Kevin Feige Says The Fantastic Four Will Be A 'Big Pillar' For The Future Of The Marvel Cinematic Universe

It has been a while since we last saw Marvel's First Family, the Fantastic Four, on the big screen. We had the critically-maligned 2015 reboot, and before that, we had the divisive early 2000s duology. Even further before that, if you can believe it, we had Roger Corman's unreleased attempt. Kevin Feige and Matt Shakman are hoping to finally make a great movie that the team deserves, even if it'll take a little bit for them to be reintroduced into the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

In a new interview with Entertainment Weekly, Feige didn't say much about the upcoming MCU slate. After all, why would he? The franchise has relied on speculation and pulling together threads of loose information for years, so why stop now? Regardless, he kept relatively mum about what Shakman, along with co-writers Jeff Kaplan and Ian Springer have in store for fans. However, he did make a pretty big hint about the franchise's future, and how this team of superheroes fits into it.

"We plan on [them] being a big pillar of the MCU going forward," Feige told the website, "just the way they've been in the comics for 50 or 60 years."

The MCU has long since proven to be the on-screen standard for many of Marvel's famous characters, and their interpretation of the Fantastic Four won't be any different. That being said, Kevin Feige has frequently made a point to acknowledge the other Marvel-related films that included characters now synonymous with the franchise. This will be no different with "Fantastic Four," as he told Entertainment Weekly. However, they hope to integrate everything that Marvel created the team to be while infusing it with MCU elements.

"Fantastic Four is the foundation for everything that came after in the comics," said Feige. "There's certainly been versions of it [on screen], but never inhabiting the storytelling of the MCU. And that's something that is really exciting for us."

From the sounds of it, there's a strong chance that everything that the MCU will eventually be built around will involve the Fantastic Four in some way. This makes a ton of sense, as like Feige said, the team was largely responsible for establishing Marvel Comics as we know it. Having them just be secondary characters to the larger franchise would be a huge slap in the face to the brand that made the MCU such a powerful media entity. Reed Richards, Sue Storm, Johnny Storm, and Ben Grimm deserve a great movie that does their lengthy comic history justice. Here's to hoping the MCU can provide such a movie.

"Fantastic Four" is currently scheduled to soar into theaters on February 14, 2025.