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"Hold your loved ones close, and speak the words you've been afraid to speak. Use this time to rejoice and celebrate, for your time is short."
The Silver Surfer, Fantastic Four: First Steps, 2025
I always wonder whether lines like this come from the original comics.
@strypey
No. Well nothing the pre2001 runs.
@ThewTheKooky
> Well nothing the pre2001 runs
Thanks, good to know that the screenwriters working on Marvel movies sometimes add something of value to the stories they retell.
The scariest thing for a person who depends on their intelligence for strength isn't not knowing the answer. Working out answers is what intelligence is for. The scariest thing is not knowing how to approach the problem, how to make it tractable.
When something important depends on untangling a knot, and you can't find any loose ends or anything to get your nails into, that's scary.
The writers of First Steps made Reed Richards face that fear, and it's deeply compelling.
Reed and Sue were clearly the lead characters here. But I really liked the way they gave Ben and Jonny some room to breathe.
The little details like Ben's love of cooking, and the courage it took him to overcome his shyness and go see the teacher who clearly likes him. Jonny's determination to use his mind and his empathy to understand and connect with Shalla-Bal, rather than always just trying to overpower her with his abilities, made him way more relatable.
More little details, seeing Stingray from Cobra Kai turn up as Harvey "Molman" was good fun. I was glad that the film didn't layer on the droid sentimentality of recent Star Wars with H.E.R.B.I.E. He was a fun little supporting character, never goofy or over-present, and I loved the visual design.
In fact the retro-futurist Tomorrowland-esque visual design was one of the best things about First Steps. A breath of fresh air after decades of grim, forced realism in superhero fantasy.
The climactic battle with Galactus made me think of the stories of gods and heroes in older films based on ancient Greek, Roman and Norse mythology. If there's any record of our superhero stories in a thousand years, that's probably how they'll look in hindsight.
What makes those stories resonant across the centuries is not the crash! whallop! action, but the way the characters cope with the bizarre and challenging situations they find themselves in.
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