This week, Matt Shakman completes a quartet including Oley Sassone, Tim Story, and Josh Trank. You can work out who has the longest arms, because it's not cosmic rays that connect them, but the accolade of having directed a Fantastic Four film. Only this time round, Shakman and Marvel Studios will be hoping he fares a bit better than his predecessors. 

The Fantastic Four are a perfectly balanced, hugely successful comic superteam with decades of stories to draw on. But so far, the lauded first family of Marvel Comics have proved to be one of the trickiest comic properties in Hollywood. As the FF speed into the MCU, it's a good time to look at their not-so-fantastic adventures on the big screen.

First, much like the latest film, it's time to take a step back to where it all started in the 1960s, with the Terrific Two: Stan Lee and Jack Kirby.

Kickstarting The Silver Age Of Comics

Inspired by DC's success bringing together their top characters as the Justice League in 1960, the writer and artist set about creating a superteam. The Marvel Comics Group was better known for horror titles at the time, but young maverick Lee and old hand Kirby (also co-creator of Captain America in 1941) drew on the elements to change comics with four irradiated individuals:

• Water: Mr Fantastic Reed Richards, leader of the team and able to stretch his body like fluid elastic. 
• Air: Sue Storm, Reed's other half and not just an invisible woman but able to generate and manipulate forcefields. 
• Earth: The Thing, Ben Grimm, a man transformed into an ultra-durable creature of rock. 
• Fire: Lee and Kirby reached back to the flaming superhero of the 1940s, transforming it from android to teenager Johnny Storm.

A brilliant mythical update, enhanced by the soap opera realism of the FF's dysfunctional family. Spider-Man, Hulk, Thor, Iron Man and a revived Captain America followed, but there's a reason this team remains Marvel's First Family. 

The FF burst onto newsstands with four-colour appeal, achieving a success that launched the Silver Age of Comics and set a trailblazing high that film adaptations have never been able to live up to. 

Stretching Rights — Roger Corman's Fantastic Four

When Marvel was keen to capitalise on its assets in the 1980s and 1990s, the FF's reputation ensured they were top of the pile. Constantin Film (now best known for their Resident Evil films) acquired the rights in 1986, and four years later hired Roger Corman to produce an adaptation. Directed by Oley Sassone, this had a trailer and even sent its cast on a promotional tour, but the chances are you've never seen it. 

It's generally considered a cynical attempt to retain the rights, something apparently confirmed by Lee when he spoke to Los Angeles Magazine in 2005: “That film was never meant to be seen by anyone.” Corman refuted this, but anyone who's caught the infamous bootleg copies can attest to its B-movie stylings. As recounted in the documentary, Doomed!: The Untold Story of Roger Corman's The Fantastic Four (2015), it wasn't a great start for the first family. 

Too lit — Tim Story's Fantastic Four

When the Constantin rights to the Fantastic Four fell into Fox's orbit in the late 1990s, the studio saw the chance to leapfrog Sony, the owners of Spider-Man film rights, following their modest but stable success with X-Men in 2000.  

In the comics, the FF's family dynamic, character depth, and one of the best coteries of comic book villains have contributed some of the thought-provoking and entertaining stories in comic books. That wasn't conveyed in the two mid-2000s films directed by Tim Story. Featuring villains Dr Doom and Galactus, but generally lightweight, they wasted their core cast, which included Ioan Gruffudd, Jessica Alba, Chris Evans and Michael Chiklis. 

Objectively, Fantastic Four and its sequel, Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer, weren't disasters. The two films took a combined 634.5 million ($1.973 billion if you very generously add in 2024's Deadpool and Wolverine, thanks to a belated return for Evans' Johnny Storm). But it's not an era covered in glory. The first Fantastic Four sits at 27% on Rotten Tomatoes with the overriding opinion that it's a mediocre take on the First Family. 

The sequel stepped up in terms of plot, but will never live down making Galactus—major threat reduced to a nebulous storm— share a film with an infamous scene where Reed Richards goes (deep breath) dancing. It was a flimsy tone that later comic book movies, including the DCEU, reacted against, and the FF wouldn't be immune.

Hard To See — Josh Trank's Fantastic Four

By the end of the 2000s, the FF still hadn't reached anywhere near the success of the comics, particularly Lee and Kirby's initial run or John Byrne's legendary ‘80s revival. So faced with Marvel turning from collaborators to competitors with the release of Iron Man in 2008, Fox dodged the neat reset of X-Men: First Class (2011) and rebooted the FF hard. Really hard. 

The signs were good when writer-director Josh Trank, fresh from crafting the unique psychological, found-footage superhero IP Chronicle in 2025, was hired. The cast drew inspiration from younger versions of the characters as seen in the Ultimate Fantastic Four comics (2004 – 2009). Playing them were some of the hottest names in Hollywood: Miles Teller as Reed Richards, Kate Mara as Sue Storm, Michael B. Jordan as Johnny Storm and Jamie Bell as Ben Grimm.

But if Fox's first attempt had been too light, this version was the opposite. Apparently shocked at the “moroseness” of Trank's first cut, the studio ordered reshoots, hiring editor Stephen E. Rivkin to produce a new version. 

Styled as Fant4stic, the film fell far short of its predecessors with a global box office take of $167.9 million. Labelled gloomy, humourless and tedious by critics, this attempt to take the FF into a darker space set an unenviable record: with 9% on Rotten Tomatoes, it's the lowest rated Marvel film. One spot above it is the unreleased 1994 version at 33%.

Clobberin' Time – Over To The MCU

Now, nearly 65 years after their comic debut, it's Marvel Studios' turn to bring their First Family home. It comes at the right if high-pressure time: The MCU hopes the comic that launched the Silver Age will trigger a new era of success on the Silver Screen.

Long fending off accusations of saturation, comic book cinema has reached a strange point where the FF will be in cinemas at the same time as DC's Superman, the hero who launched Comics' Golden Age. Both are considered a little old-fashioned, and both have a lot riding on their shoulders. But the signs are good that the MCU has grasped what the FF need to soar after their post-credit introduction in Thunderbolts*. 

This version will dodge an origin story (like James Gunn's Superman), place the FF in a 1960s setting, and embrace the comics' broad history, including H.E.R.B.I.E. and Franklin Richards, Reed and Sue's son. Not only that, the history of FF is expected to be nodded to with cameos from the main cast of the 1994 adaptation. The film that never disappears.

As good as it sounds, the key to success is in the MCU remembering that FF also stands for First Family—conveying the inner strength of four familial elements working together. 

The MCU's Fantastic Four need to be as strong as the Thing and as resilient as the Invisible Woman. If they can also stay as flexible as Mr Fantastic, there's every chance they can finally light up cinemas like the Human Torch. 

The Fantastic Four is in cinemas from 25 July

 

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