THE FANTASTIC FOUR: FIRST STEPS

This is a superhero movie built around something rarer than powers or explosions: a family deciding to protect what it loves. Reed Richards and Sue Storm are expecting a child, and the fear, joy, and fierce protectiveness that follow drive every scene — even the ones involving a planet-devouring cosmic giant. Director Matt Shakman and his editors build that premise to a fever pitch, mixing real heart with plenty of humor to keep the movie's dialogue-heavy stretches moving.

The cost is real peril. Galactus is a legitimately scary villain, the action is strong throughout, and much of the danger circles directly around a helpless infant — enough that younger children may need to sit this one out.

For older kids and adults, though, this is superhero filmmaking that earns its four stars and its heart. Take the family, just leave the little ones home.

Four years after cosmic rays gave Reed Richards, Sue Storm, Johnny Storm, and Ben Grimm their powers, Sue tells Reed she's unexpectedly pregnant — and Reed's scientific mind immediately starts worrying whether the radiation that changed them will affect their baby. Before the family can settle into that joy, a silver-clad messenger arrives from outer space with terrifying news: a ravenous cosmic being named Galactus has marked Earth for destruction, and he's coming to devour it.

Four stars means this is exceptional work, and the source material here backs that up scene by scene. Shakman handles a huge comic-book premise — a devouring cosmic god, a herald who glides across galaxies, a grand 1960s-inspired future — with real craft, and he pulls off the harder trick too: making the quieter, dialogue-heavy family moments land just as hard as the spectacle. The humor is well-placed, easing tension without undercutting it.

The one honest complaint is that it may leave you wanting more — a sign of a movie that earns your investment rather than one that overstays it.

This is a movie unusually clear about what it believes matters: family, and the duty to protect it. The script leans hard on the importance of fathers and mothers, on sacrifice, and on extended family — Johnny and Ben commit themselves as uncles to a baby who isn't blood kin to Ben at all. Reed and Sue's fear for their unborn child is treated with real tenderness rather than played for cheap stakes, and the story is unmistakably pro-life in its instincts.

The villain matters too. Galactus is written as a demonic figure — one who destroys and devours, who threatens mother, child, and family alike. Some characters call him a "space god," but the film itself corrects that: by the end, he's shown to be no god at all, just an appetite. That's a worldview choice worth noticing — the film refuses to let raw power masquerade as divinity.

What the movie ultimately argues is that mindless destruction and rapacious greed can never be satisfied and never ease pain — only sacrifice, ingenuity, and love do that. Scripture says something sharper still: "Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends" (John 15:13). A superhero movie that puts a family, not a weapon, at the center of its climax is closer to that truth than most.

This is a superhero movie with its priorities straight: family first, spectacle second, and both handled with real craft. It's scary and intense enough to earn caution for younger kids, but for older children and adults, it's a rare comic-book film that leaves you moved as much as entertained. Our verdict stands: worth the trip — ages 10 and up.