What Just Happened? Explaining the "The Fantastic Four: First Steps" Post-Credits Scenes

This is the one Marvel fans have been waiting for. The Fantastic Four have finally come to the Marvel Cinematic Universe and they’re here to finally set up the next Avengers film. Marvel’s first family is here to usher in the new era of the MCU, and they got two post-credits scenes with which to do it.

That’s right, The Fantastic Four: First Steps has both a mid- and a post-credits scene.

The Fantastic Four: First Steps spoilers ahead!

First, some context. The film reaches its climax with the heroes defeating Galactus with a little help from the Silver Surfer. However, it appears as though Sue Storm was killed in the process, after she over exerted herself in order to force Galactus into a wormhole. After a brief emotional moment that will have audiences muttering “are they really going to kill her off?" and “maybe this Reed will meet up with John Krasinski’s Sue," Sue is revived by Franklin, her son who bears the power cosmic and served as a sort of human MacGuffin for the whole film.

That was our first taste of the power of Franklin Richards and it is apparent that the whole team becomes aware they will be seeing a lot more of it in the future.

Now that we’ve covered that, let’s get into the mid-credits scene.

Doom?

The mid-credits scene time jumps to four years in the future and opens with Sue reading “The Very Hungry Caterpillar" to Franklin. A fitting book given the ravenous space god we just saw them defeat. Once they’ve finished, Sue goes off to find another one of Franklin’s favorite books. After Herbie suggests a philosophy book, proving that Franklin is taking after Reed already, Sue finds the one she was looking for.

However, things get tense as Sue senses someone else in the room. She slowly approaches to find a figure in a green cloak kneeling at Franklin. Franklin appears to be touching the man’s face. In the man’s hand we can see the iconic Doctor Doom mask before the scene ends.

Okay, here we go. We’ve got our first look at Doctor Doom. This is getting exciting. We also learn from the credits that the score for this scene is titled “Doom?" and it is composed by none other than Alan Silvestri, who scored the previous Avengers films.

But let’s take a closer look at the few seconds we got to see Doom on screen here. As you likely know, or could at least infer, Doom wears his iconic mask to hide his scarred face. Throughout his storied history, he has always been a bit obsessed with his appearance and repairing his face. It’s even a bit of a storyline in the 2015 “Secret Wars" comic arc that will be adapted for Avengers: Secret Wars.

That appears to be true here as well. Doom would likely have seen Franklin’s power in action by now. Whether he saw him revive Sue after they defeated Galactus or something else occurred in the ensuing four years, Doom now knows of the child’s abilities. And with Franklin apparently touching his face in this brief scene, it appears Doom wants the child to fix his scars.

It should also be noted that, earlier in the film, we saw a meeting of the Future Foundation, a governing body founded by Sue Storm to help solve the world’s problems. In that meeting, we panned across to see members of several nations before eventually seeing an empty seat marked for Latveria. This is the home country of Doom. It would appear he was already a bit at odds with Sue or maybe the Fantastic Four as a whole. Perhaps, these characters have a bit of a history prior to the events of this film.

So with that, we now have Doctor Doom in the MCU. Surely, the post-credits scene will further that and explain why the Fantastic Four was heading to Earth-616 in the post-credits scene of Thunderbolts*, right? Right?!

That’s just in the cartoon

Well let’s slow things down a bit. Marvel does have a formula to these things. We typically get one scene that furthers the over-arcing story of the MCU as a whole and one that’s just for comic relief. These scenes followed that same formula.

Instead of an explanation as to the team’s arrival on Earth-616, we get an animated title sequence for the in-universe cartoon that was alluded to earlier in the film. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a great theme song and it looks better than the animated Fantastic Four series from the ‘90s, it’s just not quite what a lot of Marvel fans were hoping for.

So yes, these scenes followed the typical formula, but the problem is the mid-credits scene didn’t quite further that over-arcing story enough. It has been six years, 15 movies and 12 television series since Avengers: Endgame and fans have been more than a little antsy to the universe to start connecting again. And with a year and a half and only Spider-Man: Brand New Day and a few more series separating us from the new Avengers title, this was supposed to be the film that brought it all together.

Yes, we got a glimpse of Doom. We did not, however, get an explanation as to why the Fantastic Four jump to another dimension or how the heroes of Earth-616 are going to be involved in this highly anticipated film. There are countless characters and a very long row of chairs for the actors who play them in this film, so perhaps a little bit of set up would have been nice before we get to a theater on December 18, 2026.

Instead, we’ll have to wait another 17 months with our questions, with just a glimpse of Doom to hold us over.

Marvel’s The Fantastic Four: First Steps is in theaters now.