Matt Shakman’s “Fantastic Four: First Steps” also features the return of the cosmic being Galactus and his enigmatic herald, the Silver Surfer. In the film, the Fantastic Four face off against the Silver Surfer and Galactus as the world devourer threatens the safety of their planet — and their family.

As the filmmaker’s three-year journey wound down on the project, he realized a key moment was missing, and managed to shoot it within a few months of the film's opening.

First Steps" brings a new supergroup into the MCU while a post-credits scene gives a taste of an iconic supervillain. Spoilers!

Garner also noted that she’s portraying Shalla-Bal, a female iteration of the Silver Surfer, and not Norrin Radd, the male version of the character who was played Doug Jones and voiced by Laurence Fishburne in 2007’s “Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer.”

Is the new “Fantastic Four” movie fantastic? No, and not everyone will love the amount of downtime in this one. But good is good enough for a Marvel superhero movie these days.

After an infamously unreleased low budget Roger Corman treatment in 1994, two coolly received noughties movies, and the total car crash that was Josh Trank’s 2015 reboot, Matt Shakman is about to have another go with The Fantastic Four: First Steps.

The new “Fantastic Four” blends a retro sensibility with a type of optimism that is reflective of a reboot in the comic book movie industry itself.