‘The Fantastic Four’s latest twist casting reveals how it’s already serving as Marvel’s ‘Avengers 4.5’

Not that we want to skip past Deadpool & Wolverine, but 2025 can’t come fast enough. On top of a full stack of MCU movies on the way, including Captain America 4 and Thunderbolts, next year finally delivers The Fantastic Four, the reboot of Marvel’s First Family we’ve been waiting for since it was announced… in 2019!

It’s been a long time coming, then, and thankfully all the signs are pointing to director Matt Shakman’s production proving worth the wait. Promo artwork teases a unique 1960s-influenced aesthetic, talk of it being set in its own time period or even universe is intriguing, and the cast… Well, let’s talk about the cast for a moment.

On Valentine’s Day 2024, Marvel announced the lineup of the titular foursome — Pedro Pascal (Reed Richards), Vanessa Kirby (Sue Storm), Joseph Quinn (Human Torch), and Ebon Moss-Bachrach (The Thing) — and we thought that was as starry as this movie was going to get. How wrong we were, though, as each new casting update is conspiring to convince us that The Fantastic Four is the next Avengers movie in disguise.

Natasha Lyonne makes The Fantastic Four cast even more Avengers-level

As we get ever nearer to filming starting in June, more and more A-list actors are being added to the movie’s cast all the time. Julia Garner is a female Silver Surfer, Ralph Ineson is Galactus, and John Malkovich and Paul Walter Hauser are on board in undisclosed roles. The same goes for Poker Face and Russian Doll icon Natasha Lyonne, announced to be part of the gang on May 15.

So far, each and every name that’s boarded The Fantastic Four has been a household name, a rising star, or an acclaimed character actor, and many of them have already been confirmed to be playing some of the most iconic characters in the Marvel universe. While Phases Four and Five have been full of wonderful casts — whatever else Eternals was lacking, for instance, it did boast a ridiculously talented ensemble — it seems like the fandom hasn’t been this excited by an MCU movie’s cast since Avengers: Endgame.

With Avengers 5 facing an uphill battle to win fans over again after a mixed Multiverse Saga, at least The Fantastic Four is here to act as a kind of Avengers 4.5 by generating heaps of fresh hype for the franchise’s future with its ever-growing cast assembled of much-loved stars. And with nary a multiversal crossover or legacy actor in the mix. See, it can be done.

The Fantastic Four stretches into cinemas on July 25, 2025.