10 Movies Made For Terrible Reasons

8. To Stop The Rights Reverting To Marvel - Fantastic Four (2015)

House of the Dead
Fox

Where major movie IP are concerned, it's depressingly common for rightsholders to put a new film into production simply to keep hold of said rights and prevent them from reverting to the original owners.

Case in point, we have 2015's Fantastic Four movie. Following the release of 2007's commercially unsuccessful Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer, Fox had seven years to get a new film shot before the rights would return to Marvel Studios.

And so, shortly before the deadline, they hastily assembled a new take helmed by rising filmmaker Josh Trank (Chronicle) - a production which was famously troubled due to either excessive studio interference, Trank's reportedly volatile behaviour, or a chaotic combination of both, depending on who you believe.

Either way, Fantastic Four 2015 was a flop in every way that a movie can be, ensuring the net result was nothing more than keeping Marvel Studios from getting the rights back for a few extra years.

But everything resolved itself quite nicely when Disney acquired Fox in 2019, and an MCU reboot directed by Matt Shakman (WandaVision) is currently in development for a planned 2025 release.

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Contributor

Stay at home dad who spends as much time teaching his kids the merits of Martin Scorsese as possible (against the missus' wishes). General video game, TV and film nut. Occasional sports fan. Full time loon.