It’s no secret that the Galactus from Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer wasn’t that faithful to the source material. Sure, it still consumed planets, but this Galactus was depicted as a sentient cloud rather than a humanoid entity. This July’s The Fantastic Four: First Steps won’t repeat that mistake, as Ralph Ineson’s Galactus will look much more like his comic book counterpart. As if that isn’t good enough news, it’s also pleasing to hear that the upcoming Marvel movie didn’t rely solely on motion-capture to bring this new version of the Devourer of Worlds to life.
It certainly would have been easy enough for Ineson to just act out his Galactus scene wearing a standard motion capture suits and then create the antagonist’s look entirely through CGI. However, First Steps director Matt Shakman decided it was important for the actor to actually wear purple and blue armor when performing the character on set, telling EW:
I didn't want to just use motion-capture for Galactus. I wanted to actually have someone there embodying the part. So we've built an entire costume for him, and we've done a lot of photography testing to figure out, How do you make sure that the scale is correct? How do you film Mount Rushmore?
While I do still have concerns about Galactus’ size in The Fantastic Four: First Steps, I appreciate that Shakman went the extra mile to have Ralph Ineson actually look like Galactus during principal photography. It helped with figuring out just how this cosmic baddie should be depicted in live-action, and it was also noted in the article that “the costume workshop on set is full of various attempts at making his signature look work.” I’m sure Galactus would have looked just fine as a purely motion-capture creation, but also including the practical element improved the chances of his look being the best it can be.
Although the first Fantastic Four trailer showed the back of Galactus’ head, it remains to be seen if we’ll get our first full look at the towering baddie in the next trailer or be saved for the superhero flick’s release on the 2025 movies schedule. The same goes for Galactus’ herald, The Silver Surfer, although CinemaCon attendees got a sneak peek at Julia Garner’s character from exclusive First Steps footage shown at the event. Mole Man is also expected to appear in the movie, but don’t expect to see Doctor Doom causing trouble too, despite him being the Fantastic Four’s arch-nemesis in the comics.
Ralph Ineson and Julia Garner are joined in The Fantastic Four: First Steps by Pedro Pascal, Vanessa Kirby, Ebon Moss-Bachrach, Paul Walter Hauser, John Malkovich, Natasha Lyonne and Sarah Niles. Catch the movie in theaters starting July 25.
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