Earlier this month, CinemaBlend's Jeff McCobb sat down with the filmmaker during the Los Angeles press day for Fantastic Four: First Steps (as captured in the video at the top of this article), and one of the subjects discussed was new 2025 blockbuster 's complicated fit into the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

As promised last year by Disney CEO Bob Iger, Marvel Studios has scaled back to only 2-3 feature film releases each year, and with "The Fantastic Four: First Steps" in theaters, that's it for the 2025 lineup.

This iteration of the Fantastic Four has a standalone adventure without all the burden of the MCU's history and cast of characters.