10 Comic Book Movies Everyone Loves To Hate
5. Fantastic Four
The version that played theatrically was a train wreck, but there was a good movie buried beneath the bad wigs and obvious reshoots. Will we ever get to see Josh Trank's original cut?
Time Out called Fantastic Four a movie of two halves “the first likeable and fun, the second tiresome and loud.” It takes its time (50 minutes) setting up the characters, but then goes horribly wrong as second guessing by the studio dilutes their motivations and muddies the narrative. By the second half, you’re no longer invested in the characters or their story because they’ve become more like pieces on a chessboard.
It wouldn’t be the first time a studio threw away a decent film and ordered reshoots to make it “commercial” – exactly the same thing happened to Clive Barker’s Nightbreed, whose scope and majesty was junked in favor of a slasher movie that would appeal to the Friday The 13th crowd.
Was Trank another casualty of studio filmmaking, or did Fox make the right decision? Hopefully, we’ll see a director's cut so we can decide for ourselves.