It seems 20th Century Fox is so desperate to hold onto the ‘Fantastic Four’ franchise that they are willing to try just about anything. And I mean ANYTHING. The latest bright idea from the people you who brought you not 1, not 2, but 3 awful ‘Fantastic Four’ movies so far, is to keep the latest version of the franchise going, but get rid of Reed Richards and Susan Storm, keep the Thing and Johnny Storm, and make the third and fourth members of the team the children of Mr. Fantastic and the Invisible Women, Franklin and Valeria.
Oh yes, you read that right, still four heroes, just two of them will be actual children. Kind of like a live actual ‘Incredibles,’ only the rumor has it the parents will be either dead or just missing entirely, so the surrogate parents will be the terrifying rock-monster played by Jamie Bell in the first awful ‘Fant-4-stic’ and Michael B. Jordan’s the Human Torch, both of whom are still under contract. Granted, Michael B. Jordan could carry the movie, but still, this sounds awful, and I cannot believe that this is the potential next direction that 20th Century Fox could take the franchise.
According to sources from BleedingCool, there is already a draft of the screenplay out there written by Seth Grahame-Smith (‘Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, ‘Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter‘).
Of course, as always, these rumors should not be taken too seriously, but with 20th Century Fox and ‘Fantastic Four,’ nothing can be considered too stupid. Though to be fair, executive producer Simon Kinberg has stated since ‘Fant-4-stic’ that Fox has learned its lesson about greenlighting these projects too quickly before getting all the details right, so maybe this is nothing more than a rumor.
Even if it is true, maybe it is just a pitch someone has, and a screenplay draft that no one has officially said they are making yet. It could also go through hundreds of changes before actually getting made. The only limit for Fox right now is time. To keep the rights to the franchise from reverting back to Disney/Marvel, they have to make another film before 2022, but really, that is plenty of time to do this right, and not have another embarrassment on their hands. And if the studio that can make ‘Deadpool’ and ‘Logan’ cannot figure out a way to properly handle ‘The Fantastic Four,’ maybe they should give it back.
