Across the years, a handful of actors have played The Thing, aka Ben Grimm, aka one of the Fantastic Four. The most harshly-nicknamed member of the group doesn’t have stretchy powers, or invisible powers, or flame powers. Instead, he’s rendered in orange rock form, somewhat indestructible, and yet forever physically altered by the cosmic incident that gives him – and Reed Richards, and Sue and Johnny Storm – superpowers. In Tim Story’s Fantastic Four and Rise Of The Silver Surfer, Michael Chiklis was The Thing; in Josh Trank’s version, it was Jamie Bell. Now, in Matt Shakman’s The Fantastic Four: First Steps, the role is primarily portrayed by The Bear favourite, Ebon Moss-Bachrach.
Except, technically it isn’t just Moss-Bachrach. Since The Thing is a CG creation on-screen, it was a multi-layered process: Moss-Bachrach performing the scene in performance capture; a stand-in wearing a practical costume of The Thing for additional reference; oh, and an actual rock, named ‘Jennifer’. “We went out to the desert and found a rock that looked exactly how we thought The Thing should look,” Shakman tells Empire, “and we filmed it in every single shot that The Thing appears in in the movie, under every lighting environment.” That’s full-method.
Still, it’s Moss-Bachrach’s performance that’s set to shine through – the first member of the Four to be cast. “It’s a little bit heady to think about all the hundreds of people that are helping animate this character,” he tells Empire. “I just had faith that they would make my performance so much cooler. I’m very, very happy with the way Ben looks.” And while the MCU might be a different world for Moss-Bachrach, having previously starred in Girls, and Andor Season 1, and, of course, The Bear, he felt grounded with Ben Grimm – primarily via the New York connection he shares with comic book legend Jack Kirby. “He’s a Lower East Side guy,” the actor explains. “A lot of this character was a homage to his father, and that, to me, is very meaningful.” The Marvel Cinematic Universe is about to get rocked.