Any time Kevin Feige hits the press circuit for whatever the latest Marvel Cinematic Universe project may be, he’s inevitably going to be asked a ton of questions about what comes next. After all, he’s the architect of the most successful franchise in history, so he’s always several steps ahead of his audience at every turn.
Very rarely does the company’s Chief Creative Officer come right out and deny anything or offer vague answers, because he always wants the fans to be invested from the ground floor. It was right before the release of Black Widow that he teased Fantastic Four casting news might not be as far away as we think, and he’s now hinted that the ensemble could be comprised of established stars and relative unknowns.
“I think the MCU is a beautiful combination of both. I think you look no further than Simu in Shang-Chi, like Chris Hemsworth, like Tom Hiddleston, like Tom Holland, an actor that hadn’t been seen by a tremendous amount of people before, or you have a Benedict stepping into Doctor Strange or Christian Bale stepping into Gorr in our Thor film. It is always a beautiful combination of both, and it really is about the search for the best actor for the job whether that actor is known to the world yet or not.”
The MCU is known to recruit big names for major roles, but it’s also famed as a star-making factory that sent the careers of Robert Downey Jr., Chris Evans, Chris Hemsworth, Chris Pratt, Tom Hiddleston and many more to a whole new level. Balancing the two could be key for Fantastic Four, especially when a lot of casual viewers might only know the characters from Tim Story’s middling 2000s duo and Josh Trank’s disastrous 2015 effort.
Fantastic Four is a big deal solely for the fact Marvel Studios are behind the wheel this time, and in 99% of cases the MCU has been impeccable when it comes to casting. No matter who it is, Feige’s track record for handpicking headliners is already enough reason to believe that whoever winds up as Reed Richards, Sue Storm, Johnny Storm and Ben Grimm are going to knock it out of the park.
