The secret message hidden in the Fantastic Four cast announcement

Marvel gave us the best Valentine’s Day gift imaginable this year when the studio behind the most popular superhero franchise in history finally announced the cast of their upcoming Fantastic Four movie.

Yes, after (quite literally half a decade) of speculation and rumors, we now know that Marvel’s first family will be played by Pedro Pascal, Vanessa Kirby, Ebon Moss-Bachrach, and Joseph Quinn. It’s an exciting time to be a Marvel fan, yet I don’t think learning the Fantastic Four cast is what made this announcement so thrilling.

No, I think there’s more to this kitschy-looking Valentine’s Day card than meets the eye. You see, Marvel (or the person who made this for Marvel) has deliberately chosen a retro design for this fantastic reveal, even referencing the obscure ’70s Marvel animated character H.E.R.B.I.E. in the art. So what does it mean?

Back to the ’60s

Well, I could be overthinking it, but everything about the card – from the furniture to the stylized Marvel logo and H.E.R.B.I.E. himself – seems like a deliberate throwback to the past, specifically the ’60s and ’70s. That hints at two things. The first is that the Fantastic Four MCU movie won’t be set in the present-day MCU. Instead, we’ll take a trip back in time, to the days before the Avenger assembled, to the ’60s or ’70s.

Now, the more dedicated MCU scholars may note that SHIELD existed during this time, and surely someone in the organization would have mentioned the Four before now. Well, that’s a good point, but it’s a relatively easy one to get around within the film’s narrative. The Four could have been involved in an adventure so secretive that not even SHIELD knew about them. Of course, there’s another possibility.

I believe that the answer to the Fantastic Four’s absence in the present-day MCU is hidden in the Valentine’s card announcing the cast, and this brings me to my second point. I think the card’s ’60s aesthetic is deliberately designed to evoke a feeling that the Four are literally out of time.

That’s right, we’ve never heard of the Fantastic Four in another MCU movie because whatever adventure they go on in their first film will end with them lost in time. That might sound crazy, but stay with us.

In the comics, the Four have always been adventurers first and superheroes second, so it makes sense for their first MCU outing to end with them off exploring. With that in mind, we know they’ve not been in space because The Guardians would have run into them by now, surely? So, if they’re not lost in space, where are they? Well, they’re clearly lost in time! Quite how that happens, we don’t know, but we’re willing to eat a Reed Richards action figure if we’re wrong.

That’s the secret of the Fantastic Four announcement. It’s not meant to reveal the cast. It’s meant to tease the promise of a sci-fi time travel romp. The only question now is how Doom fits into all this…