Where The MCU’s Fantastic Four Could Go Next…

WARNING: The following article contains spoilers for The Fantastic Four: First Steps.

It’s been a little over a month since the Fantastic Four got their well-deserved welcome to the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

At the end of their film, The Fantastic Four: First Steps, you might recall the family defeating Galactus with the help of Silver Surfer. By using a superpowered portal, they were able to transport him to a distant galaxy millions of light years away from Earth-828.

For the time being, everything is back to normal. Baby Franklin Richards is safe and the Fantastic Four are still their world’s primary saviors. But the question remains: What is next for the superhero family quartet?

WHAT WE KNOW

In the film’s mid-credit scene, we fast-forward 4 years into the future. Franklin Richards is now a toddler (approximately 4 years old). He’s spending time with his mother, Sue, in the Baxter Building. When she goes to the kitchen to find a book to read to Franklin, all of sudden she finds a potentially familiar person playing with her son. The iconic green cloak and unmistakable metal mask he holds tells us that it’s none other than Victor Von Doom a.k.a Doctor Doom. For anyone who somehow missed the major casting announcement months ago, the scene is further confirmation that the family will play a pivotal role in the MCU’s next major ensemble: Avengers: Doomsday.

While the project is currently shooting in the United Kingdom, both this film’s post-credit sequence and the one scene at the end of Thunderbolts* were actually shot by the Russo Brothers. We know this because director Matt Shakman confirmed it in a recent interview with Entertainment Weekly.

Despite not seeing his face, it has also been confirmed that the Doctor Doom in the post-credits sequence is Robert Downey Jr.

WHAT WE CAN PIECE TOGETHER

Plot details are scarce about the film, but given that we know Doom has his sights set on Franklin, it seems logical to assume he’s going to be used as a some sort of bargaining chip. But for what? With Doomsday being the first in a duology, it’s likely we may not know until its follow-up, Avengers: Secret Wars comes out a year later.

In the comic book series titled Secret Wars by Jonathan Hickman, Victor Von Doom is the main villain who orchestrates the destruction of the Marvel Multiverse as different universes colliding altogether. At this point, we don’t know for certain if that’s what the film will be about. But considering the title and several cast members returning from other non-MCU projects, it would also be a pretty good assumption to make.

In case you have stopped keeping track, at the very least we should expect wthe original Avengers, the New Avengers (or Thunderbolts*), and the original live-action X-Men to return. That’s not including the other major heroes also confirmed to be returning such as Thor, Namor and Deadpool.

If this is the route the Russos are taking fans on, it’s important to note that The Fantastic Four (and particularly Reed Richards) are integral to the storyline.

But even after Doomsday and Secret Wars, what else could the future hold for the family?

WHAT WE PREDICT

In a recent Disney earnings call, Disney CEO Bob Iger confirmed that the studio is happy with the success of launching an “important franchise” into the Marvel Universe. He’s referring to the Fantastic Four.

After scooping up rights to the heroes in the 2018 20th Century Fox merger, it truly felt like a mission to bring the heroes home. After previous adaptations of the heroes were universally panned by both critics and audiences, it’s about time they were done justice.They are Marvel Comics’ first superhero team after all.

With a catalog of adventures going back decades (their first comic issue written by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby all the way back in the early 1960s), there’s no telling who or what The Fantastic Four could be up against next. On top of Galactus and the Silver Surfer, the film manages to introduce and namedrop numerous other iconic foes including Mole Man, Red Ghost and Diablo.

But whether they see any of those foes again depends on if they actually remain in their universe. Could they lose their home to an incursion? Could Galactus return to finish the job? Or could tangling with Doom force them to flee their world in search of stability elsewhere? Unlike many of the other heroes we’ve been introduced to, the possibilities really do seem endless.

And while there is a path for Marvel Cinematic Universe to be truly “fantastic,” we won’t know for sure until we see how they are handled when they return in Doomsday.

The Fantastic Four: First Steps is currently playing in theaters worldwide.

You can check out for The Fantastic Four: First Steps here.