‘Fantastic Four’: Pedro Pascal In Talks to Play Reed Richards
One of the busiest actors in Hollywood is about to get a lot more on his plate. Pedro Pascal is apparently Marvel’s top choice to play Reed Richards in the forthcoming Fantastic Four film. He’s been offered the job and is expected to take it, according to several insiders.
All hell broke lose on the Internet today when insider Daniel Richtman posted on his Patreon page that Pascal has the offer and should sign soon, with an official announcement from Marvel coming right after. Jeff Sneider piled on on Twitter, saying his was a name he’d heard last week but couldn’t share (he’d hinted at something along those lines during the Hot Mic podcast). He added that he has been Marvel’s top choice to play the character for a couple of months. /Film then followed up saying a deal is not just close; it’s done. But don’t pop the champagne just yet…
Deadline joined the party soon after, saying multiple sources close to the negotiations are telling them it’s heading in the right direction, but it’s far from done yet. One of the main concerns at this point is, of course, the actor’s schedule. The Hollywood Reporter has also backed it up.
Pascal is currently expected to return to the Gladiator 2 set imminently, and would also be required on the set of the second season of HBO’s The Last of Us, albeit for a smaller part this time around (if the video game’s story is followed closely). However, the HBO series was expected to have a similar schedule as Matt Shakman’s Fantastic Four, starting to film in the first few months of 2024, which may have Pascal’s team in a constant back and forth with HBO and Marvel Studios. He’s also set to return as the titular character in The Mandalorian season 4, though, much like in the third season, his role would primarily be voice-centric.
Pascal is currently nominated for an Emmy for his turn as Joel Miller in The Last of Us.
Marvel is ramping up pre-production on Fantastic Four now that the strikes are over and they can move full steam ahead with casting. Reports from earlier this summer suggested that Vanessa Kirby would star as Sue Storm/the Invisible Woman. That same report had Joseph Quinn as The Thing, though the latest Internet rumors have pivoted to Ebon Moss-Bachrach. It should be noted, however, that the trades who’ve backed up Pascal’s negotiations are saying that the other three roles in Marvel’s First Family are still vacant.
That would seem contrary to what most insiders had been saying, as apparently the lead of the film is Sue Storm. She was the first person Marvel wanted to cast and later build the team around her. That may have also been problematic to find the proper actor to play Reed, as they needed/wanted a top-tier name that could also play second fiddle to another actress. For now, though, don’t put too much stock into it.
In terms of the rest of the movie, Sneider said on the most recent episode of the Hot Mic that, apparently, Silver Surfer will be female. Galactus is expected to be the main villain of the film; Antonio Banderas was thought to be circling the role earlier this year, but nothing has come of that since. Additionally, the story is set to introduce Doctor Doom, a character that would be key to Marvel’s future per the Internet’s latest speculation, especially amid the latest troubles Marvel has run into with Kang and Jonathan Majors. Will they recast the part of Kang or move on from the character and his variants altogether? We don’t know yet, but Doom will certainly play a big role moving forward.
Marvel may be looking at announcing the full Fantastic Four team really soon. Matt Shakman, who directs the movie, has an Apple TV Plus series coming out on Friday, Monarch: Legacy of Monsters. Wouldn’t that be nice timing?
Miguel Fernández is a Spanish student that has movies as his second passion in life. His favorite movie of all time is The Lord of the Rings, but he is also a huge Star Wars fan. However, fantasy movies are not his only cup of tea, as authors like Scorsese, Fincher, Kubrick or Hitchcock have been an obsession for him since he started to understand the language of filmmaking. He is that guy who will watch a black and white movie, just because it is in black and white.
