Let's be real. If you bring up the 2015 Fantastic Four reboot today, most people don't think about the story or the Negative Zone. They think about the absolute firestorm of controversy surrounding the casting. Specifically, the moment Michael B. Jordan was announced as Johnny Storm.
It was a mess.
Honestly, looking back from 2026, it’s wild to see how much that one casting choice shifted the conversation around superhero movies forever. Jordan wasn't just playing a guy who could set himself on fire; he was walking straight into a cultural kiln. People lost their minds. Some fans felt the "source material" was being desecrated because Johnny Storm had been white since 1961. Others saw it as a long-overdue update to a team that desperately needed to look like the actual world we live in.
But the movie itself? That’s where things get really complicated.
Why Michael B. Jordan in Fantastic Four Was a Massive Risk
When Josh Trank signed on to direct, he didn't want to make a "poppy" Marvel movie. He wanted body horror. He wanted something grounded. To do that, he tapped Michael B. Jordan, whom he’d worked with on Chronicle.
The logic was sound. Jordan is a powerhouse. If you've seen him in Fruitvale Station or Creed, you know he brings a weight to his roles that most actors can’t touch. But the internet wasn't looking at his acting chops. They were looking at the fact that he was playing the brother of Sue Storm, played by Kate Mara, who is white.
The questions were endless and, frankly, pretty exhausting. "How can they be siblings?" "Is he adopted?" Jordan eventually had to pen an essay for Entertainment Weekly titled "Why I’m Torching the Color Line."
He basically told everyone to grow up.
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He pointed out that the world is way more diverse now than it was in the sixties. He mentioned that even Stan Lee gave him the thumbs up. Think about that for a second. The guy who co-created the character said it was fine, yet the "fans" were still livid. It’s one of those instances where the backlash says more about the audience than the art.
The Production Nightmare Nobody Saw Coming
You’ve probably heard the rumors. The 2015 Fantastic Four set was reportedly a disaster.
There were stories of Trank being "combative" and "abusive" toward the crew. There were reports that the studio, 20th Century Fox, got cold feet about the dark tone and started hacking the movie to pieces in the editing room.
It shows.
If you watch the film, there is a literal "One Year Later" title card that acts as a guillotine for the plot. Before the card, it’s a slow-burn sci-fi drama. After the card, it’s a rushed, nonsensical mess where the characters don't even seem like the same people.
Michael B. Jordan suffers the most from this.
In the first half, his Johnny Storm is a rebellious drag racer with a chip on his shoulder—a guy trying to prove himself to his father. He’s charming. He’s cocky. He’s exactly who Johnny Storm should be. Then, suddenly, he’s a government soldier with zero personality. It’s like the movie forgot how to use him.
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- The Wig Issue: Fans noticed Kate Mara wearing a very obvious, very bad blonde wig in reshoots.
- The Facial Hair Flub: Jordan’s facial hair changes from clean-shaven to a goatee between shots in the same sequence.
- The Missing Scenes: Entire action set pieces from the trailers—like The Thing dropping from a helicopter—are nowhere to be found in the final cut.
The Killmonger Redemption
Most actors would have been buried by a flop this big. A 9% on Rotten Tomatoes is usually a career-killer.
But Jordan isn't most actors.
He didn't run away from Marvel. Instead, he teamed back up with Ryan Coogler for Black Panther. It’s almost poetic. He went from a hero in a movie everyone hated to a villain in a movie that changed the world.
He actually spoke about this later, saying he had "zero hesitation" to do another comic book movie. He viewed it as a second shot to get it right. And man, did he get it right. Erik Killmonger is widely considered one of the best antagonists in the history of the MCU.
It’s interesting to compare the two roles. Johnny Storm was about "unity" and "family," but the movie lacked heart. Killmonger was about rage and systemic injustice, and it felt more "real" than anything in the 2015 Fantastic Four.
Jordan eventually sought therapy after playing Killmonger because the role was so dark. He put everything into that performance, perhaps partially fueled by the "scars" (as some critics called them) of the Johnny Storm experience.
What We Can Learn From the 2015 Disaster
So, what’s the takeaway here?
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First, casting Michael B. Jordan as Johnny Storm wasn't the problem. The problem was a studio that didn't know what kind of movie they wanted to make. They hired a director with a specific, dark vision and then got scared when it wasn't a "superhero" movie.
They tried to fix it in post-production, and in doing so, they broke it.
If you’re a creator or a fan, the lesson is pretty simple: Commit to the bit. If you're going to change a character's race or background to reflect the modern world, do it with conviction. Don't let the noise of the internet dictate your creative choices. The 2015 film tried to play it safe by making Sue and Johnny adopted siblings, which felt like a half-measure to appease the vocal minority.
In the end, Michael B. Jordan’s stint as the Human Torch is a weird footnote in a legendary career. It’s the "bad" movie that paved the way for a masterpiece. It proved that he could handle the heat—literally and figuratively—and come out the other side as a superstar.
If you want to understand Jordan's evolution, you have to watch both. See the potential in his Johnny Storm, then watch the realization of that power in Killmonger. It’s a masterclass in resilience.
To really see how far the genre has come, go back and watch the first 40 minutes of the 2015 film. Forget the ending. Just watch the chemistry between Jordan and the rest of the cast before the studio interference kicked in. There was a "fantastic" version of that movie once. We just never got to see it.
Check out the Creed series if you want to see Jordan at his peak physical and emotional performance, which many argue was his way of reclaiming the leading-man status he almost lost in 2015.