Tag Archives: Fantastic Four

Comic Books/Graphic Novels, General, Movies, TV

Disney buying up most of Fox Entertainment…

Woke up today to the news that Disney is, as the headline right above states, buying up most of Fox Entertainment’s assets.  The link below is to a CNN article written by Hadas Gold and Charles Riley concerning that big bit of news…

Disney is buying most of 21st Century Fox for $52.4 Billion

To comic book/movie geeks like me, this means that Disney, who owns Marvel Comics and the characters, nonetheless did not have the right to make movies using the X-Men, Fantastic Four, and only until recently, Spider-Man, even though those characters and the ancillary characters around them were part of the Marvel Comics stable.

Why?

Because there was a time, believe it or not, when Marvel Comics wasn’t doing all that well financially and the rights to the movie versions of these properties were sold to what eventually became 21st Century Fox.  These properties, ironically enough, were THE most popular properties in the Marvel stable, so when the Marvel films first started coming out, they were forced to use “lesser” characters at first.

Sure, people knew the Hulk and Captain America, but Iron Man wasn’t a big character.  Thor, also quite well known in comic book circles, was hardly a Marvel “A” lister.  So too the Guardians of the Galaxy.

But the movies were successful beyond anyone’s dreams and, voila, the Marvel films were hot hot hot and when Disney purchased them, lock, stock, and barrel, they continued the success… and even managed to procure the use of Spider-Man.

I suspect that small opening allowed Disney to continue their negotiations with Fox and, today, it looks like we’ve come to the logical conclusion.

So, now what?

Will we see the Fantastic Four and X-Men finally come into the Marvel Universe?

I strongly suspect we will.

And… it kinda depresses me.

Look, its nice that the Marvel properties, both in print and in theaters, are now going to be under one umbrella.  The properties should be together as they always were in print.

However…

Is it me or are we rapidly coming to the point where our entire lives are going to be influenced by only a handful of companies?

Think about it: In entertainment Disney, Warner Brothers, and Sony are a trio of incredibly big and influential companies.  Fox was, too, but now Fox is part of Disney.

I could go on with other companies, such as Amazon and Apple and Samsung and Microsoft and… the list sure seems to get smaller and smaller, no?

One other thing: Fox owns the rights to the original cut of Star Wars (1977).  Now, supposedly George Lucas, when he sold his Star Wars properties, put a clause in there nixing any release of the original cut of the film.

But now Disney actually owns that cut (again, this was like the Marvel deal, while Disney owns the Star Wars properties, Fox had the rights to the original theatrical version of the original film).

The big question: Will they finally release it?

Movies

Holy crap…

I’ve been curious about the new Fantastic Four movie in the “I-wonder-just-how-bad-it-will-be” kind of way.  No, I don’t relish anyone’s failures but given all the pre-release stories and strange (that’s putting it kindly) castings and creative decisions, including changing the group’s origin and radically (it appears) changing their main villain, I couldn’t see how this film would succeed.

It was like someone was given the Fantastic Four property and decided to remake the whole thing.  In other words, it appeared the Fantastic Four film featured the Fantastic Four in name only.

Well, looks like the film has finally been given to the critics and man, have the reviews been brutal.  Yesterday at Rotten Tomatoes the film was polling at a pathetic 14% positive among critics.

Well, it appears more critics have had their say and adding their opinions to the overall critical score the film, as of this minute, is polling at an even worse 8% positive.

http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/fantastic_four_2015/

Ouch.

Perhaps what bothers me the most is that I like the Fantastic Four concept…the actual comic book concept, and feel good films can be made with the characters.  Looks like it wasn’t the case here.

Movies

First Glimpse of New Fantastic Four Costumes…

I found the following picture on io9.com (http://io9.com/first-glimpse-of-fantastic-four-costumes-reveals-a-cro-1681960834) which shows Michael B. Jordan (Johnny Storm, aka The Human Torch) on the set of the new “reboot” of The Fantastic Four:

First Glimpse Of Fantastic Four Costumes Reveals A "Cronenberg-ian" Look

Count me among those that are confused and -now- disturbed by this upcoming film.  If this is the new Fantastic Four outfit, it certainly looks absolutely nothing like what was presented in the original books.

   

Add to the fact that in the above link the director talks about making the film “Cronenberg-ian” and I’m really, really confused.

Sometimes one uses a book or a comic book more as an inspiration for the movie you’re making than adhering to the original source.  Sometimes, that works.  Men In Black, for instance, was almost nothing like the original comic book and the end result, I believe, was for the better.

But Men In Black was a little known comic book and The Fantastic Four is quite the opposite.  The Fantastic Four are a very well known and established entity.  The comic books are beloved by many fans because of the elements found in them.

While you can find similarities in the Fantastic Four to other superhero concepts, it is quite a stretch -at least for me- to look at any of the fifty or so year history of the book and think there are elements within it that are “Cronenberg-ian”.

Of course, I haven’t seen the film yet.  Indeed, like most people out there, the above picture and the cast/creator listings are the only things I know about it so far.  Perhaps the film will surprise me and be something fresh and exciting and, despite much evidence to the contrary, adhere to the spirit of the Stan Lee/Jack Kirby books this film is supposedly based on.

But at this moment, I have grave doubts.