Ant-Man‘s Peyton Reed is delving into his comic book post and revealing his version of a Fantastic Four movie that never came to be. Reed hoped to unite Mister Fantastic, the Invisible Woman, Thing, and the Human Torch in a swinging ’60s movie that paid tribute to their comic book origins.
When you hear the name Fantastic Four at the moment, you tend to think of Josh Trank’s box office bomb from 2015 and the movie that tried pretty hard to end the careers of Michael B. Jordan, Miles Teller, Kate Mara, and Jamie Bell. If you need reminding, here’s what that abomination was like…
In contrast, Ant-Man was a light-hearted entry to the Marvel Cinematic Universe where Reed wasn’t afraid to tackle the funnier side of superheroes. Speaking to audiences at an Ant-Man and the Wasp IMAX screening (via Comic Book) Reed explained the movie we’ll never see.
“I developed it for about a year and we went through some different permutations and some different writers, but yes, one of the big ideas was a set-in-the-’60s thing that at the time was structurally gonna be basically like [The Beatles’ 1964 comedy-musical] A Hard Day’s Night, where we were not going to even deal with the origin story,” said Reed.
He continued, “It was just going to be like you’re in Downtown Manhattan and they’re there. It was a pretty exciting idea. At the time — again this was 2002 or ’03 — early on, way pre-MCU, I felt like Fox was not gonna make it.”
Co-created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby in 1961, the Fantastic Four are known as Marvel’s First Family. Sadly, the team has struggled to get the justice they deserve on the silver screen. As well as an unreleased movie from 1994, there were two pretty average entries in the ’00s, and Josh Trank’s abysmal entry from 2015.
Reed’s idea is definitely a clever one and sounds like a precursor to Matthew Vaughn’s X-Men: First Class. The success of movies like Captain America: The First Avenger, Wonder Woman, and First Class prove that period piece comic book movies can mean big business at the box office.
Sadly, Reed never got his wish and we were left with the first two movies and a the no-so ‘fantastic’ Fant4stic. With the impending Disney/Fox merger, audiences are hoping for a full reboot and that the Fantastic Four can get the magic touch of the MCU.
[Featured Image: Marvel Comics/20th Century Fox]