Rumor: Matt Smith was offered the role of Reed Richards in Fantastic Four
By Ashley Hurst
After playing the Eleventh Doctor on Doctor Who and Daemon Targaryen on House of the Dragon, Matt Smith knows a thing or two about landing huge roles in genre franchises. He has yet to make a foray into the expansive Marvel Cinematic Universe, unless you count his role in the MCU-adjacent movie Morbius, which we won’t because it’s embarrassing. If rumors are to be believed, Smith has been offered the role of Reed Richards, aka Mister Fantastic, in Marvel’s upcoming Fantastic Four movie.
The rumor comes from insider DanielRPK, who’s always breaking stuff like this. He has a decent (although not perfect) track record. On his Patreon, he wrote that Matt Smith was “the last actor to get an offer” for the role before casting were put on pause due to the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes.
Was Matt Smith offered the role of Reed Richards in the Fantastic Four movie?
On X, Streamr Entertainment posted that they’d reached out to Smith’s representatives for comment on the rumor. According to the reps, “as of June 28th 2023, he was not cast as Reed Richards in the upcoming ‘FANTASTIC FOUR’ film.”
But the story doesn’t end there. After reaching out for a second time, his representatives returned with dead silence, neither confirming nor denying the casting:
"We again reached out today and, instead of a confirmation or flat out denial as was previously made, we were told, ‘No comment,’ on whether Matt Smith was cast in the upcoming ‘FANTASTIC FOUR’ movie."
An alternate version of Mister Fantastic has already appeared in the MCU: he was played by John Krasinski in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, although that was mostly a winking walk-on role to satisfy fans who had been dream-casting Krasinski as Richards for years.
Whether we’ll see Matt Smith play Mister Fantastic remains to be seen. Do you think he’d make a good Reed Richards?
Adam Driver reportedly passed on playing Reed Richards in Fantastic Four
Smith is only the latest actor rumored to be offered the role of Reed Richards. Before that, Star Wars veteran Adam Driver reportedly passed on the part because he couldn’t connect with the character.
This news comes from the Hot Mic podcast hosted by John Rocha and Jeff Sneider:
"This contradicts some stuff some we’ve put out there in the past, but…this comes from someone apparently working on the Fantastic Four movie. They said that Adam Driver was never really engaged in this. They sent Adam Driver the script a while back and he said that he couldn’t connect with the character on the page, and he passed very early on."
The casting of Fantastic Four will no doubt make or break the movie. This is Marvel’s oldest superhero team, and it has to be perfect. And there’s more pressure after the disaster that was the 2015 Fantastic Four movie. Things can only get better after that, right?
There may be still be “missing” Doctor Who episodes out there. dark. Next
To stay up to date on everything fantasy, science fiction, and WiC, follow our all-encompassing Facebook page and sign up for our exclusive newsletter.
Get HBO, Starz, Showtime and MORE for FREE with a no-risk, 7-day free trial of Amazon Channels