Marvel's next superteam is taking shape. In February, Marvel Studios finally announced that Pedro Pascal will play Reed Richards in the upcoming Fantastic Four reboot. The Last of Us actor will star alongside Vanessa Kirby (Mission: Impossible—Dead Reckoning) as Sue Storm (AKA the Invisible Woman), Joseph Quinn (Stranger Things) as Johnny Storm (AKA the Human Torch) and Ebon Moss-Bachrach (The Bear) as Ben Grimm (AKA the Thing).
The upcoming film, titled The Fantastic Four, will follow a group of scientists who are blasted with cosmic rays during a mission to outer space. The experience grants the team superhuman abilities, including Mr. Fantastic's elastic figure, Invisible Woman's invisible force fields, Human Torch's body of flames, and The Thing's powerful rock exterior. At Marvel’s big Hall H panel at San Diego Comic-Con this Saturday night, The Fantastic Four stole the show. (Until that Robert Downey Jr reveal, at least—he's back!)
The Fantastic Four's director—WandaVision's Matt Shakman—took the stage, saying that the film will take place in a retrofuturistic New York City in the '60s, and that production was still in its early stages. And yet! He had some footage ready. Remember the early episodes of WandaVision, where Shakman threw on an I Love Lucy sheen to the action? Mash that together with The Jetsons—and that's the tone of this Fantastic Four preview.
Itstarts with Pascal's Reed Richards in a classroom, showing off a rocket engine to a bunch of kids. Pascal looks damn good as Richards—plenty of charm, an old-timey New York accent, and a 'stache. We see the Storms, Grimm, and Richards elsewhere in the preview, cheerily talking each other up and preparing to go to space. (Looks like The Fantastic Four will retell the team's origin story.) There's also a glimpse of a dating show called "Let's Make a Match," where The Thing is the winning contestant—but he's dimly lit, obscuring our first look of Cousin in rock form. The preview ends with a fleeting look of the big bad, Galactus, peering through a skyscraper window.
As a reminder: In 2019, Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige announced the upcoming Fantastic Four film, with Spider-Man: No Way Home director John Watts helming the project. But Watts stepped down to take a break from superhero films after the third Spider-Man entry, and he was replaced by WandaVision's Matt Shakman. The film has also been through the hands of many creatives on the writing side, including Palm Springs'Jeff Kaplan and Ian Springer, with rewrites from Foundation's Josh Friedman. According to Deadline, all three writers will be credited on the film.
The Fantastic Four is currently scheduled for release on July 25, 2025. We'll be calling Pedro Pascal "Mr. Fantastic" in no time.
