Pedro Pascal has officially joined the Marvel Cinematic Universe as Mr. Fantastic, and even for someone who’s been part of huge franchises like Game of Thrones, Star Wars, and The Last of Us, the move still left him feeling intimidated.
In The Fantastic Four: First Steps, set to release this July, Pascal plays Reed Richards-better known to fans as Mr. Fantastic-the brilliant leader of Marvel’s first family of superheroes.
In a recent interview with Collider, Pascal admitted stepping into the MCU spotlight came with its own kind of fear. “Each time you step into one, and you feel like this can’t be scarier, you find out, ‘Oh, this is scarier,’” he said. That fear isn’t new for him though. He experienced it entering Game of Thrones, joining the DC universe in Wonder Woman 1984, taking on The Mandalorian, and becoming Joel in The Last of Us. Still, Marvel has a different kind of weight to it.
Pascal also highlighted how overwhelming it was when The Last of Us introduced him to the passionate world of gaming. “It was like an atom bomb in the best way,” he said, acknowledging the power of storytelling across different mediums. But nothing quite prepared him for the expectations that come with playing one of the most iconic characters in Marvel history.
Despite the pressure, Pascal credits his Fantastic Four castmates-Vanessa Kirby (Sue Storm), Joseph Quinn (Johnny Storm), and Ebon Moss-Bachrach (Ben Grimm)-for keeping him grounded. “The lucky thing is to anchor yourself so completely to a partnership, to your colleagues, to the original kind of authorship of this particular telling of the Fantastic Four,” he shared. That bond, he said, was “the perfect antidote to the fear and to the pressure.”
The Fantastic Four: First Steps follows the team as they gain extraordinary powers after a cosmic accident during a space mission. As they come to terms with their new abilities, they also face a rising threat that could put the entire planet in danger.
Pascal spoke to Entertainment Weekly as well, where he echoed similar thoughts. “It was really intimidating,” he admitted. “I relied on the people that I was around to hold me to the experience and help get me through it.”
He emphasized the importance of trying to meet fan expectations while staying true to himself. “You want those expectations to be met. You also want to be authentic to yourself so that it can be the best that it can be for anybody who wants to be entertained by a story and travel with us into this world,” Pascal said.
Now at 50, Pascal is no stranger to big franchises, but joining the MCU as Mr. Fantastic might be his most high-stakes role yet-and it sounds like he’s meeting that challenge head-on.
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