In the aftermath of the opening weekend flop of the heavily marketed and promoted Fantastic Four, speculation is running rampant as to what went wrong with the Marvel vehicle.
Director Josh Trank thinks he knows. In fact, he began distancing himself from the film even before it was released.
On Thursday, Aug. 6, one day before the film was released to the masses, Trank sounded off on Twitter after scores of bad reviews had already poured in to suggest that the studio did a horrible final cut of the movie and that is why it failed to connect with audiences.
“A year ago I had a fantastic version of this,” Trank wrote. “And it would’ve received great reviews. You’ll probably never see it. That’s reality though.”
Trank deleted the tweet shortly thereafter, but as the adage goes “screenshots live forever.”
Prior to Four, Trank directed Chronicle for Fox, and was slated to lead a Star Wars offshoot for Disney and Lucasfilm but ended up leaving the project. He later talked about his exit from the production, saying he was tired of the pressure of big-budget films and wanted to do something on a smaller scale.
“I want to do something original after this because I’ve been living under public scrutiny, as you’ve seen, for the last four years of my life,” he said. “And it’s not healthy for me right now in my life. I want to do something that’s below the radar.”
20th Century Fox has yet to announce if they’ll move forward with their plans for a sequel to FF in light of its lackluster showing.
Fantastic Four, which stars Miles Teller, Kate Mara, Jamie Bell and Michael B. Jordan, opened at No. 2 behind Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation with a domestic take of $26.2 million despite costing $120 million to produce.
