Now that Marvel has the rights back to Marvel’s first family, they need to have a proper introduction into the conglomerate that is the MCU.

1. 1. Do the origin story. Even though it’s drawn out to death, it’s important to Johnny and Ben’s character arc. Somehow make Johnny distract Reed or Sue and make them get hit with cosmic rays. Johnny’s character arc makes him feel responsible for Ben’s sadness.
   2. Emphasize the family aspect!!!! Reed and Sue are the parents, Ben is the uncle, and Johnny is the son.
   3. Johnny Storm and Sue Storm will be older sister and younger brother; Johnny is still in high school (cameo from Tom Holland’s Peter Parker establishing a friendship nodding to their friendship in the comics), Sue has taken the role of mother figure in Johnny’s life since their parents died.
   4. Reed and Ben have been best friends since elementary school (one of the very few elements from Fant4stic that was interesting and good in theory but was poorly executed), they are basically brothers.
   5. Now that we’ve gotten the foundations for the characters down, the movies will be a part of a trilogy, the first movie being about Thing and Johnny Storm, the second movie will be about Reed Richards and Sue Storm, and the third will be about Franklin Richards (we’ll get back to these second and third movies at a later date).
   6. Doctor Doom WILL NOT be in these movies, he is a much bigger villain to be constrained to a single Fantastic Four movie. He will be in an inevitable Avengers/FF crossover movie. BUT allude to him and Latveria throughout the series. Make the threat much greater until the last end credit scene of the third movie with text saying they will return in “Avengers: Secret Wars.” Galactus will not be in it either at least for the first two movies. It’s the same deal, build him up across an entire phase or two and make him the threat like Thanos.
   7. Doctor Doom will get his own origin movie setting up the character because he’s a fantastic character that has not been given his full potential in the FOX movies. Reed/Doom relationship gets established and Reed betrays Doom, leading him to hate him.
   8. The first Fantastic 4 movie will be a coming of age story/ accepting responsibility for Johnny (learns from Parker); Ben Grimm will have to come to terms with himself and accept his new life. Reed and Sue would get married at the end or something while everything is happening to give them something to do.
   9. Reed “reaches out” to Hank Pym and Bruce Banner to try and fix Ben’s condition since Ben has been down on his luck and thinks himself a freak. Ben gets to his breaking point and furious that Bruce can’t do anything about it and Ben yells, “IT’S CLOBBERIN TIME!” and attacks. This leads into the Hulk/Thing fight that everyone wants to see.
   10. Johnny at first is a wild teenager being dismissive and rowdy. He’s brash and doesn’t think things through. After their parents died, he’s been slacking in school and becoming a nuisance but then learns to be responsible for his actions.
   11. The villain is Mole Man. OK hear me out, I know there are several hundreds of villains more interesting than Mole Man but let me explain. He was the villain of the first Fantastic Four issue, so it’s a callback to that. Mole Man and Thing have something in common. They both feel that Society treats them like outcasts because they’re different. The difference is how they act upon it. Ben helps people, and Mole Man wants to conquer the world. By defeating him it signals his acceptance of his new purpose in society as a hero by utilizing his mutation for good. Johnny uses this as a chance to prove himself by helping Thing take down Mole Man.
   12. Mole Man to spice things up and give credibility to Iron Fist has an underground world he is the ruler of. He also has control of Fin Fang Foom, a giant dragon. Thus giving something to Iron Fist by establishing that yes, Dragons lived and existed under New York City this entire time. Also it’ll be good fan service since it’s a cool call back to the comics. He would essentially fill the place of Giganto, who also appears in the first issue.
   13. Reed and Sue plan their marriage in a subplot. This is mainly to provide laughs. This shouldn’t be the main point of the movie besides to provide Johnny with more reason to be rebellious because they won’t pay attention to him.
   14. Conclude it with the four coming together to fight for the first time. Reed and Sue get married with a Stan Lee cameo (if applicable) and end the movie.
   15. Post Credit Scene: Zoom into the ocean to find Atlantis. Go into the throne room and have Namor sitting there telling his troops to prepare to launch an attack on the Fantastic Four. The second post credit scene has Silver Surfer bowing down to Galactus. Much like the first Avengers Movie with the Thanos post credit scene, giving a promise to fans that he’s coming eventually.
   16. That’s it for the first movie in the trilogy. Even though it’s smaller than I would’ve liked it to be, especially since Marvel wants to go cosmic and that’s the Fantastic Four’s specialty, I feel like it’s a good introduction to the characters you’re going to spend the next 10-20 years with.
   17. I‘ll be back to talk about the rest of the trilogy for Fantastic Four, and also how I would introduce the X-Men into the MCU which will be much trickier to pull off.
   18. I have a lot of free time on my hands.