At this year’s San Diego Comic-Con, studios strutted their upcoming projects across the stage of Hall H, and began building marketing momentum. It’s a key date in the movie calendar that the entire year hinges upon, prompting fans to ponder many film-related questions. Will we see footage from a new Marvel flick? Are we likely to hear some insane casting news? Or failing that, will be granted a look at a murky, pixellated behind-the-scenes photo? So, bearing in mind the importance of the event, there was one noticeable absence from this year’s proceedings – Fox’s The Fantastic Four reboot.
There’s been a number of speculative reasons put forth for the movie’s absence, but none have stuck. The lack of anything promo-related is rather baffling, especially when you look at the pile of promotional teases other studios have stacked in their favour. Marvel will usually drop set photos or an official synopsis sooner rather than later, and Warner have been trotting out a few choice pieces of artwork for Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice. The latter of which isn’t scheduled for release until 2016 – a year after Josh Trank’s remake of The Fantastic Four.
Well, now we might have a reason. Producer Simon Kinberg spoke with Comic Book Movie (via Collider) while doing press for X-Men: Days Of Future Past and revealed why everything is being kept at bay. Specifically, he was asked when the public are likely to see any footage:
“We’re putting it together now, and one of the important things, because this Fantastic Four is a reboot, and is such a different tonality and vibe from those other films, we want to make sure that the first thing we put out really expresses the voice of the movie, and isn’t compromised by not having visual effects ready, or anything like that.
I don’t actually know when it’s coming out, but I’ve seen all the footage from the movie. I was there for pretty much the whole shoot. It is a very different film from the others, and one that I think is very different from other superhero movies. It’s a very emotional, character-driven, more grounded film than I think people are anticipating.”
Emotional, character-driven and grounded. Sounds gritty! While it’s a pleasant change to have a man on the inside affirm that the flick is still being assembled, it’s a shame there’s no fixed date we can look forward. Heck, we’d even accept a blurry shot of an unrecognizable actor at this point! So far, all we’ve seen from the film is a selfie taken by the film’s leads, Miles Teller, Kate Mara, Michael B. Jordan and Jamie Bell, after production wrapped. Here’s hoping we see an official photo soon.
The Fantastic Four opens in theatres on August 7th 2015.
