Who Could Be the Villain in Fantastic Four 2?

The new Fantastic Four movie hits in less than a week — so of course, in true comic book fan fashion, we’re looking forward to the next big event, scheduled for a few years down the line.

As in — with Doom out of the way, who will Marvel’s First Family take on in the sequel? Assuming, of course, that it isn’t more Doom (in case that seemed like a good idea after last time) or the X-Men (since heroes fighting heroes instead of villains is just a thing that happens now).

There’s a lot we don’t know about the rights situation for FOX’s Fantastic Four franchise, so we’ll have to just work through this by assuming that villains primarily associated with the Four, and not previously used in other people’s movies, are fair game.

Except Namor. He’s all weird, and we’ll just skip it.

Either way, here’s our list:

Puppet Master

This one would have to be handled with care. Mind-control villains rarely turn out great stories, and visually, he’s not that striking a character.

That said? The grounded, personal approach to filmmaking that Josh Trank and the actors have all said is at the heart of Fantastic Four lends itself to the whole Alicia Masters drama that could come with using her father as the central villain. Probably the only downside to playing that card in the second film is that the previous, much-maligned FF franchise used her as well.

If there was a way to make Puppet Master a secondary threat, a la Harvey Elder in the current film, that would probably be the best approach, allowing him to be there, but not necessarily a focus, so that any manipulation he’s doing could be subtle and ultimately culminate in something cool and surprising, rather than overt and potentially a bit overplayed, as we saw with Hawkeye in The Avengers.

The Fearsome Four

In some way or another, it seems everyone is getting into the supervillain teams at this point.

In Captain America: Civil War, the heroes will be pitted against one another, forcing them into allegiances that will almost certainly be marked as “good heroes” and “bad heroes” by most fans watching. Sony has been trying to make the Sinister Six happen for a while now. And, of course, DC Entertainment and Warner Bros. are bringing the Suicide Squad to the big screen in a movie all their own.

So…what does all this have to do with the Frightful Four? Even though two of the four core characters are not Fox properties (Sandman goes to Spidey and Medusa to the Inhumans), the concept is a solid one: A group, probably put together by an outside force, that collects up villains who may not pose enough of a threat to take down the FF on their own but who, together, can really cause some headaches.

The leader of the group Bentley “The Wizard” Wittman could be portrayed as a kind of counterpart to Reed Richards. A brilliant scientist who uses his intellect for fame and personal gain rather than the benefit of the human race as Reed does, Wittman could even be seen as an alternative Doctor Doom without Doom’s baggage from the previous films and with his own set of super-powered flunkies. Peter “The Trapster” Petruski is actually a long-time villain with a set of interesting weapons in addition to his paste gun. So long as he isn’t referred to as “Paste Pot Pete” he can actually come across as a formidable nemesis. To fill out the roster, one could go with the traditional super-strong female (e.g., Thundra or Titania) and any one of the other oddball characters who have been on the team previously (e.g., Dragon Man, Absorbing Man, Blastaar, etc.).

Hell, if you really wanted to mix things up, their puppet master could be…err…the Puppet Master.

This indefatigable alien from the Planet Poppup could be a brilliant foil for the FF. He might not end up being the primary villain of the picture, but visually he could be an amazing spectacle.

A fun-loving imp with the ability to transform his body in any way imaginable through “instantaneous evolution,” there’s no end to the situations a talented writer could invent for him to get into. With modern CGI and special effects, we would love to see him transform his way through a fight against the full force of the Fantastic Four one minute and a bevy of comedic references the next.

One note though: Fox and Josh Trank, please, just leave out painful pop-culture references that will unavoidably date this film if you do use him.

There are a number of reasons why Annihilus would be a great villain for a Fantastic Four film. First, he resides in the Negative Zone, probably the trippiest alternate dimension in the Marvel Universe. Like Psycho-Man and the Microverse, Annihilus’ inclusion would be an excellent opportunity to depict a dimension of the Marvel Universe hitherto almost exclusively seen on the printed page.

As for Annihilus himself, he’s a giant, winged insectoid tyrant who can shoot laser blasts from the Cosmic Control Rod at his throat. He’s also got a horde of ravenous alien scavenger creatures at his beck and call which he uses to lay waste to planets within the Negative Zone and plans to conquer the main Marvel Universe.

Sure, his color scheme needs some work with all that pink, but a little reworking of his design with maybe some Xenomorph thrown in for good measure and you might have some movie magic. He also has the added perk of being tied into some of the darkest moments of FF history. He’s the villain who killed Johnny Storm, he almost caused Susan Richards to miscarry her first child, and he proceeded to terrorize Franklin Richards when he managed to break out of the Negative Zone and into the Baxter Building.

Though perhaps not an obvious choice, we stand by this one.

The Molecule Man is the villain who forces the Fantastic Four to ask, “How do you stop someone who can literally do anything?” Bathed in radiation from an experimental particle generator, Owen Reece gained the ability to rearrange and manipulate matter at a molecular level. He can change anything into anything else and move and shape all matter to his whim.

Imagine how much more dangerous Magneto would be if he could form metal out of thin air. The Molecule Man is more dangerous. In the comic in which he debuted, he was only beaten by being tricked into thinking his powers were gone and in a moment of weakness he was whisked away by the Watcher. This trick would not even have worked in later years once Reece realized that he was not limited to only affecting inorganic molecules.

In terms of film potential, the Molecule Man could make for some spectacular visuals. Just in his first appearance, he manifested ice, made building disappear, created objects from thin air, erected impenetrable shields, threw bolts of lightning, encased New York City in a giant glass cage, and propelled himself across the city on a slide arcing across the sky.

Terrax the Terrible

Terrax would be higher on the list but as a herald of Galactus his origin would need significant retooling, since it’s unlikely they’ll go back to Galactus right away. That being said, he still has a lot of potential.

He’s an imposing, rocky powerhouse with a gigantic cosmic axe. That’s enough of a hook, but on top of that he controls the element of earth. Imagine Kwame from Captain Planet with the power cosmic, a bloodthirsty attitude, a lack of any concern for the environment and the aforementioned giant axe.

And he also plays to what seems to the popular notion that superheroes — as individuals or as a team — need one nigh-unstoppable guy standing in the middle of the action holding his ground. This is about as close as you’ll get to the visual of Thanos for The Avengers or Ronan for Guardians of the Galaxy, but in the world of Fox.

Why the Super Skrull? Because seeing all the powers of the Fantastic Four integrated into one alien body will probably make for an action and special effects bonanza. On top of that, with the Super Skrull comes the entire Skrull Empire.

This means the potential for outer space action, alien dogfights with Ben Grimm piloting an FF-branded space ship, and the design and realization of an entire alien culture. There’s even potential for some sneaky espionage/thriller action if the Skrulls have decided to use their shape-shifting abilities to infiltrate major earth institutions.

What if the clichéd lone, dissenting partisan hack who subtly tries to sabotage the efforts to resist the Skrull invasion turns out to be a Skrull?!?!

Of course, there’s the question of just where the rights to the Skrulls lie. That’s why this guy gets an honorable mention.

Additional reporting by Russ Burlingame.