Marvel Reveals “The Fantastic Four” Cast Including Pedro Pascal & Vanessa Kirby
Marvel Studios has found its Fantastic Four.
Pedro Pascal has indeed been cast as Reed Richards, aka Mr. Fantastic, and he’s joined by Vanessa Kirby as Sue Storm/The Invisible Woman, Joseph Quinn as Johnny Storm/The Human Torch, and Ebon Moss-Bachrach as Ben Grimm/the Thing.
The news arrives along with new release dates for upcoming Marvel Studios films. It looks like 2025 is going to be a big year for the MCU, with Captain America: Brave New World slated for a February release, the antihero team-up film Thunderbolts now set for a May 2 premiere, followed by The Fantastic Four on July 25 and then the new Blade in November. For 2024, the only MCU film set to release is Deadpool & Wolverine, which just broke records months before it’s July 26 premiere.
WandaVision director Matt Shakman is directing The Fantastic Four, but how Marvel is going to approach re-introducing one of the most iconic super-teams in the canon, the very first superheroes created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, is unknown. In the comics, the Fantastic Four were astronauts-turned-superheroes after they were exposed to cosmic rays, giving them wild abilities like Reed Richard’s super elasticity and Sue Storm’s invisibility. The script for the new film comes from Josh Friedman, Jeff Kaplan, and Ian Springer.
Marvel Studios finally got the rights to Fantastic Four in 2019 when Disney acquired 21st Century Fox. Fox produced three films based on Marvel’s first family—Fantastic Four (2005), Fantastic Four: The Rise of the Silver Surfer (2007), and a reboot, Fantastic Four (2015). In that 2005 film, a future MCU star, Chris Evans, played Johnny Storm. In the 2015 reboot, another MCU star, Michael B. Jordan, played the same role.
There was a nod to Reed Richards in a recent MCU film, however—in 2022’s Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, John Krasinski appears as an alternate-universe version of the character. However, this poor version of Reed was annihilated by the Scarlet Witch (Elizabeth Olsen), whose powers of destruction are a touch greater than his bendy abilities.
Pascal’s star has been rising for some time, especially after HBO’s stellar zombie series The Last of Us. Kirby starred in The Crown as Princess Margaret, earned an Oscar nomination for her astonishing performance in Pieces of a Woman, and has been in the past few Mission: Impossible films. Quinn broke out in season 4 of Stranger Things as the beloved Eddie Munson, while Moss-Bachrach is coming off an Emmy win for his turn as Richie Jerimovich in FX’s The Bear.
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Featured image: L-r: LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA – JANUARY 19: Pedro Pascal attends the 26th Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 19, 2020 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Rich Fury/Getty Images). LONDON, ENGLAND – NOVEMBER 16: (EDITORS NOTE: This image has been converted to black and white.) Vanessa Kirby attends the “Napoleon” UK Premiere at Odeon Luxe Leicester Square on November 16, 2023 in London, England. (Photo by Gareth Cattermole/Getty Images)
