Fantastic Four Reboot

What's wrong with self-contained universes?

The first movie all but stated they visited earth in the past and were worshiped.

edited 4th Mar '15 9:16:27 PM by Canid117

"War without fire is like sausages without mustard." - Jean Juvénal des Ursins

There's nothing wrong with it. The point is that when you're measuring who's objectively done a better job with superhero movies, a studio that's been able to make multiple movies in several franchises while weaving them all together to critical acclaim gets more points than a studio that so far has handled their franchises separately. Quantity and quality don't always go hand in hand, but when one's made ten movies that have all been fairly well-received, it's hard to dispute that they're on to something.

edited 4th Mar '15 9:20:41 PM by Khfan429

Mostly, Marvel's success is based not on having consistently great movies, but on having a lot of middling movies, a few good ones, and no terrible ones - whereas the other studios have had some good movies, some great ones, and some dreadful ones.

Marvel's movies tend to have fairly similar tones (plenty of snark and jokes), and also consistent flaws (weak and uninteresting villains in most of the films). It's good to have the superhero movies in a bunch of different franchises, because it allows for varied tones and different strengths. Marvel wouldn't do anything like The Dark Knight; they also wouldn't do anything like the better X-Men films (X-Men, X2, and First Class) because they don't generally draw in social and political analogies and issues into their movies (Winter Soldier being an exception).

Superhero films solely from Marvel would be like a diet consisting solely of pizza - it's tasty, but eventually you're going to get tired of it. Having a cinematic universe doesn't make their films inherently better; it's just been an effective business model for them. Or going to a chain restaurant because you're confident that, while their food may not be great or innovative, it won't be dreadful.

Also, the mythos of Marvel's success is self-reinforcing: if another studio had made Thor: The Dark World, reactions would have been a resounding meh. The romance was flat, the plot was basic and predictable, the action was all greenscreen and looked it, and the villains were forgettable. But because Marvel's made a name for themselves, the weaker movies can skate by on the reputation of the better ones, because even the weak ones like The Dark World don't sink to the level of Green Lantern or Wolverine Origins.

Personally, X-Men: First Class is my favourite comic-book superhero movie. (Chronicle is my favourite non-comic-book superhero movie, which is why I'm hoping [with increasingly less confidence] despite all the rumours that the Fantastic Four movie will be good.)

edited 4th Mar '15 9:52:01 PM by Galadriel

You forgot Iron Man 3. Which drove me up a wall, because bin Laden was a real person who founded and led a real terrorist organization that killed real people. The analogy doesn't hold.

Sure, The Winter Soldier's attempts at political commentary were misinformed, but at least I never got the impression that it wanted to pat itself on the back for being so clever like I got from IM 3.

edited 5th Mar '15 6:50:10 AM by Bonerfart

Iron Man 3 wasn't about Bin Ladin though. It was about the military-industrial complex taking advantage of terrorism and more importantly the fear of terrorism to create huge profits. Its about how fear controls modern American society. To a lesser extent, its about how veterans can be abandoned once they come home.

The Mandarin ruse was a distaction.

Forever liveblogging the Avengers

The comparison still exists, however. In fact, the comparison existing is more or less the entire point.

edited 4th Mar '15 11:43:53 PM by KnownUnknown

"The difference between reality and fiction is that fiction has to make sense." - Tom Clancy, paraphrasing Mark Twain.

Marvel movies don't have all the same tone or style. It makes a huge difference if you watch "The Incredible Hulk" a Thor movie or "The Winter Soldier". The brand of humour they use when they use it is similar (with the exception of Got G, which relies more on subverting tropes than the others do), but the focus is shifting constantly. Monster movie, political thriller, they offer something for everyone. That's why the "favourite" lists tend to differ, depending on the taste of the watcher.

I don't think that the Fantastic Four bombing will necessarily result in the property reverting to Marvel. At best it would give Fox a push to consider selling the rights back. Better some money now than having to make those movies again and again to keep rights for a franchise they don't manage to turn into profit. And I am not obsessed enough to wish the people working on this movie anything bad.

Thus said, I think it would be great if Fantastic Four were in the MCU, simply because it would benefit both franchises. The Fantastic Four work better in a larger universe, and the MCU could use the rogues Gallery of this particular franchise. It's difficult to top Thanos of you don't have Colossus.

The X-Man?

Forever liveblogging the Avengers

I think you mean Galactus?

And then All Hail The King hit the reset thing to say Bin Laden actually does exist! Oh, and some Mandarin guy too.

edited 5th Mar '15 12:21:18 AM by Tuckerscreator

Yeah, him (my inability to remember names is striking again). Or is there any other villain more powerful than Thanos?

Colossus is the russian metal skin guy. Villains stronger than Thanos...I dunno

Given that comic!Thanos could be killed by someone ripping his heart out, yes.

As a small example I can say that Thanos needs the most powerful artifact in the universe to be a universal threat once. Galactus can destroy a portion of the universe if he gets angry(like what happened when he was rescued from captivity once and decided that his enemies and their light year spanning fleets that currently ruled the universe shouldn't be allowed to exist any more)and doesn't care about feeding on worlds whenever he wants to.

Thanos is a man with a god complex and a deathwish but there are real Gods(both evil and good)in this universe and they don't like to be challenged directly.

Too late. They had a chance and they blew it. Hell, I wouldn't be surprised if the Mandarin never shows up in the movies. Can't risk pissing off the Chinese censors and losing access to the precious Chinese market, after all.

edited 5th Mar '15 6:52:58 AM by Bonerfart

Well no, you really can't. I mean, if you do contrive to lose the Chinese market that is a LOT of money to potentially miss out on. If a few die hard purists bitch and moan but see the film anyway, you've lost no money at all. Pretty sure if Mandarin ever appears he won't be Chinese, or even recognisably 'Asian', just a generic mad extremist type.

"These 'no-nonsense' solutions of yours just don't hold water in a complex world of jet-powered apes and time travel."

Which might be better in any case.

The Mandarin in the comics is an "extremist type"", but not a "generic mad" one. He's a faux-aristocratic megalomaniac, more than a little reminiscent of Doctor Doom. My problem is that he almost certainly won't appear at all, because villains who are in any way, shape, or form Chinese makes the censors mad.

edited 5th Mar '15 9:33:09 AM by Bonerfart

Several, at least normal Thanos. His power projection gets a lot huger when he's got the Infinity Gauntlet.

In any case, the MCU is probably going to introduce characters more powerful than Thanos very soon (with Dr. Strange definitely, and if Thor 3 has Surtur - who I'm pretty sure trumps Thanos - then there's that too), and (to stay on topic) several of the F Fs' cosmic level threats (which we're probably not going to see in this current, more realism heavy series) are probably either as powerful or moreso than he is.

"The difference between reality and fiction is that fiction has to make sense." - Tom Clancy, paraphrasing Mark Twain.

I think Annihilus is going to be the main enemy of the reboot with Doom as the human enemy but Ultimate!Annihilus is way weaker than "Hey, I took over 99% of the universe before my Annihilation Wave was destroyed by Galactus himself and I was killed and had to be reborn again" 616!Annihilus.

New images. Also the movie after this one has been pushed back a week so that they don't open at the same time as Episode VIII.

edited 13th Mar '15 8:36:46 AM by LordofLore

I still don't feel it but at least I think Susan looks the part.

Whatever your favourite work is, there is a Vocal Minority that considers it the Worst. Whatever. Ever!.

So it'll open the week right after Star Wars' opening?

Yeah, it'll still get crushed bar none a miracle.

Guardians of the Galaxy 2 is also going to be 4 weeks before this. Heavy competition indeed.

This is assuming the second one even gets made.

I am ready to bet against it. Unless the upcoming movie is really good, they wont get the people into the theatres. And if they won't manage it without the stiff competition in the following years, they will delay the sequel until they decide what to do with the property.