• Movie stills • Trailer • MTV 2007 Movie Awards in Photos All images courtesy of 20th Century Fox

It's the sort of juicy creative development that can trigger what the comic-book geeks so eloquently term a "fangasm." As the title makes plain to the already-initiated, Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer delves into the story of a longboard-riding space enigma dispatched to Earth as an advance scout for a planet-devouring entity called Galactus, with only our heroes standing in the way. The Silver Surfer is among the most popular characters in the Fantastic Four pantheon, one that quickly segued from misunderstood antagonist to "FF" BFF to breakout solo act when he was first introduced in the mid-'60s. What's more, his inclusion in the FF sequel marks a rare instance of a movie actually depicting a shared superhero universe, something that's long been a storytelling staple for comics publishers but that's often impossible onscreen because of divvied-up rights. (Publishing giant Marvel regularly gets the FF and Spider-Man together in print; somehow, though, one imagines FF rights-holder Fox and Spidey distributor Sony being less keen on the idea.) In this case, "All the rights were with Fox," says FF producer Avi Arad, the former longtime head of Marvel Studios, who several years ago eyed a standalone Surfer project scripted by Andrew Kevin Walker (Seven). "It was too good to pass up."

The Silver Surfer in pop culture

"I had started talking about the Silver Surfer before I finished shooting the first movie," says returning director Tim Story. "My fingers were crossed that Fox would be willing to put off doing a [solo] Surfer movie, and let me have him for one. At some point, everybody just said, 'If we're going to take this franchise to the next level, what's the coolest character we can add?' Other than Dr. Doom, he's the most important." (It probably helped that Fox and Marvel already had a business model for spinning off franchises: X-Men is being extended via planned Wolverine and Magneto projects. Of course, the two outfits also diminished their so-so Daredevil returns with Elektra.)

As long as it meant more action, sharing title billing was fine with the returning lead foursome — Ioan Gruffudd (Reed Richards, the rubbery Mr. Fantastic), Jessica Alba (Sue Storm, the Invisible Woman), Michael Chiklis (rocky monstrosity Ben Grimm, a.k.a. the Thing), and Chris Evans (Johnny Storm, the Human Torch). "We all feel pretty psyched about not having to lay down the origin track this time," says Chiklis, whose character, much like his comics incarnation, has largely worked through the angst of his metamorphosis here. "The first movie was a difficult task for us, because we couldn't really get into the story until after the first act," agrees Gruffudd, whose nerdy scientist finally marries Sue and mans up as team leader as well. "This script was ultimately a much more satisfying read."