Writer/producer Simon Kinberg was heard last year expressing a desire to make more movies with the cast of 20th Century Fox‘s disastrous Fantastic Four reboot. Since then, the studio has taken a sequel — originally scheduled to debut in theaters on June 2, 2017 — completely off their calendar. Now Kinberg, fresh off of writing this month’s X-Men: Apocalypse, has told Den of Geek that he STILL hopes for a Fantastic Four 2 with the same cast, albeit a much more upbeat tone.
“We want to make another ‘Fantastic Four’ movie,” stated Kinberg. “We love that cast – I mean if I were to say to you now Michael B Jordan and Miles Teller, and Kate [Mara] and Jamie [Bell] are great actors – we love that cast. I love the comic, I mean I love it almost as much as X-Men. We’re working really hard on figuring that out. Nothing would make me happier than the world embracing a ‘Fantastic Four’ movie. We’ll try to be truer to the essence of the tone of Fantastic Four, which is completely – well, not completely, but largely – distinct from the X-Men, which is brighter, funner, more optimistic tone. I think we tried to make a darker ‘Fantastic Four’ movie, which seemed like a radical idea but we were kind of messing with the DNA of the actual comic instead of trusting the DNA of the comic.”
As for that 2015 film, which Kinberg did a Page 1 rewrite on from a screenplay originally written by Jeremy Slater and Josh Trank (which originally WAS more upbeat with more set pieces), the prolific producer now admits it was ultimately a mistake.
“We didn’t make a good movie,” Kinberg said, “and the world voted, and I think they probably voted correctly. And you can’t make a good movie every time out – not everybody does. We actually have a pretty good batting average, all things considered. But I think we made many mistakes when we made that movie – mistakes that we learned from and we wouldn’t repeat.”
What fans may not realize is another Fantastic Four movie is likely in the cards, as Fox will have to make one within the next few years in order to maintain the rights, which is how the 2015 film came about. The studio seems unwilling to let these valuable assets revert back to Marvel Studios, which already supposedly has a contingency plan in place should the characters fall into their hands ala Spider-Man.
Loosely based on Marvel’s “Ultimate Fantastic Four” comic series, the film was mired in controversy from the start, including a controversial tweet from director Josh Trank sent the day the film opened, lamenting the quality of the final cut.
Fantastic Four stars Miles Teller as Reed Richards (Mr. Fantastic), Kate Mara as Sue Storm (The Invisible Woman), Michael B. Jordan as Johnny Storm (The Human Torch), Jamie Bell as Ben Grimm (The Thing), Toby Kebbell as Victor Von Doom, Reg E. Cathey (“The Wire”) as Dr. Franklin Storm, and Tim Blake Nelson.
The film went on to gross just $56 million at the domestic box office with a global total of $167 million. It reportedly cost about $120 million to make.
