Yes, Sue Storm is a leader in the Fantastic Four – just as she should be

This week, the Fantastic Four returned to the big screen in The Fantastic Four: First Steps and – like so many recent movies of this genre – into the centre of America’s ongoing culture war over who gets to be a hero.

If the framing of Superman as an immigrant sparked backlash, in the case of First Steps, it’s gender politics driving the outrage – specifically, the decision to place Sue Storm, Marvel’s first female superhero, front and centre.

For the first time in the team’s film history, Sue isn’t just a member of Marvel’s first family. She’s a competent leader. The film, directed by Matt Shakman, places Sue at the head of the Future Foundation – a fictional think tank responsible for global peace initiatives and scientific progress. In the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), it’s one of the most powerful institutions on the planet. And it’s run by a woman.

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Critics have accused Marvel of pandering. Comment sections have lit up with complaints about the so-called “M-She-U” – a term used by ‘anti-woke’ commentators to dismiss any shift in focus toward female leads – calling it another example of the MCU “emasculating” its male heroes.

What seems to sting most? That Sue Storm (played by Vanessa Kirby) feels like the leader of the Fantastic Four, a title traditionally held by Reed Richards, aka Mister Fantastic (Pedro Pascal) – the team’s resident genius. In previous iterations, Reed has been portrayed as the intellectual centre of the group – “the smartest man alive”. He still is, but in a recent press interview, director Shakman explained why that doesn’t automatically qualify him as the team’s frontman

“If [Reed] is the most scientifically intelligent person, then [Sue] is the most emotionally intelligent person on the planet,” he told Entertainment Weekly. “Between the two of them, they’re building an idealistic society.”

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For fans who grew up with the comics, Sue’s promotion is a major shift, but almost certainly an overdue one. Sue Storm was Marvel’s first female superhero, created in 1961 as The Invisible Girl; later becoming The Invisible Woman. Those names alone tell you plenty. Her initial power – invisibility – fit a familiar pattern of 1960s gender roles: be present, but not seen.

And in early comics, that’s exactly how Sue was treated. She was routinely taken hostage, having to be rescued by her male team mates, or left out of action scenes. Reed, meanwhile, was the calm scientific patriarch. Johnny was the hothead; Ben the muscle. Sue was merely the girlfriend, the wife, the mother, the damsel.

As feminist critics have long pointed out, invisibility was more than a superpower, it was a metaphor for how female characters have been positioned in pop culture. Sue, even as part of a groundbreaking superhero team, was a side character. Yet in recent decades, she has begun to take command in crises and been framed as the moral centre of the team. In a few comics, she is even referenced as “boss”. And in the new film, her power of force field manipulation takes centre stage.

That’s why her new positioning matters. This isn’t about reversing the team’s hierarchy for the sake of appealing to new audiences. It’s about finally catching up with what the character could have been all along, and what she should be in 2025. A mother. A businesswoman. A strategist. And yes, a leader.

The Fantastic Four: First Steps is in cinemas now. 

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