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The Fantastic Four: First Steps — 100% Boring, 0% Heart

 

The Fantastic Four: First Steps

I have to admit something before I start: I spent a surprisingly large part of The Fantastic Four: First Steps waiting for it to end.

I was so bored!

And that became increasingly frustrating because The Fantastic Four: First Steps contains almost everything a superhero movie needs to be exciting. There are superheroes, space travel, a giant cosmic entity, an alien civilization, the fate of a planet, a family expecting a child, moral dilemmas, and enormous CGI battles.

And yet, somehow, the film's biggest problem is that very little of it feels surprising.

The First Family Is Already Famous

The film begins with an interesting idea: the Fantastic Four are already established.

They aren't struggling to discover their powers. They aren't trying to convince people that superheroes exist. They aren't even particularly mysterious.

They are celebrities.

They have already saved the world. People know who they are. They live together, work together, and have become a kind of superhero family in the public imagination.

Great, now they need to learn how to be regular people, with regular responsibilities and struggles beyond their public persona. Sounds interesting. Unfortunately, the movie doesn't stay there for very long.

Another Cosmic Threat

The problem isn't that Galactus (Ralph Ineson) is a bad villain. The problem is that he arrives carrying the enormous weight of being Galactus without the movie making me feel much about him.

He is enormous. He is powerful. He eats planets.

Okay.

But what does he actually represent?

A villain this powerful should create more than visual spectacle. He should make the characters — and the audience — confront something frightening.

Is he death?

Is he nature's indifference?

Is he the terrifying idea that entire civilizations can disappear without the universe even noticing?

Really, there isn't anything, and the tension it should create... feels flat. 

Beautiful, But Emotionally Empty

This is probably what frustrated me the most. The world of First Steps looks fantastic.

There is something wonderful about seeing the Fantastic Four's retro-futuristic universe, with its 1960s-inspired technology and optimistic vision of the future. There is also a lovely idea underneath the destruction: people coming together to save their world.

You see the whole world working together, and that should be moving, but somehow I kept feeling less involved.

Emotional stakes aren't created simply by making the consequences enormous; they are created by making us care about the people experiencing them. That's where the movie clearly fails.

The Silver Surfer's Best Story Is the One We Don't Get

Silver Surfer (Julia Garner) actually has one of the most interesting moral situations in the film.

She saved her own planet. But by doing so, she effectively condemned others. That is a fantastic moral dilemma.

Imagine having to choose between saving your own people and allowing another civilization to die.

Unfortunately, the movie doesn't seem particularly interested in staying with that moral complexity.

Eventually, Silver Surfer turns against Galactus and helps the heroes. And there is nothing wrong with that decision. But it feels familiar. The character who works for the villain eventually realizes the villain is wrong and joins the heroes.

We've seen this story before. It needed something else, more conflict, more guilt, more... something.

And What Exactly Is So Special About This Baby?

The baby is obviously important. The movie tells us the child matters enormously to the future, yet the baby feels like an extra.

What exactly is the power of this child? Why should I emotionally care about it?

The movie gives the baby enormous narrative importance, but importance isn't the same thing as emotional connection.

Nothing feels particularly important.

The Best Scene Involves a Car Seat

And then there is the scene I actually loved. The Fantastic Four struggle to put a car seat in the car.

That's it. No Galactus. No planet-destroying weapon. No cosmic battle. Just people trying to deal with something ridiculously ordinary.

And it is genuinely funny.

Why?

Because we've been there. We can relate.

When Everything Is a Spectacle, Nothing Is

There is a strange paradox at the center of The Fantastic Four: First Steps.

The movie constantly tries to impress us. It succeeds visually, but being impressed isn't the same as being entertained.

The film is beautiful. The world is imaginative. The production design is probably one of its strongest elements. The idea of this alternate 1960s world is genuinely appealing.

But after a while, I started to feel like I was looking at a very expensive exhibition rather than watching a story I desperately wanted to follow.

And that's why the film felt so long... and disappointing.

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