India, July 25 -- For a studio once capable of turning obscure comic-book characters into global billion-dollar phenomena, Marvel has spent the post-Endgame years behaving like a magician who's forgotten how to pull a rabbit out of a hat - and keeps blaming the audience. After a string of bloated sequels, forgettable series, and increasingly tangled timelines, the studio has finally delivered something that feels like. well, a movie. Fantastic Four: First Steps may not reinvent the genre, but it does something arguably more impressive - it makes the superhero film fun again.

Directed by Matt Shakman (WandaVision), this much-needed reboot brings Marvel's First Family back to life with a kitschy, retro-futurist twist set in an alternate 19...