Pedro Pascal, Vanessa Kirby part of Marvel Studios’ ‘The Fantastic Four’

Los Angeles, Feb 15 (PTI) Pedro Pascal, Vanessa Kirby, Joseph Quinn and Ebon Moss-Bachrach are set to headline the cast of “The Fantastic Four” from Marvel Studios.

The film also marks the entry of the superhero quartet Pascal’s Reed Richards (Mr. Fantastic), Sue Storm (the Invisible Woman) to be played by Kirby, Johnny Storm/ the Human Torch to be essayed by Quinn, and Moss-Bachrach as Ben Grimm, also known as the Thing in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) after 20th Century Fox’s merger with The Walt Disney Company in 2019.

Matt Shakman of “WandaVision” fame will direct “The Fantastic Four”, from a screenplay by Josh Friedman, Jeff Kaplan and Ian Springer, reported Variety.

Based on the first characters created for Marvel Comics by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, Disney will release “The Fantastic Four” on July 25, 2025.

True to Marvel fashion, details about the story are scarce. According to the comics, the Fantastic Four are astronauts who obtain superpowers after they are exposed to cosmic rays in space.

Reed can stretch his body to astonishing lengths, Sue (also Reed’s girlfriend and eventual wife) can manipulate light to become invisible and cast powerful force fields, Johnny (Sue’s brother) can turn his body into fire which gives him the ability to fly, and Ben (Reed’s best friend) is transformed into a body of giant, orange boulders giving him super strength.

Previously, Fox produced three films with the characters: “Fantastic Four” and “Fantastic Four: The Rise of the Silver Surfer”, released in 2005 and 2007, respectively, and starred Ioan Gruffudd as Reed, Jessica Alba as Sue, Michael Chiklis as Ben and Chris Evans as Johnny.

In 2015, Fox rebooted the franchise with Miles Teller, Kate Mara, Jamie Bell and Michael B Jordan, but did poorly both with critics and at the box office.