How the Fantastic Four Got Their Powers

The modern Marvel Universe truly began with the Fantastic Four’s first flight. After Mister Fantastic and his teammates came into contact with cosmic rays, they developed superhuman powers and ushered in a new generation of heroes. As influential as it was, though, the Fantastic Four’s first mission was shaped by several secret players and hidden forces that have only been revealed in the years following their fateful trip to space.

Now, let’s take a closer look at how the Fantastic Four got their powers, as well as the full details of their legendary journey. From the team’s real reasons for going into space to the ways those cosmic rays still affect them today, here is everything you need to know about the Fantastic Four’s origin.

HOW THE FANTASTIC FOUR GOT POWERS

The Fantastic Four got their powers during their first appearance in FANTASTIC FOUR (1961) #1 by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby. As several factions raced to get to space, Reed rushed to test his experimental rocket. Although Ben Grimm did not want to pilot the mission over concerns about cosmic rays, Reed’s fiancée Susan Storm convinced him into taking the flight. With Johnny Storm, Sue’s younger brother, rounding out the team, they snuck into the rocket’s launch site and took off into space.

Once they entered Earth’s orbit, cosmic rays penetrated the ship’s shielding. Although the team did not feel anything while exposed to the rays, their bodies underwent painful changes when the ship crashed back to Earth.

As the terrified team stepped out of their rocket, Sue briefly disappeared as she turned into the Invisible Woman. Ben raged as he transformed into his rocky Thing form, and Reed stretched his elastic limbs for the first time while trying to restrain him. Meanwhile, Johnny overheated, caught flame, and took his first flight as the Human Torch. As they began to understand their superhuman abilities, the team announced their heroic codenames and agreed to help humanity as the Fantastic Four.

WHY THE FANTASTIC FOUR WENT TO SPACE

Long before the Fantastic Four got their powers, several factors influenced Mister Fantastic’s decision to go into space. After Reed proved himself as a promising young genius, Nathaniel Richards—Reed’s time-traveling and dimension-hopping father—left him billions of dollars. Reed used most of his fortune to build a rocket base in Central City, California.

While he built his rockets, Reed and Sue encountered Gormuu—an alien who wanted to conquer Earth—in FANTASTIC FOUR (1961) #271 by John Byrne. After Reed defeated the giant alien, his need to test his rocket, the Marvel-1, and its experimental star-drive became much more urgent.

While searching for a planet similar to Earth, Reed discovered a habitable world called Spyre, as revealed in FANTASTIC FOUR (2018) #14 by Dan Slott and Paco Medina. Although the planet was 44 light years away from Earth, Reed decided it would be a perfect destination for his rocket’s first flight.

Although Reed possessed billions in funding, the Richards Rocket Group still relied on some government funding. So, when the government prepared to withdraw its financial support, Reed and his teammates snuck onto the base to test the ship while they still could.

THE FANTASTIC FOUR’S COSMIC RAYS

As the Fantastic Four soared through the Van Allen belt of radiation that surrounds Earth, those fateful cosmic rays easily overwhelmed their shields. While Reed thought he made an error in his shielding calculations, he later learned that two separate aliens influenced the rays from afar.

After stumbling onto a truth about the nature of the universe, a powerful alien known as the Entity created a storm of cosmic rays to communicate with Reed, whom he saw as a like-minded individual, as revealed in FANTASTIC FOUR (1998) #530 by J. Michael Straczynski and Mike McKone.

Revos, the Overseer leading the residents of the Spyre, also played a crucial role in the birth of the Fantastic Four. After detecting Reed’s scans over Spyre, he feared the Fantastic Four would invade and disrupt their perfectly ordered society, so he manipulated the cosmic rays, increased their intensity dramatically, and placed them in the Marvel-1’s path. Upon seeing the abilities the Fantastic Four received from the cosmic rays, Revos empowered many Spyre residents by exposing them to similar cosmic rays.

WHY THE FANTASTIC FOUR HAVE DIFFERENT POWERS

Although they initially appeared to be random, the distinctive abilities of the Fantastic Four were shaped by a few outside forces. During his early communications with the Entity, Reed’s impressions of his teammates influenced the effects of the cosmic rays, as revealed in FANTASTIC FOUR (1998) #532. While his elastic mind inspired his own powers, Reed’s thoughts of Sue’s quiet nature led to her invisibility, Johnny’s fiery personality sparked his flame powers, and Ben’s gruff attitude translated into his rocky body.

The abilities of the Fantastic Four were also shaped by the Four-Are-One, a being from an earlier incarnation of the universe who debuted in DEFENDERS (2021) #4 by Al Ewing and Javier Rodriguez. With attributes that roughly align with the Fantastic Four’s powers, the Four-Are-One is a “primal avatar” who influenced the team’s empowerment on a cosmic level.

The Fantastic Four’s powers also rely on their proximity to each other, as revealed in MARVEL 2-IN-ONE (2017) #3 by Chip Zdarsky and Valerio Schiti. When the members of the Fantastic Four spend extended amounts of time apart from each other in separate universes, their powers will gradually fade away until they are reunited.

THE FANTASTIC FOUR’S CHANGING POWERS

While the Fantastic Four’s abilities surfaced as soon as they returned to Earth, their powers never stopped evolving. Although Invisible Woman could initially only turn invisible, she developed the power to create invisible force fields in FANTASTIC FOUR (1961) #22 by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby. With continued practice, Sue finetuned all aspects of her invisibility powers. Meanwhile, her brother, the Human Torch, developed the ability to generate unimaginably hot supernova flames. After a villain temporarily depowered him, Reed repowered himself by exposing himself to cosmic rays again, further increasing his abilities.

More than any of his teammates, the Thing’s powers have fluctuated dramatically. Both intentionally and accidentally, Ben has returned to his human form on numerous occasions for various lengths of time. In his rocky form, the Thing’s outer skin originally looked lumpy like dried lava before the rocks eased into more geometric shapes. The rocks on the Thing’s skin briefly turned jagged and spikey after he traveled through cosmic rays again in FANTASTIC FOUR (1961) #310 by Steve Englehart and Keith Pollard.

FANTASTIC FOUR RETURNS TO THE COSMIC RAYS

Throughout their cosmic adventures, the Fantastic Four have returned to the cosmic rays several times. While the team’s members have used them to recharge their abilities, several other heroes and villains—like the Red Ghost and his Super-Apes—have also developed powers from cosmic radiation. When the super-strong Sharon Ventura went through cosmic rays with the Thing, she developed a rocky exterior like his. Because of their parents’ exposure to cosmic rays, Franklin Richards developed his immense superhuman powers, and Valeria Richards came into her advanced intelligence as a young child.

When the Fantastic Four finally decided to finish their original mission to the Spyre, they found a civilization shaped by cosmic rays in FANTASTIC FOUR (2018) #15. Thanks to Revos the Overseer, many residents of the Spyre were also exposed to cosmic rays as a defensive measure.

While many of the Spyre’s exposed took on inhuman Thing-like forms, several developed superhuman powers that they used as the Unparalleled. When the Fantastic Four finally traveled to the Spyre, Mister Fantastic and Revos developed a procedure to return the cosmic ray mutates to their original forms.

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