saw the MCU returning to character-focused narratives with a sharp balance of humor, action, and pathos. With Thunderbolts being all about found family, it makes for the perfect launching pad for the introduction of Marvel’s First Family. Coming this July and kicking off the MCU’s Phase Six, Matt Shakman’s The Fantastic Four: First Steps sees the first depiction of the famous four in the MCU, after the painfully 2000s duo of films by Tim Story that have, for the most part, been wiped from public memory. And the less said about the 2015 version, the better. Starring four of the most sought-after actors of today — Pedro Pascal, Vanessa Kirby, Joseph Quinn, and Ebon Moss-Bachrach — as the titular team, we are promised a retrofuturistic 1960s tale of family, heroism, and going beyond what reality makes us believe are our physical limits. Last September, Collider, alongside several other media outlets, visited the set outside London, talking with the cast and crew and observing the making of what feels like the most unique and stylish movie the MCU has made in a long time.
‘Fantastic Four: First Steps’ Is a Family Affair

From the second we step foot on the set, everyone we meet reinforces the same thing (almost ad nauseum): this movie is about family. The subsequent trailers also underline this, with the centerpiece of the advertisement being Kirby’s Sue Storm declaring that they will fight the evil of the world “as a family.” We meet Grant Curtis and Tim Lewis, both veteran franchise producers, with Curtis having worked on Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man trilogy, and the MCU TV show Moon Knight, while Lewis was a co-producer on the last four Harry Potter films. “It’s all about family,” Curtis reiterates to us. But it’s not just one family! Lewis tells us that Reed and Sue’s growing family is as much a part of the story as the main four. This dedication to putting family first is etched into every fiber of the movie’s making. Production Designer Kasra Farahani took inspiration from cozy mid-Century California family homes for the Fantastic Four’s Baxter Building penthouse. Curtis later lamented how family isn’t just a theme, but the core aspect of the movie, including characterization and the Fantastic Four’s battles.
“If you don’t care about them as a family, and you don’t believe in that family unit and the romance, or at least the marriage between Sue and Reed, and the ups and downs of a marriage, if you don’t play that organically, then everything else is going to fall apart because people don’t believe those relationships and they don’t believe the grander, Galactus threat.”
Curtis noted that this dedication to family and what the Fantastic Four has always been about is shared by everyone on the team, especially the director, Shakman. “Matt is a big family guy. We talk about family has been part of the DNA of the Fantastic Four from from comic one. But how do we bring those emotional bits into it? So it’s great when your fellow storytellers are also fellow fans. And it makes that process a lot easier.”

Perhaps the concept of family being so important especially applies to the cast, who are asked to come together and to build that intimacy. Quinn, who stars as Johnny Storm and the Human Torch, younger brother of Sue Storm, told us:
That’s kind of the brief for all of us as actors is to establish this kind of familial dynamic that is complicated. and caring and consistent. And, you know, families are rarely totally functioning. There’s certainly some dysfunctionality, some dysfunction stuff going on in this family. And it’s kind of nice leaning into that, the idea that we have to love each other for who these characters are, you know, and it’s pretty useful that we all get on well, so that kind of makes it easy.
While the bond of family will naturally make for lighter fare, Shakman does tease about the existential and moral conflicts that Sue and Reed will face. Questioning how to be both a superhero and a parent is integral to First Steps’ story,
It’s a tremendous amount of pressure to bring a young person into a world where essentially the world is depending on you, and that you live in the Baxter building, which is essentially a glass house that the entire world knows what you’re doing day to day, and there are all these villains that want to come after you. Can you be a parent? Should you be a parent? What does it mean when you are a parent to balance all of those things? And ultimately, does being a parent make you better at being a superhero?
We’ve seen tons of teams in the MCU that become a makeshift family, so what sets the Fantastic Four apart? Shakman has an answer, “They’re Marvel’s first family, and unlike Star Trek or The Avengers or X-Men, which is a found family, this is a true family. This is a husband and a wife, this is about a brother and a sister. This is about old friends and an honorary uncle and eventually about children, and that makes them different in the comic book world, and that’s what makes them special and what we’re trying to bring to life here.”

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The theme of family helped one of the main cast members get into character. When we talked to Moss-Bachrach, he drew similarities between Ben Grimm and Richie from The Bear based on how committed they are to those around them, “Both these characters are deeply loyal people; fighters with a fierce sense of code, morality, and family. I think Ben Grimm is a little more socially evolved than, say, Richie. But there’s a lot of common ground there.”
The Team Was Committed to Being as Period Accurate as Possible

The 1960s are undoubtedly one of the most stylish decades of recent memory, and it’s evident from every person involved in the movie that this period has been a lot of fun to establish this world in. But why the 1960s? First of all, Curtis calls back to the 1950s and 1960s, when Marvel Comics was on the brink of bankruptcy, and it was the concept of a superhero family that saved Jack Kirby and Stan Lee’s business. Curtis went on,
We know that with Guardians of the Galaxy and other movies, we’ve explored slivers of the 1960s, ‘70s, ‘80s, etc., but setting a whole movie with the 1960s aesthetic, we thought it was a new really cool canvas. Matt Shakman always keeps saying optimism, optimism, optimism of the ‘60s, and that really unique vibe that sadly… we’ve kind of lost some of that. But what you do gain with the 60s and that optimism is a really cool bedrock from which everything else can rise.
The setting won’t just allow us some banger needle-drops or stylish flourishes, it will allow First Steps to get that but further beyond the confines of the MCU. “By setting it in that period… It’s a different world in terms of Marvel.” Lewis tells Collider. The production has taken great lengths to ensure an authentic ‘60s ambiance, with Lewis adding that their second unit director of photography, Tim Wooster​​​​​​, used his father’s old 16mm camera to shoot some scenes in the movie, with Curtis going on to say “we’ve been able to grab some of those techniques from the 60s to make this look as authentic as possible, and it’s been fun just to see our crew grab some of the stuff off their own shelves to, to help make this movie.” Shakman spoke to the importance of this movie being rooted in the 1960s culture, saying,
The comics were created in the ‘60s, and they’re very much informed by the space race and that JFK sense of optimism. It really defined that decade, looking to the stars, and you see it not just in the Fantastic Four, but you see it in Star Trek, which is another project that is all about family and about optimism and about believing that the right head and the right heart in combination can solve any problem. You see it in Spock and Kirk, you see it in Sue and Reed, and so these are some of the similar thematics that we’re dealing with.

It’s Important to the Entire Cast and Crew to Root the Fantastic in Reality

People we meet from various departments all note that while Fantastic Four: First Steps is a superhero movie with superpowers, space travel, a massive hulking villain, and a surfer made out of silver, the fantastic aspect of this world all has to come from something real and practical. We met Costume Supervisor Dan Grace, who stressed the significance of this facet for relatability and charm. “It’s really important to our director, Matt, that everything is based on something real and physical.” So, however it ends up being the final product, the origin of it has to be something real and physical, and we hope that that will give us a better character, a better-rounded but more believable, more realistic looking when it comes to the final product.” In terms of costuming, this is most applied to the design of Ben Grimm, AKA the Thing. While Ben is a massive rockman of a being, don’t expect something as otherworldly as, say, Mark Ruffalo’s The Hulk. Grace still describes Ben as “in every way, larger than life” and also names him as his favorite character to work on. But the design of this version of Ben will remain deeply human and practical, and Grace and his team have designed his outfits true-to-scale, including massive shoes and that famous trenchcoat and hat. “It was really important to both Ebon, our director, and our vision effects department that we were able to do a physical representation of everything.” A separate performer then wears those larger costumes on set. But it was important to everyone that Moss-Bachrach was on set every day with his fellow actors, as they didn’t want to leave it fully to CGI to bring such a deeply human character to life. This is echoed by Set Decorator Jill Azis, who we talk to right in the middle of Ben Grimm’s childhood neighborhood, Yancy Street, based on New York’s Delancey Street. She notes that she and Farahani, the film’s Production Designer, agree that “the fantasy elements work much better if the believable elements are really believable.” But Shakman is perhaps the biggest proponent of rooting the fantastic quartet in the practical, saying that it’s always the best route for authenticity.
It’s real for me as a filmmaker, it’s real for the actors. I think the audience loves it. We’re trying to go on location as much as we can. We’re building real sets. We’re depending less and less on blue screen, green screen, and making things… The movie is set in the ‘60s, and so a lot of our inspiration is what Stanley Kubrick did in the ’60s.
Shakman wanted to build miniatures for the sets, creating a 14-foot miniature for the team’s ship, The Excelsior; “The more you can make things with your hands and see things with your eyes, I think the more people will believe it when they see it on the screen. “

Back to Kubrick, the masterful director of 2001: A Space Odyssey and A Clockwork Orange, the influence of the director spreads beyond the production design. Shakman names him as an influence, particularly his work in the 1960s, revealing that the design for Reed’s lab was inspired by 2001. Lewis also names the 1968 sci-fi epic as a guide for when approaching the balance of practical and special effects. It comes back to that devotion to the period — how did movies of this era get made? What can they learn from how Kubrick made 2001 with such limited resources?
Sam Raimi and His Spider-Man Trilogy Looms Large Over ‘First Steps’

Image via Sony Pictures Releasing

Producer Curtis has had a decades-spanning professional relationship with Sam Raimi, working with him on his three Spider-Man movies. This comes up a lot throughout our set visit. When speaking about First Steps, Curtis compared working on Fantastic Four with his days with the famed director.
“One of the beauties of that and that I see in Matt Shakman is Sam always went back to the source material and said, ‘there’s a reason why Peter Parker and Spider-Man has been so popular for so long,’ and we have nothing to do with that 50 plus years at that time. And Matt always looked at it the same way. There’s a reason this IP has been popular for 60 years. Let’s embrace it. Let’s not run from it. Let’s challenge our screenwriters to tell the coolest Galactus story.”
Curtis and Shakman met with John Dykstra, the now semi-retired visual effects legend who worked with Curtis on Raimi’s first two Spider-Man films. They wanted to “ peek behind the curtain through your [Dykstra’s] eyes on how you created a lot of this stuff.” What they learned from Dykstra was to look back at the filmmaking of the 1950s and ‘60s when First Steps is set when Raimi’s Spider-Man trilogy was made and study the camera movements. There was a natural restraint back then as visual effects weren’t as developed and movies couldn’t easily take audiences zooming through space and other worlds. “We had to respect the limits of the period in which we were making the movie.”

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Curtis also recalls overhearing Raimi tell someone, “I’m not a director. I’m an entertainer because that’s my job.” Curtis says that he would guess that Kevin Feige would say the exact same thing about himself. “Every movie he [Feige] knows, you have to be entertaining the audience and not taking yourself too seriously.” A fun fact for my fellow Raimi-Spidey fans, Curtis was there when Tobey Maguire famously caught all the props on that tray in the first film. When the ingenious decision to cast Alfred Molina as Doctor Octopus in Spider-Man 2 came up, Curtis regaled, “ It was one of those things where there was a variety of names talked about for that, but when Alfred came in, it was just ‘okay, that’s Doc Ock.’ It was one of those no-brainers.“
‘The Fantastic Four: First Steps’ Has a Unique Position Within the MCU

Image via Marvel

The post-credits scene of the last MCU film, Thunderbolts* aka The New Avengers, saw the heroic gang of misfits notice the Fantastic Four’s ship, The Excelsior, make its way into their atmosphere. So, how much will Fantastic Four tie into the rest of the franchise? Not a while lot, apparently! Since this goes back to the 1960s, the story does not have the constraints that arise when following a strict timeline set by several other projects. Curtis describes not having to tie everything about the film into the MCU as “massively freeing.” He compares it to his experience of making Moon Knight in that you don’t need to watch 30+ movies and TV shows in order to follow the story. “You can just drop into this universe.” However, he’s quick to say that for devoted fans of the MCU, they’ll have “smiles on their faces” when seeing certain easter eggs in First Steps. In terms of how First Steps, as it’s kicking off a new phase for the MCU, will lead the franchise forward, Grant Curtis and Tim Lewis stress the pressure they feel under. “We feel a huge responsibility because this is moving into the next stages of the various universes and the worlds and how they all combine,” said Lewis. While there is great pressure in directing the MCU as it gears up for an epic showdown in a two-movie event with Doomsday and Secret Wars, there is also a great sense of relief in being allowed to try something different. Quinn spoke to this, admitting that the stakes and expectations of the MCU now are what tautened his interest.
What drew me to this project was the fact that it had its own kind of exposition to the MCU. It’s very much set in a different time. It’s got a new ensemble of actors in there. Matt did such a great job with WandaVision, and it felt like not so much a departure from the previous films, but a kind of standalone thing and a certain thing. So that was something exciting, and who knows, down the line maybe merge… It feels like its own organism, and it’s our responsibility to kind of…to nurture it and take care of it and have fun.
First Steps will not be an origin story, but if you’re not privy to the details around the inception of the Fantastic Four, don’t worry. Curtis promises the movie will give audiences enough information so they don’t get lost. Still, don’t expect an entire movie about the team getting to know each other and their powers. When it comes to the balance of honoring what came before and distinguishing this film from the rest, Pascal says. “I think that it isn’t really about seeing them and then thinking, ‘What’s the different thing that I’m gonna do?’ It really is focusing on what the authorship of this version is under Marvel, under Matt Shakman, under our writers, under Kevin Feige, under this cast. Everything is percolating, you know? Directly from the comics, from other iterations.” But, for you Jack Kirby and Stan Lee fans, don’t worry, the movie appears to be very much a faithful representation of the work those men did over 50 years ago. Shakman describes himself as a huge fan of the original comics, which served as a huge inspiration for him. Curtis believes that while neither Lee nor Kirby is still with us, their presence can be felt throughout the entirety of First Steps. “If you do represent the Kirby aesthetic, if you do represent family, I do think they’re in this movie, even though physically they’re not.”
H.E.R.B.I.E. Takes a Lot of Work Behind the Scenes, but It’s Worth It

When the cast announcement for the film dropped in February of last year, it wasn’t just the four faces of Hollywood elite that got people excited. Standing next to The Thing and offering him a cup of coffee was H.E.R.B.I.E., the robot assistant to the team who was left out of the last live-action movies. We got to speak to Allistair Williams, head of the practical FX team for First Steps, and we got to meet the little robot himself. Despite being a fraction of the size of the Fantasticar that we had seen moments earlier, H.E.R.B.I.E. took much longer to create and is described by Williams as being “three times more challenging than building the car.” It takes a team of five or six people to control H.E.R.B.I.E. One has a remote control that controls the direction and velocity of the robot’s wheels. But for the arm movements and interactions with humans, that’s where Waldo comes in. Remember in Rugrats in Paris, when the babies wore mechanical sensor parts that allowed them to control the giant Reptar robot? It’s kind of the same thing here. Another person wears these parts, and those sensors allow for H.E.R.B.I.E. to replicate the movements and hand gestures of the controller. He may be a sweet little boy, but the lawnmower battery-powered boy is a whopping 40 kilos.

But who is H.E.R.B.I.E. as a character? Shakman describes the small robot as a multitude of things,
H.E.R.B.I.E. is also the right hand to Ben in the kitchen and the right hand to the family in whatever way that they possibly need him. He is their nanny, their cook, their cleaner, their scientific advisor, he’s everything. He’s overworked, he’s stressed out. He has a lot on his plate, but he is a rich character and a big part of our domestic world.
On how H.E.R.B.I.E. fits into the story, well, remember, it’s all about family! “H.E.R.B.I.E. is a welcome flavour in the family dynamic,” Quinn tells Collider. H.E.R.B.I.E., being built from the ground up, ties into everything the team wanted for the world of The Fantastic Four. Everything is bespoke, and H.E.R.B.I.E.’s design also has to reflect the superhuman genius of Reed Richards. In short, H.E.R.B.I.E. is the epitome of small but mighty.
The Centerpiece of Fantastic Four’s Set Is 1960s Times Square

We got to stand right in the middle of what feels like the set’s pièce de résistance — its 1960s Times Square set. This set best encapsulates the retrofuturistic style of the film as well as its take on the era. As a lot of the team on First Steps worked on WandaVision, including Shakman, there will be similarities between the projects, and that can be seen in Times Square’s biggest set piece. At the center, in place of the gigantic screens we have today, is a cornerstone of mid-century entertainment — the tube TV, which is seen throughout WandaVision. Just imagine one 1000x larger.

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There are also the cannons that Reed uses to attack Galactus. There are various advertisements for food and drink products, from Wrigley’s Juicy Fruit to Aquaria Lime Soda. Along the street, the units are made up of a Little Caesar’s, UFO Diner, and an RKO Palace Cinema. There’s a notable mix of real and fake touchstones, signifying that dedication to a blend of reality and the fantastical. We were also told that there are some Easter Eggs hidden in Times Square that are tied to the cover of the very first issue of The Fantastic Four.
We’re Getting the Sue Storm We Deserve

Image via Marvel

The last live-action version of Sue Storm wasn’t exactly a win for women. This is certainly not the fault of the actor who played her in the two mid-2000s films, Jessica Alba, but more a byproduct of a more male-gazing era of filmmaking. The Sue Storm we’ll see in First Steps is promised to be much more multifaceted. As Curtis astutely notes, Sue is the real center of the Four: “If you do go back through the comics, you realize that Sue Storm is arguably the leader of the Fantastic Four, because without Sue Storm, everything falls apart.” While not naming the past films directly, Curtis does recognize the need for better characterization for women in these films, “We had the desire to date aesthetically, but in terms of character and treatment, who should be front and center, it’s like, hey, let’s tell the best story possible.” Sue Storm, herself, Kirby, spoke to Collider about balancing Sue Storm as a member of this family, as a wife, sister, friend, and mother, as well as being a strong force on her own. She acknowledges that the earlier comics were very much a product of their time, remembering laughing with Pedro when seeing an early comic that shows Reed placating Sue’s “complaining” by buying her a new dress. But when it comes to her playing a mother, Kirby, it’s all about making it practical and understanding real-world expectations. “It’s the reality of embracing being pregnant and then carrying a baby throughout without falling into tropes or the archetypes we see in film around it. And it’s a daily choice. And even when it came to beginning costumes for things, I was like, ‘don’t give me any like dolly skirts.’”

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What makes Kirby feel truly feminine is allowing in space for vulnerability, and she didn’t want to make Sue simply a “bad boss bitch.” She wants to ensure that Sue has a “genuine feminine soulfulness,” and not acquiesce to a cute, sexy version of how men perceive femininity. Seeing Kirby and Pascal stand beside each other is quite startling, as you can get that sense of bond and intimacy. Kirby describes her on-screen husband as generous and without ego, going into detail, “I’ve never had a male actor as a counterpart who’s been so utterly equal and supportive of the relationship, but also the female character opposite him. I just feel so grateful every day to have an actor like Pedro who is so generous.” To which Pascal responds, “I love being led in a way. What you may identify as generosity for me, it just isn’t. I’m only inspired by… I guess just powerful women have been the thing that has gotten me through being alive. So, to have the opportunity to stand by one, to learn from one — just a partner, it’s partnership; it’s male and female, but it’s also just a kind of transcendent sort of partnership in the work and in the characters. And, so I don’t really know what the fuck I’m gonna do without you [Vanessa] honestly,” to which Kirby adds, “It’s rare for an actor to speak like that.” ​​​​
We’re Promised an “Epic” Villain

Image via Marvel Studios

When asked about what we can expect from the film’s villains, with Galactus as the main baddie with his mercenary, the Silver Surfer, Curtis doesn’t hold back in getting us excited.
The most epic of the most epic that you can imagine. Because that’s the global stakes we’re dealing with, the universal stakes we’re dealing with. That’s Galactus. When Galactus’s gaze comes across your planet, you’re not in a good spot. I think that’s as big of a scope and scale you could ever ask a villain to bring with him or her. And that is what Galactus brings… One of the beautiful things about working with Kevin Feige and with Matt Shackman, they are totally in on sci-fi. I know that’s not a shock, but just to see them talk about all things sci-fi and really embracing that look, and Galactus and one of the original bad guys of the Marvel Universe.
Galactus likely wasn’t picked just because of his magnitude, but because he is one of the original great villains, and represents the beginning for Marvel Comics, particularly the work of Kirby. “I don’t think you can accurately give even the silhouette of Galactus without knowing Kirby right away.” The team has a lot of reverence for Galactus, not just due to his threat level, but because of his legendary status within the legacy of Marvel Comics. In short, it’s fair to say that the entire cast and crew behind The Fantastic Four: First Steps understand how much is riding on this film. Not just because it could make or break the MCU at a pretty pivotal point in its progression, but because of how much these characters mean to fans, and have meant for going on 70 years. Curtis summarizes this astutely: “Fantastic Four is that IP that’s never been in the MCU Mount Rushmore, and it should be. We want to put it up there because what Jack and Stan did 60-plus years ago is super cool. There’s a reason it remains popular to this day, and we just want to get them up there with Cap and Thor and everyone else.” It’s First Steps ​​​​​​for the Fantastic Four, one giant leap for the MCU. Fantastic Four: The First Steps releases in theaters on July 25, 2025.

The Fantastic Four: First Steps

Release Date

July 25, 2025

Runtime

130 Minutes

Director

Matt Shakman

Writers

Jeff Kaplan, Josh Friedman, Ian Springer, Eric Pearson, Jack Kirby, Stan Lee

Producers

Jamie Christopher, Kevin Feige, Louis D’Esposito, Tim Lewis

Reed Richards / Mr. Fantastic

Sue Storm / The Invisible Woman

Joseph Quinn

Johnny Storm / Human Torch

Ebon Moss-Bachrach

Ben Grimm / The Thing