20th Century Fox may have officially put the nail in the coffin for plans of a potential sequel for the rebooted Fantastic Four, since it has been reported that they have removed it from the upcoming release schedule. The sequel was scheduled to be released on June 9, 2017 despite a poor critical and box office performance from the 2015’s Fantastic Four. Box Office Mojo tweeted the news last night.
Fox announces a Nov. 2017 release for MURDER ON THE ORIENT EXPRESS and removes FANTASTIC FOUR 2 from the schedule. https://t.co/HJCbnNhfFp
— Box Office Mojo (@boxofficemojo) November 24, 2015
While this doesn’t mean that the film has been canceled for certain, but the news doesn’t bode well for Fox’s least successful Marvel Comics property. While the Fantastic Four sequel may be over before it even begins, the initial reboot was also dead in the water due to multiple conditions that surrounded the film long before the release.
Behind the scenes issues plagued the film during every stage of production, and as a result, the film never really has a chance to flourish. The film underwent several rewrites during shooting, there were multiple issues between the director Josh Trank, Fox and the cast. This led to reshoots being ordered after the film’s original cut that cause Fantastic Four to seem like two separate movies wrapped into one.
The film was universally panned by critics, earning 10% on Rotten Tomatoes and 27/100 on Metacritic, and only making $56 million domestically and $168 million worldwide against a $120 million budget. Trank took to social media to put his two cents on the film’s reception.
“A year ago I had a fantastic version of this. And it would’ve received great reviews. You’ll probably never see it. That’s reality though,” Trank tweeted, then promptly deleted.
The story behind this failed franchise reboot brings up comparisons to 1994’s attempted Fantastic Four film that never saw the light of day, outside of illegal copies obtained. The biggest comparison between the 1994 and 2015 versions is that a major motivator behind the production of both films was maintaining film and merchandising rights, with the former arguably being made with no intentions of being released.
So it appears Fox Studios chose sensible spending over sticking to their guns on a movie that was likely doomed from the time it was announced. Perhaps now there’s a chance the the original Marvel super team makes its way into the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
[button link=”http://comicbook.com/2015/11/24/fantastic-four-sequel-removed-from-foxs-release-schedule/” icon=”fa-external-link” side=”left” target=”blank” color=”285b5e” textcolor=”ffffff”]Source: Comicbook.com[/button]Last Updated on November 27, 2018.
