Can ‘Fantastic Four: First Steps’ Break the Franchise Curse?

_{Fans hope “Fantastic Four: First Steps” will redeem the franchise, with Marvel’s reboot expected to top both the Tomatometer and the box office. (Image: 20th Century Studios/The Walt Disney Company/Album/Alamy)}

Fantastic Four films haven't exactly been hugely lauded on the big screen, but now it's Marvel's turn to show what the quartet are all about.

Marvel Studios regained the movie rights to the foursome, Reed Richards (Mister Fantastic), Sue Storm (Invisible Woman), Johnny Storm (Human Torch), and Ben Grimm (The Thing), in 2019, and fans are eagerly anticipating the new film "Fantastic Four: First Steps" to be a superhero success.

However, others are apprehensive given the Fantastic Four's history in the past 20 years.

"Fantastic Four: First Steps,"which features Pedro Pascal as Mister Fantastic, Vanessa Kirby as Invisible Woman, Ebon Moss-Bachrach as The Thing, and Joseph Quinn as Human Torch, is dropping on July 25th, but how will it rate? While fans wait, some are passing the time with their own Fantastic Four-style adventures, spinning superhero-themed slots and chasing welcome bonuses worthy of a blockbuster.

Fantastic Film

Fantastic Four fans haven't had a massive amount to celebrate when looking at the Rotten Tomatoes' Tomatometer in the past two decades. It's nearly 20 years to the day since 2005's "Fantastic Four" was released, and the movie scored 27 per cent on the Tomatometer.

The Tomatometer is a measurement of critical entertainment recommendation for millions of fans, and its score represents the percentage of professional critic reviews that are positive for a given film or television show. "Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer" showed an improvement for the franchise two years later, when it rode into cinemas with a 37 per cent rating on the Tomatometer.

However, spoiler alert, that's as good as it gets for the first three Fantastic Four movies. They maybe shouldn't have bothered with 2015's "Fantastic Four," because it was far from fantastic, if critics' ratings on the Tomatometer are anything to go by. The movie scored just nine per cent after 259 reviews, and some of the Tomatometer's Top Critics were particularly brutal.

Rolling Stone's Peter Travers awarded it a score of zero out of four and wrote, "The latest reboot of the 'Fantastic Four,' the cinematic equivalent of malware, is worse than worthless. It not only scrapes the bottom of the barrel; it knocks out the floor and sucks audiences into a black hole of soul-crushing, coma-inducing dullness."

Tell us how you really feel, Peter.

The New York Post's Lou Lumenick and the San Diego Reader's Matthew Lickona also scored the movie a zero out of four and five, respectively, with Lumenick describing it as "abysmal."

However, it wasn't all bad. Little White Lies' David Jenkins scored the motion picture four out of five and insisted it was a "proper movie."

He wrote, "Fantastic Four is a really good film, shorn of glib know-all theatrics, faux profundity and the spangly CG that's usually ushered in as dramatic shorthand for "we got nuthin." It is, as the old saying goes, a proper movie." But will "First Steps" prove to be a proper movie or a backwards step for the franchise?

With Marvel taking over and assembling a top-class cast, there's a buoyant feeling in the Fantastic Four camp. It looks like the days of the below-38 per cent ratings are well and truly over, because it's 11/10 favourite for "First Steps" to be first class and score between 75 and 100 per cent on the Tomatometer.

If it misses out on the big scores, then the film is likely to fall in the 50 to 74 per cent bracket (6/4), which would still be an improvement on its three predecessors. However, it's a big 6/1 for the movie to flop and receive less than 25 per cent from critics. 

High Hopes For First Steps 

If the film is scored favourably by the critics, it is likely to do well at the box office. "Fantastic Four" (2005) was the highest grossing of the three movies, taking home more than $333.5 million at the worldwide box office from a production budget of between $87.5 and $100 million.

While 2007's "Rise of the Silver Surfer" rated better than the other two on the Tomatometer, it didn't quite match its predecessor numbers-wise. It managed $301.9 million from a budget of between $120 million and $130 million, but that is a success compared to 2015's "Fantastic Four" film.

The writing was on the wall after the movie's disappointing opening total of $26.2 million, and it only went on to gross just over $167.8 million worldwide from a budget of between $120 million and $155 million.

"Fantastic Four: First Steps'" budget is widely estimated to be between $210 and $250 million, excluding any marketing costs, meaning it could do with making around $450 to $500 million just to break even.

And it's good news for Marvel - because the movie looks to be on track to do that.

According to a recent report from Box Office Theory, the forthcoming film is predicted to hit between $125 million to $155 million for its opening weekend and between $277 million to $395 million overall domestically.

If that proves to be the case, then the film looks likely to gross between $600 million and around $900 million worldwide. It is just 5/4 to hit between $600 million and $799 million and 11/8 to record a total in the $800 million to $999 million bracket.

If "First Steps" really performs well, it could hit the dizzy heights of the $1 billion mark, which is 2/1, but it's a massive 8/1 to flop and make less than $400 million.

Step Too Far?

While it may not flop at the box office, the movie might still struggle to taste success at the Oscars. "Fantastic Four" doesn't have a hugely impressive awards record.

The 2005 movie received a Best Science Fiction Film nod at the 2006 Saturn Awards, but it was defeated by "Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith." However, "Rise of the Silver Surfer" performed better after it was nominated for 15 awards and won two, including Jessica Alba's 2008 Kids' Choice Award for Favourite Female Movie Star.

The 2015 film followed that up with an Ensemble Award win at CinemaCon for cast members Miles Teller, Michael B. Jordan, Kate Mara and Jamie Bell, and the movie received a Choice Movie: Sci-Fi/Fantasy nod at the Teen Choice Awards. It also won a couple of unwanted accolades at the Golden Raspberry Awards, including Worst Picture and Worst Prequel, Remake, Rip-off or Sequel.

Despite this, there is renewed optimism among Fantastic Four super-fans that "First Steps" can put the franchise on the right track, including scoring multiple nominations and accolades for positive reasons. However, an Academy Award might be a step too far, and it's 1/3 that the upcoming motion picture will be empty-handed come the end of Oscars night 2026.

One step at a time, guys.