Fantastic Four: First Steps Learned an Important Lesson from the 1994 Roger Corman Movie
Disney drew inspiration from the early attempts to bring Marvel’s First Family to life. When The Fantastic Four: First Steps premiered earlier this year, audiences hoped to finally see the team fully realized. Previous adaptations struggled to capture the essence of the source material before Pedro Pascal, Vanessa Kirby, Joseph Quinn, and Ebon Moss-Bachrach took on the roles.
The 2015 adaptation leaned too far into dark body horror, while the 2005 and 2007 films added humor but couldn’t match the scope and heart of Stan Lee and Jack Kirby’s comics. The 1994 Roger Corman production, famously never released, became an unexpected point of reference for Disney’s latest effort.
“They did a lot of things right in that movie,” said producer Grant Curtis in a new behind-the-scenes featurette released by Marvel. “One of the things I think they did extremely well was the character relationships. It holds up… Those were very real relationships that, when we did our homework and looked at the movie early on, we took note.”
The 1994 version, despite its limitations, remains a fascinating artifact in superhero film history and even helped shape how First Steps portrayed its characters today.
Author’s Summary
The creators of Fantastic Four: First Steps found unexpected creative lessons in Roger Corman’s unreleased 1994 film, emphasizing authentic character relationships over spectacle.