Amph Official "Fantastic Four" Reboot(s) Thread

yep, I agree with Merk -- definitely not a first movie villain.

I'd go, were I in charge:

Movie 1: Origin + Mole Man
Movie 2: Doom
Movie 3: Galactus

 

It's the latter. You'd have a point if "Ant-Man", "Avengers: Age Of Ultron", "Guardians Of The Galaxy", "X-Men: Days Of Future Past" and "Captain America: The Winter Soldier" all bombed within a fifteen month span. But did they didn't and this film has. "Ant-Man" has made $141,867,000 domestically and $159,500,000 internationally and is sitting at $301,367,000. And that's just based off of Friday's estimates. And this has done better than "Fantastic Four" which is at $11 million. "Ant-Man" came in at $57,225,526 for it's opening weekend.

 

Then who should be the villain for the first movie?

 

You can't do an FF origin film anymore until superhero films go by the wayside. So, if this film bombs and in our dream of dreams they sell it to the other folks there would be no origin story. Just throw them in with the current or soon to come crop and at best have a flashback or two.

 

I think I would not let Victor and Reed be friends in the beginning if I have the chance to write the story, let them be rivals and Sue be the reason he care or help the heroes. I would write Victor as a quite ambitious and intelligent person.

 

-The FF's origins aren't compelling enough to fill a whole film. Do them during the opening credits (ala TIH) and then have them actually do FF stuff.

-Make Doom the uber-powerful/mysterious dictator of Latveria. STOP tying his origins directly into those of the FF (and giving him superpowers, it's not needed). But he DOES have a past connection to read.

-He's a master of science, engineering, and sorcery, with an intellect that is only surprised (slightly) by Reed's. And he's bent on ruling the world because he genuinely believes that he could make it "better."

-Show him as brilliant, charismatic, manipulative, utterly ruthless, and convinced that he is right. But also show that he possesses a twisted code or morality/ethics. You can keep his respect/admiration for Sue (that's present in the comics as well).

 

Actually most of the Superhero origin movies take this way, the villain is either the same species of the hero(Zod), had the same training(Ras' Al Ghul) or gained power from the same thing the hero did(Red Skull, Iron Monger). So the movie could tell both the hero and the villain's origin through one single story line.

 

Doom doesn't have superpowers, he doesn't need them. That's part of what irritates me about these films. Go watch the Avengers EMH episodes with him in them (there's only two of them, so it won't take that long). THAT'S Doctor Doom.

 

That's why Red Ghost and his Super-Apes should be the villains for the first Fantastic Four film. Make the apes cgi, but have them mocapped by Daniel Day-Lewis, Jack Nicholson, and Meryl Streep. And all the Fantastic Four should be played by Adam Sandler. Skip a summer release and go straight for Oscar territory.

 

Just got out of a 2:30 Saturday PM show, big AVX theatre, I think maybe a dozen, two dozen-ish max. Also the Saturday afternoon shows would be the "kid" shows, I think there was like, one family there. (short review of FF(2015): not a fan but the body horror superpower reveal scenes are pretty strong. Just tonally extremely odd in a movie about superheroes called the Fantastic Four).

assuming this is gonna be a flop (probably), it'll be interesting to see what Fox does with the FF property. Does anyone really think they're gonna make another "only to hold onto the rights" Fantastic Four film? Really? If/when they lose money on this? The property would be practically toxic. Certainly moreso of a dinged brand than Sony's Amazing Spider-Man. At least Sony is still making Spider-Man movies (although they kind of had to crawl back to Marvel and figure out how to share the character). But that assumes that Sony Spider-Man movies can still make money. It's probably likely FF movies will not make money for Fox. so that's it for FF at Fox. Has to be. Completely illogical if they kept going.

 

Only if they want to be petty about it.

 

what's the timeline in between "fox has to be actively developing an FF movie" to "rights revert back to Marvel", same thing happened to Daredevil, like five years or something? I don't see how Fox could start up another FF movie and somehow try to make money on it. Even if they made a "Doctor Doom" or "Silver Surfer" movie. Would Fox even go the Fantastic Four 1994 route (which I just watched, which is a better movie than this FF) and make a movie that is insanely cheap and never have a proper theatrical release? Would Fox want the brand that badly anymore?

Semi-related, random interneting post so take with grain of salt however this person states:

http://peeltheorange.net/fox-asking-fans-what-to-do-with-fantastic-four-franchise/



Anyway, I actually don't despise this movie. I don't hate it. I just don't think it's a very good movie at all. Somewhere between okay / mediocre / meh and totally gawdawful. In there.

 

How freakish is the body horror aspect in this? Cronenbergian?

 

Well, it ain't gory but it is very nicely presented as disturbing. The opening scene where Reed discovers his stretching ability (he looks and passes out), the random shot of Johnny lying there like a smoldering corpse so you just think he's dead. It's tonally awkward for Fantastic Four but as an isolated piece of filmmaking, there is a pretty darkly entertaining 10 minutes or so in there. And I even liked the reveal of Doom at the end from a horror / style standpoint. It's just terrible that the character is supposed to be Doctor Doom. but if you mentally rename him "psychic powered crazy guy with spacesuit fused to his skin" it's not bad.

But these bits are few and far between. It's barely over an hour and a half and it's a freakin dour, self-important slog most of the time. Also Roney Mara's character seems to change hairstyles inside of every other scene. And her performance goes from mousy, oddball introvert to strong Susan Storm team leader depending on any moment in the flick.

All of the actors seem to be good at what they are doing, but what they are doing tonally seems to change on a whim from scene to scene.

 

What about The Thing? How messed up is his transformation in this?

 

He's a talking pile of rocks when Reed first wakes up that seems to be moving. then Reed sees his stretched legs and passes out. Reed ends up escaping and finds Ben in an isolation as sort of a half pile of rocks / half The Thing that is breaking himself out of it and begging for help. It's a cool bit if not very FF. Also when they get their powers in the accident, it's pretty violent as Grimm is basically stuck in a matter transformer while being crushed by waves of rubble. When things go haywire and they try to save Victor is also well done. It's a decent bit of horror moviemaking for all of 10 minutes or so.

 

Actually, Kate Mara (Rooney's sister) plays Sue in this movie.

 

Right, got my exquisitely beautiful very good actresses with the last name of Mara confused. It happens.

Wozers, they are astonishing pretty and actually solid thespians to boot. Poor Mara here though seems to be stuck at the whims of a constantly shifting tone. but she's good in whatever scene she happens to be in of whatever movie she's in.

Weird part is, there is kind of a few superhero moments, the closing scene is actually one of the few times in the damn movie where they actually seem like a team, but overall, nope. Too serious, too heavy, too dark. Doom is exploding people in bio containment suits into bloody pulps, which looks badass but not very fun comic book movie.

Also Ben being smacked around by his brother who hollers "It's clobbering time!" is just .... wow, that was a misstep. And then when the Thing yells "It's clobbering time" at the climax it's kind of like "Okay, so now the Thing is an abusive bully like his brother was to him?"

 

I think Doom was the biggest miscast, while it wasn't 100% the actor's fault.

 

HOLY ****.....WOW......

Would love to be in that room.....

 

Toby Kebbell is a good actor, goddamnit! He's Koba and The Real Rock N Rolla. And I even liked his Victor (when he points out that the government could use the portal for "Waterboarding in the 4th Dimension!" was neat) and I dug him as Doom when he returned, very creepy. The only problem is it's supposed to be Doctor Doom. If you get what I mean.

If this wasn't a Fantastic Four movie, I would be much more accepting of it. There is "doing an adaptation and changing things to make them unique" and "so outside the box that it misses the point". This is one of the latter.

 

Another thing we should consider is that Fox wants to make the X-Men TV show. I don't think they necessarly need Marvel's permission, but having Marvel support would probably be nice. Which is another thing that can be used in any discussion about what to do with the 4.

 

If the FF revert to Marvel, that would just leave the X-Men, right?