Warmth is The Fantastic Four: First Steps’ real super power.

Marvel’s First Family’s journey on the big screen has been one dominated by productions driven by rights obligations more than passion for the property which is why, at least until now, the finest expression of the soul of The Fantastic Four in feature film form remains The Incredibles. The Fantastic Four: First Steps understand this, explicitly embracing Brad Bird’s retro-futuristic sixties aesthetic and Michael Giacchino’s musical sensibilities to provide the foundation for this latest attempt to do the Richards family justice. It gives the film an advantage of the familiar – without feeling derivative; the easy charm of a Sunday afternoon sci-fi repeat – a comforting mix of retro aesthetics, clean storytelling, and enough emotional authenticity to provide something sturdy beneath the sheen. It doesn’t rewrite the superhero playbook, but it doesn’t trip over it either, using its MCU-adjacent setting to give its heroes – and villains – time to breathe, grow and live before the looming tidal wave of continuity comes crashing down.

Directed by WandaVision’s Matt Shakman, the film condenses the origin story into an entertainingly old-fashioned montage and drops us off four years after Reed Richards (Pedro Pascal), Sue Storm (Vanessa Kirby), Ben Grimm (Ebon Moss-Bachrach), and Johnny Storm (Joseph Quinn) returned from space with a set of cosmic upgrades. In the intervening years, they’ve become the go-to fixers for Earth’s dilemmas, whether sub- or extra-terrestrial. The story picks up on a different kind of event horizon – Reed and Sue are expecting a baby, and for all their insistence that nothing has to change, Shalla-Bal (Julie Garner), the silver surfboard-riding herald of Galactus (Ralph Ineson) knows better.

Where most versions of the Fantastic Four embrace to some extent the familial dynamics at the heart of the characters, First Steps makes it the whole point. This isn’t a team finding their feet, or adapting to their powers – it’s one that already knows the dance, and finds themselves adjusting to a new rhythm as their family grows. There’s a confidence that the audience will love this family as much as they obviously love each other and that alone sets it apart from the franchise’s previous false starts. Their intimacy doesn’t need to be explained, it feels lived-in, the casual shorthand of people who’ve spent long enough in each other’s orbit and the more time they spend together on screen, the more the film’s warmth enfolds the audience like the cosiest blanket.

That alchemy comes almost entirely from the cast, a cast which I don’t mind saying I was sceptical of when it was first announced – possibly more sceptical than I’ve ever been of any other comic book casting, save perhaps the forthcoming Doctor Doom. The near ubiquitous Pedro Pascal caused me the most consternation. Despite his having played virtually every other role going – seemingly simultaneously – these past couple of years, I struggled to see him as the MCU’s Reed Richards – right up until I saw him on screen as Mr Fantastic. Pascal’s Reed is a twitchy mix of conviction and self-doubt, never quite comfortable with how much he cares and always concerned by how much he knows – and how much he has yet to learn. Likewise, I was underwhelmed by the choice of Joseph Quinn as The Human Torch but he brings us an immensely likeable Johnny Storm, running on pure impulse and mischief, and managing to steal many of the film’s best moments while carving out a distinct identity from his predecessors. Yes, there’s hints of Chris Evans’ superficial cockiness and even Michael B Jordan’s arrogant aggression but they’re tempered by a more thoughtful maturity in this incarnation. Ebon Moss-Bachrach, freed from the obligation to explore The Thing’s more tortured early days of adapting to his cosmically-induced skin condition, brings something soft and sardonic to Ben, making the team’s erstwhile answer to The Hulk the calm centre of the chaotic family goings-on. But it’s in Vanessa Kirby that The Fantastic Four: First Steps finds its greatest strength. It’s the first film of The Fantastic Four to acknowledge and embrace the fact that Sue is the powerhouse of the film, not just in terms of super heroics but emotionally too. Reed is the brains, Ben the brawn and Johnny the brash but Sue is and always has been the beating heart of the team – and their best connection to their core humanity despite their molecular metamorphosis.

Inevitably, something arrives to threaten all this cosy cohesion. Julia Garner’s Shalla-Bal – a sleek, silver herald who never actually gets called “Silver Surfer” – descends to inform the team that Earth is now on Galactus’ dinner plans and she’s here to book a planet for one. Galactus finally gets his due on the big screen. Huge, unknowable, mythic. The film smartly resists deflating him with wisecracks or redesigning him into a weather system; he’s a proper god-like presence – and Ineson revels in the scale, making everything feel much, much bigger than it already is.

It’s true that the more the film leans into cosmic peril, the more it edges away from its strongest asset, the group’s chemistry, but the film manages to marry the improbably interstellar with the domesticity of its alt-sixties earth-bound setting without missing a beat and ties the global and personal stakes together in a satisfyingly unexpected way. The final act being set in New York once again is the one point in which it may start to feel a little formulaic to cinema goers, but then again for Marvel comic book readers, New York remains an inevitable battleground given its unfeasibly dense population of superheroes per square mile and the film does a good job of showing how a group of four human-sized heroes could credibly take on a planet-eating giant without looking silly.

The Fantastic Four: First Steps is a good superhero movie and a great Fantastic Four movie but it doesn’t seem all that interested in making a play for top tier MCU status. Perhaps there’s a lingering note of caution, an awareness of the preciousness of its cargo that it can’t take any huge risks for fear it joins the other Fantastic Fours in the “forgettable” pile that holds it back from truly excelling. A more patient montage – with longer looks at their previous battles – might have helped and it wouldn’t have hurt to have Mr Fantastic do more creative contortions than just the usual limb lengthening. But maybe it’s okay that it doesn’t aim to dominate at this stage – it aims to endear and in that, it largely succeeds. It lays down a solid foundation, does right by its characters, and gets out before it overstays its welcome. There’s more than enough here to make you want to spend more time with these characters – and crucially to care when Doctor Doom inevitably comes calling.

The Fantastic Four have successfully made their first steps into the MCU. Let’s see if they can make the giant leap to Avengers: Doomsday without losing what’s made them fantastic in the first place.