I’m still shocked that one of Marvel’s ridiculous movies managed to depict Galactus a whole year before his official debut in the MCU timeline. Galactus, the devourer of worlds and one of Marvel Comics’ most awe-inspiring cosmic forces, is finally ing the MCU in 2025’s The Fantastic Four: First Steps. Yet in a surprising twist of fate, it wasn’t the Marvel Cinematic Universe that introduced this towering figure to modern audiences first.

Galactus is one of Marvel's most iconic villains. Created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby in 1966, he isn't your average bad guy – he's a cosmic entity who consumes entire planets to sustain his existence. With his impossibly grand scale and complex motivations, Galactus has been wish lists for live-action appearances since the early days of the MCU. While Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer (2007) hinted at him with a vague cloud, the character never got the proper treatment. The Fantastic Four: First Steps promised to rectify this, but another, very silly movie, beat them to it.

Lego Marvel Avengers: Mission Demolition Beat The MCU To Galactus By A Year

Released in 2024, Lego Marvel Avengers: Mission Demolition is a chaotic, colorful animated movie that doubles as a spiritual follow-up to the Lego Marvel video games and other Lego Marvel specials. What makes this installment stand out is its inclusion of Galactus – though not in his usual form.

Mission Demolition depicts an aspiring hero who accidentally unleashes Galactus. This Galactus isn’t terrifying in the traditional sense – he’s a giant vacuum cleaner. Once activated, Galactus roams the streets until he sucks up the Avengers, trapping them inside his giant dustbin.

Despite the silliness, it’s undeniably a legitimate introduction of the character in motion media – just one wrapped in absurdity, minifigures, and brick-based explosions. This marks Galactus’s second cinematic depiction after 2007’s cosmic cloud. Bizarely, this makes the vacuum cleaner version of Galactus surprisingly relevant.

The Lego Movie’s Galactus Depiction Makes It Releasing So Close to the MCU’s Debut Make Sense

Turning Galactus into an evil giant Roomba might seem like a throw-away joke, but it is actually quite revealing. It boils down Galactus’s essential characterizations in a way that primes new audiences for Galactus in First Steps. Galactus is the devourer of planets, who sucks the life out of them and drains them of their life-giving capabilities.

The vacuum cleaner is a handy metaphor for this. Moreover, Galactus quickly capturing the Avengers demonstrates the awesome power the villain wields. This establishes the stakes in a fun self-parodic way in advance of the MCU’s rendition.

Galactus in Mission Demolition is a literal plot device, with no will or sentience. While this might undermine him slightly, it offers a bite-sized, kid-friendly intro to Galactus that doesn’t spoil or overlap with the heavier, more dramatic interpretation the MCU is building. The Lego version is such an effective spoof that it doesn’t infringe on the seriousness of Marvel Studios’ take, it makes it more exciting.

The Lego Movie’s Galactus Actually Makes Me Want To See the MCU’s Galactus All The More

Oddly enough, seeing the Lego version of Galactus hasn’t made his character feel cheapened – it’s actually made me more enthusiastic for the MCU version. There’s something charming about how Mission Demolition captures the concept of Galactus while leaning into the absurdity. It’s genuinely more entertaining than the infamous evil could in Rise of the Silver Surfer, proving that Galactus is back in the right hands.

Galactus is played by Ralph Ineson in The Fantastic Four: First Steps.

If Lego Marvel can take this character and make him work in a comedy-adventure for all ages, the MCU will surely do him justice with all its resources and storytelling weight. Moreover, it proves that Galactus doesn’t need to be scary to be effective. He needs to be memorable, meaningful, and majestic. After seeing the playful preview in Lego form, I can’t help but look forward to what promises to be an awe-inspiring version in the MCU.