Why does the promotional art for the first step of Fantastic Four look so strange? The film is clearly trying to set a retro vibe, so some of the clumsiness is intentional, but some of it is really weird.
When I saw this official Marvel promotion come out of the cover of a mock magazine, I thought it was a staple of all superhero movies.
Some versions have no type.
There are many mistakes in this. Putting aside what’s going on in Johnny’s pants, the blatant return of this broken, broken pose is extremely shocking. As we don’t forget, the broke back is a pose, with women facing viewers both on their face and ass (most of the time). It is mainly used for cheesecakes and the idea of People Magazine using Brokeback to promote their families is very troublesome. As you can see from this People Magazine cover gallery, the cute pose-like poses that Reed and Sue have are certainly very common, but they rarely use them to show off Pert Bum. (By the way, no magazines existed until 1974.) Even Jennifer Aniston remained in two dimensions.
I have already written one post about the FFFS Poster Campaign. Along with the first teaser trailer, four retro posters showing the crowd evoking a sense of warm, old timing, were soon followed by AI. The defense came soon. There’s no AI, just bad Photoshop. Well.
It’s a bit difficult to release promotional art with actual studio releases from fanmade posters, but I think these are all official releases.
The above Presale poster came for online criticism from people who think they are awake. I admit, that’s odd. While the lead with that “bold first step” pose is suitable for the brand, all posters try hard to make it look like Alex Roth painted tomorrow. The posters are sincerely trying to become fakes, but they are off as fake fakes for me.
We don’t scrutinise spoiler sites and don’t know much about the film. At least I don’t do that because I’m trying to watch the movie with fresh eyes. We know that it’s set in the alternative past and that director Matt Shakman really well fakes retro with Wanda Vision, one of the few ind game MCU projects that are actually worth watching. The end of Thunderbolts (spoiler) suggested that FF would advance to Earth-199999. All the mentions of trailers and promotional art are people, people! Wandavision had the same arch, a deliberately robust sitcom approach found in many FFFS materials. It’s a bold and dangerous take, but it’s a worthwhile risk to take to keep your FF concept up to date for those over 60. There’s a bit of retro fun, a little time travel, and a catchy remix. However, in Wandavision, this approach was a deep denial of a grieving woman. Here, it is intentional.
If the above poster doesn’t land completely for me, this was to showcase the sales of Cinema’s advance.
This FF actually looks better. In particular, this provides one of the few examples of lead stretches we have seen. It is speculated that stretch power will not translate well into filming. While the idea of extensible Pedro Pascal is appealing, it can be difficult to make it plausible. In contrast, a human torch is 11 and it is difficult to ruin things unless you give him a beard.
I’m not sure if this is an official poster, but it brings something else. All of these promotions are trying to contribute to a very well-known art style, but the final effect is often made of wood.
For example, the above poster appears to reference the work of the great Robert McGinnis these days. McGinnis was primarily focused on beautiful women, but he also did some James Bond posters.
The textured background of the FFFS poster is a hallmark of art from the 60s, and McGinnis used it a lot.
Alex Ross is another touchpoint. Ross has a strong history of collaborating with FF in the comics, and you can see how dramatic and intriguing his take is.
That sideshow poster is everything you can expect in the teaser image. Fire, rocks, forcefields and stretches are all dynamically displayed, with the horizontal surface at the bottom capturing the dangers and strength of the original FF’s unfortunate space journey. In the first step of Fantastic Four, they are skipping origins because they are so outdated. In fact, you don’t need more than this poster to tell the entire story.
Another element the campaign is about to evoke is Tomorrowland, where future Disneyland takes are immediately dated. We made some parts of Tomorrowland (Space Mountain) look futuristic, but they knew they would look very quickly like yesterday, so we looked for the whole retro fturian look. You might say it was invented in Tomorrowland.
Thinking about this made me dive deep into Tomorrowland concept art, but couldn’t find it online. One of Tomorrowland’s main designers was the legendary imaginary John Hench. He also worked on the enchanting Tiki Room and the 1964 World Fair.
I couldn’t find art specifically for him, but here is the concept art for tomorrow and some sample posts.
Syd Mead, the greatest futurist and designer of Blade Runner, did not work at the theme park at Tomorrowland, but he created a promotional poster for Brad Bird Movie.
(HM I’m a Bradbird fan, but I’ve never seen it… is that bad?)
Finally, my google found some odds and endings worth noting. A concept artist from Marvel Studios named Mushk Rizvi accidentally posted some of her concept art to the cloud, and Reddit and everyone else found it. These are pretty good so I hope she wasn’t fired. There are lots of spoilers in the link.
One of the FF Family Dinners is actually more appealing than some of the released ones.
I also found this Fantastic for First Steps 2026 calendar, which has the most images from the Style Guide.
I’ll leave it to you to decide if this is what you want to hang on your wall or not.
I also found this fan poster by Mickael Journou. This isn’t official art, but it does give me the idea that the People Magazine cover was. And that’s the problem.
To sum up: I don’t dislike the MCU, but I am a phase 6 skeptic. Most importantly, MCU films are just as loved and successful as they are, but are not known for their incredible concept art and visuals. It is pretty well known that the film is planned for Previz. Everyone wants the MCU to be unlocked and try something new. They don’t actually do that except for the Guardians of the Galaxy trilogy, which had baby steps. In the first step of Fantastic Four, the MCU is trying to do something really different. All the promotional campaigns were on top of it. There was no MCU movie like this. And 18 and 36 years from now, it’s time! But the execution here doesn’t stimulate much confidence.
Anyway, for me. I’m a huge fan of movie concept art! I think a short version of this whole essay might be “Alex Ross should have done these.” As I pointed out before, Ross probably was too expensive or uninterested. No one should be criticized for not Alex Ross. He is truly a singular talent that is a modern version of Norman Rockwell. But for fun and playful campaigns, these come across as if they’re trying too hard. The bottom line is that a lot of things are riding on the first step of the Fantastic Four for Marvel and Disney. And that shows.
Footnote: An interview with John Hench. This includes a shocking passage about Pirates of the Caribbean.
And finally, the “It could be worse!” category is the posters of the previous two versions of FF on-screen.
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