In an era where superhero movies are one of the most sure bets in Hollywood, there has been one set of heroes that, despite their history, haven’t had an easy time on the big screen. The first family of comics, the Fantastic Four, will make their fourth attempt later this year with the upcoming Marvel movie Fantastic Four: First Steps, and Miles Teller, the star of the franchise’s last ill-fated film, is wishing them the best of luck.
Josh Trank’s 2015 Fantastic Four, or Fant4stic as it appeared in marketing material, was one of the biggest bombs of the modern superhero boom. Miles Teller starred in the movie as Reed Richards, and he told THR that he hopes the new Fantastic Four film is a success because he knows just what it will mean to the cast if it isn’t. He said…
Teller starred alongside Kate Mara, Jamie Bell, and Michael B. Jordan as the titular team. Fantastic Four was plagued with issues, including significant reshoots that made massive changes to the story. The cost of the reshoots only made the movie more expensive overall. So when that flick failed to hit at the box office, the bomb was that much bigger.
Superhero movies still have the potential to create movie stars, and sequels to Fant4stic were already planned but scrapped following the movie’s failure. While it’s impossible to know just where the careers of the four stars would have gone had the movie been successful, at the very least they would have led this franchise, which would have elevated all of their careers.
Fantastic Four: First Steps certainly has some elements in its favor that the previous iterations did not. Pedro Pascal leads the Fantastic Four cast in the same role Miles Teller played last time. He is arguably a bigger name before the film’s release than any of the other previous cast members were. That alone has the potential to draw an audience. First Steps is also part of the massive Marvel Cinematic Universe, which will give this version of the Fantastic Four some importance that the previous films did not have.
Fantastic Four: First Steps also has a unique look, using a retro-futuristic world for its characters that, if nothing else, will separate this Fantastic Four movie from the others in a big way.
Overall, the new film being a bomb seems unlikely, but we’ll find out when Fantastic Four: First Steps premieres on the 2025 movie schedule in July.