I'm not taking sides in the Marvel vs. DC debate because it's never made sense to me: across all media—including comics, television, film, and more—both companies have produced brilliant works from some of the greatest minds in history, and they've also produced plenty of trash and mush. The breadth of each includes such a wide variety of adventures and dramas that a blanket comparison is meaningless. Any Marvel fan could easily find something DC that suits their tastes, and the same goes for DC fans who read or watch something created by Marvel.
A macro judgment about the two is meaningless… but the micro comparison is still valid, and in July 2025, both Marvel Studios and DC Studios will release films that are truly fascinating to compare. Director Matt Shakman's Fantastic Four: First Steps and James Gunn's Superman occupy very different positions within their respective franchises (the former is the 37th film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe and technically outside of canon; the latter is the first blockbuster in the nascent DC Universe), but similar approaches have been taken for both: due to the protagonists' immense pop cultural standing, filmmakers have felt free to skip traditional origin stories and instead opt to immerse audiences in their already developing lives as heroes.
Director: Matt Shakman
Writers: Josh Friedman, Eric Pearson, Jeff Kaplan
Stars: Pedro Pascal, Vanessa Kirby, Ebon Moss-Bachrach
It's a logical approach for both, but it produces extremely different results for each, and the difference comes down to story versus plot. In Superman, the personalities, motivations, and aspirations of all the main characters are perfectly clear, and everything that unfolds is based on the actions they take and the resulting consequences. In Fantastic Four: First Steps, on the other hand, things just happen. The entire world has a very specific aesthetic, and the heroes feel familiar, but there's never any organic growth or natural depth. Everything feels too structured as threats present themselves and obstacles arise to protecting the world. There are no interesting personalities or story arcs, and everything is so routine it's boring.
With screenplay credits from Josh Friedman, Eric Pearson, Jeff Kaplan, and Ian Springer, Fantastic Four: First Steps begins when Marvel's first family receives news of the arrival of a new member. Four years after a space mission and an encounter with a cosmic storm that granted them superpowers, Reed Richards, aka Mr. Fantastic (Pedro Pascal), and Sue Storm, aka The Invisible Woman (Vanessa Kirby), discover they are expecting a baby, much to the delight of Johnny Storm, aka The Human Torch (Joseph Quinn), and Ben Grimm, aka The Thing (Ebon Moss-Bachrach). One of the film's many montages quickly runs through the following months, including baby preparations and various scientific experiments. But shortly before Sue's due date, the team encounters a visitor from space.
Shalla-Bal, aka the Silver Surfer (Julia Garner), lands in Times Square and informs the Fantastic Four and the rest of the planet that Earth has been attacked by the world-devouring entity known as Galactus (Ralph Ineson), and that their lives will soon be over. To stop this catastrophe, Reed, Sue, Johnny, and Ben embark on their first trip into space since their fateful accident to attempt to negotiate with the voracious Celestial. There, they are presented with a choice: the only way to save their home and all of humanity is to give up their unborn child.
To be fair to Fantastic Four: First Steps, the narrative plot points come from the comics, but when assembled in this film, everything feels contrived and superficial. Reed and Sue's baby isn't introduced so we can see how its presence radically changes the parents' lives; it only happens as a way to set up the offer to save the world by sacrificing their child (perfect proof of this: there's not even any talk of nine-months-pregnant Sue skipping the dangerous trip into space, as the plot requires Galactus to scan her womb and recognize the fetus's potential).
Everything is constructed with such rigor that it diminishes its importance, and the extreme focus on simple plot synopsis means that no time is ever spent creating unique story arcs for the protagonists that would help us understand who they really are. You could say that Reed tests his personal mettle as a new father, as this triggers his need to intellectualize everything and increases his anxiety, but that simply relegates Sue to the "loving, emotionally charged mother" category, and that's not a determining factor.
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