The cast of the MCU’s Fantastic Four film was recently revealed to great enthusiasm across Hollywood and fandom alike, with the team’s official entrance into Marvel’s sprawling live-action universe arriving in theaters just over a year from now on July 25, 2025. And despite them being a cornerstone of Marvel Comics as its “First Family,” The Fantastic Four weren’t seen at all in the Infinity Saga — a problem that can be addressed by taking cues from their countless comic adventures!
A team consisting of Reed Richards, Sue Storm, Johnny Storm, and Ben Grimm, The Fantastic Four have been fighting the good fight ever since their inception in 1961, a time period their upcoming MCU film has been hinted to be set in.
If this is the case, then the MCU’s version of these characters were already in-universe when the Infinity Saga happened but were nowhere to be found, with The Fantastic Four’s absence during these events being something that’s as comic-accurate as Reed and Sue falling in love and Johnny and Ben being best buddies.
Fantastic Four: This Early Multiverse Story Is the Perfect Way to Bring Marvel’s First Family Into the MCU (Without Doing an Origin Story)
A 1970s Fantastic Four arc, featuring one of Marvel’s earliest multiverse adventures, would be a seamless way to bring the team into the MCU.
The Fantastic Four Were Technically “Snapped” During The Infinity Gauntlet Event
Confirmed to have been “snapped” during the epic struggle against Thanos as seen in the seminal Marvel Comics story, The Infinity Gauntlet, by Jim Starlin, George Perez, and Ron Lim, this comic moment easily explains the FF’s non-existence in the MCU for the latter part of the Infinity Saga, as it can be said that they were somewhere in the MCU but had been erased along with half of the universe during “The Snap.” And while this is comic-accurate, it doesn’t cover where they were previously or where they were afterward. Luckily, that can also be explained via comic canon.
Seen traveling the multiverse post-Secret Wars when Reed, Sue, and their kids, Valeria and Franklin, went off on their own to quite literally rebuild universes, this temporary hiatus leaving Earth-616’s reality could easily carry over as the explanation for why the team didn’t partake in the Infinity Saga — The Fantastic Four quite literally weren’t in their home universe. Furthermore, given their adventurer status, the team could also have been exploring other far-off places at the time, or even more plausible for the MCU, were trapped in the Quantum Realm, much like how the original Wasp was.
The Fantastic Four Might Have Been Exploring The MCU During Infinity War
Regardless of how or why it happens in comics, Reed Richards, Sue Storm, Johnny Storm, and Ben Grimm are known for going missing for extended periods of time, something the MCU can run with when trying to explain where they were during the Infinity Saga, while also acting as a built-in reason for how they eventually make the jump from the 1960s to present day. The Fantastic Four’s MCU debut is swiftly approaching, so fans shouldn’t be surprised when the reason behind where they’ve been this whole time is revealed to be a truth ripped right from the comic panel.
