You know things are bad when a universally-panned box office bomb that sank a would-be franchise at the first hurdle, has been roundly trashed by its own cast in the years since, and effectively ended the mainstream career of one of cinema’s hottest prospects can now officially be named as superior to the finale of Secret Invasion, but here we are.
Having decided the best course of action for rounding out an already-disappointing series was to drive straight off the edge of a cliff, Samuel L. Jackson’s long-awaited and hotly-anticipated Marvel Cinematic Universe showcase saw its sixth installment drowned under a sea of negativity to wind up with an eight percent approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
As a result, director Ali Selim is now responsible for the single worst-reviewed Marvel Comics adaptation there’s ever been, which finally allows Josh Trank’s disastrous Fant4stic to climb off the bottom of the pile. Beset by behind the scenes issues that exiled the filmmaker from the industry’s inner circle – which seemed unfathomable when Chronicle had almost instantly ingratiated him with both Marvel and Star Wars – the reboot lost upwards of $80 million, won a hatful of Razzies, and ended up with critical and audience approval ratings of just nine and 18 percent on the aforementioned aggregation site.
Statistically speaking, though, it’s now carrying stronger numbers than the Secret Invasion finale, which is a massively concerning point for just how badly the ball was dropped. On paper, Skrulls infiltrating the MCU was a slam dunk, but the inquest will no doubt carry on for a while to come as Kevin Feige sifts through the rubble of his biggest-ever bust.
