Superman has dominated headlines this week, but two weeks after the Man of Tomorrow returns to theaters, The Fantastic Four: First Steps will land.
A new image from the Marvel Studios reboot has been released today, with Reed Richards, Sue Storm, Johnny Storm, and Ben Grimm preparing to take flight for the fateful journey set to grant them fantastic powers.
Reed can be seen giving Ben the thumbs up, unaware that his best friend will be forever transformed into a "Thing" when they return from the cosmos.
It was initially reported that we wouldn't see the team's origin story in the MCU, but images like this (we've included a few other officially released shots below) somewhat contradict that. Still, we don't expect this to take up a huge chunk of the movie.
Ebon Moss-Bachrach recently talked about how he's approaching Ben, and praised The Fantastic Four: First Steps' practical Yancy Street and how being immersed in that benefited his performance.
"Jack Kirby wrote this character [of Ben Grimm] as a bit of an homage to his father, and to the streets that he grew up on," he explains. "I'm a New Yorker, and I've spent a lot of time on Essex Street, on Delancey, on Clinton."
"So it does feel like home to me, and the production did a beautiful job recreating that. It was so cool to walk down and see the hat seller and the fish seller," Moss-Bachrach added. "I was shocked that we were outside of London because it fully felt like the Lower East Side."
Last month, we got a possible plot leak for The Fantastic Four: First Steps; if you're curious about what's to come, you can find it here.
Set against the vibrant backdrop of a 1960s-inspired, retro-futuristic world, Marvel Studios' The Fantastic Four: First Steps introduces Marvel’s First Family—Reed Richards/Mister Fantastic (Pedro Pascal), Sue Storm/Invisible Woman (Vanessa Kirby), Johnny Storm/Human Torch (Joseph Quinn) and Ben Grimm/The Thing (Ebon Moss-Bachrach) as they face their most daunting challenge yet.
Forced to balance their roles as heroes with the strength of their family bond, they must defend Earth from a ravenous space god called Galactus (Ralph Ineson) and his enigmatic Herald, Silver Surfer (Julia Garner). And if Galactus’ plan to devour the entire planet and everyone on it weren’t bad enough, it suddenly gets very personal.
Paul Walter Hauser, John Malkovich, and Natasha Lyonne have been cast in mystery roles. Robert Downey Jr.'s Doctor Doom is rumoured to appear, though that's surely a given with Avengers: Doomsday on the way.
Director Matt Shakman worked with both Avatar: The Way of Water co-writer Josh Friedman and WandaVision's Cam Squires on The Fantastic Four: First Steps' screenplay, with Eric Pearson (Black Widow) later coming on board for a final polish.
The movie is set to be released in theaters on July 25, 2025.