As the Marvel Cinematic Universe kicks off its new era in the post-Avengers: Endgame world, there are a number of new franchises fans are looking forward to. One that arguably has fans most excited is the upcoming Fantastic Four reboot. It’s early days for the film, but that hasn’t stopped the public from fancasting the characters and expressing their hopes for the franchise. And just recently, veteran Fantastic Four director Tim Story even revealed what he wants to see altered in the new cinematic take on Marvel’s First Family.
Tim Story directed both 2005’s Fantastic Four and its 2007 sequel, Rise of the Silver Surfer and was really able to put his own stamp on some of Marvel’s most iconic characters. However, the filmmaker recently expalined that there were some things that he wasn’t able to accomplish that he hopes are rectified by the reboot. Interestingly enough, one of them these things involves Mr. Fantastic himself, Reed Richards:
We were never allowed to make Reed Richards stretch like we wanted to make him stretch. A little bit of the technology wasn’t there, it wasn’t enough for us to do it and make it look really, really cool.
Most would agree that in 2005, visual effects weren’t as intricate as what we have today. Reed Richards’ stretching abilities didn’t look too bad in the original Fantastic Four films, but it’s hard to deny that they could have been a bit smoother.
But Mr. Fantastic’s stretching wasn’t nearly as controversial as the appearance of fan-favorite villain Galactus in Rise of the Silver Surfer. Although the character appears as a large humanoid being in the comics, the film opted to make him into a cloud-like entity. And based on his comments to DesdeHollywood, Tim Story wasn’t exactly fond of that interpretation of the character:
In the second film with the Silver Surfer, some were afraid of what Galactus might look like in his, you know, creation. And what I am so looking forward to is when they get their hands on Galactus and show Galactus. I can’t wait, I can’t wait. When I saw Ant-Man big on screen, and I forget which Avengers it was, but when I saw that, I went, ‘Oh my god, wait until they get to Galactus.’
Tim Story has spoken on his personal comic book fandom before, but these new comments on the Fantastic Four reboot further exemplify his love for the Marvel characters. With this, it’s unfortunate that he wasn’t able to implement these changes in his films.
Marvel Studios’ Fantastic Four is set to be helmed by Spider-Man director Jon Watts. The director has more than proven his skill in handling superheroes. Given what we’ve seen from the Spidey franchise, both he and Marvel could very likely go all on in the more “comic booky” elements of the FF. After all, what other studio or director would have been willing to take a stab at villains like Vulture or Mysterio? And as Story even alluded to, any studio willing to show off Giant-Man could very well have plans for a being like Galactus.
With any luck, Marvel’s Fantastic Four will give fans the chance to see a comic book-accurate versions of Mr. Fantastic Four and Galactus. And if it happens, it’’ll be even sweeter knowing that the OG FF director will be in the audience soaking up all the Marvel goodness.
