The Smark Avengers - Vol 4, Ep 21: The Fantastic Four Movies Were DOOMED From the Start

Episode Date: July 18, 2025

🔥 The Fantastic Four Movies Were DOOMED From the Start | Smark Avengers Ep. 21 🔥 Before the MCU took over the box office, Fox’s Fantastic Four movies tried (and failed) to launch Marvel’s First Family into cinematic greatness. In this episode, the Smark Avengers — Corey, Dylan, and Jon — take a brutally honest look back at the 2005 Fantastic Four, Rise of the Silver Surfer, and the infamous 2015 reboot. 🧪 From bad CGI to worse scripts, questionable casting, and a complete misunderstanding of Doctor Doom, we break down: Why none of these movies really worked The awkward tone shifts between comedy and drama Silver Surfer’s wasted potential How the 2015 reboot became a legendary disaster What Marvel needs to fix in the upcoming MCU version Whether you grew up with Jessica Alba as Sue Storm or tried to erase Fant4stic from your memory, this episode is for anyone who knows the Fantastic Four deserve better. 💬 Sound off in the comments: Which FF movie was the worst? And what would YOU do differently? Click the link for Dylan's radio show!: http://www.bouncedigitalradio.co.uk🚨 Don’t forget to LIKE, SUBSCRIBE, and HIT THE BELL for weekly dives into comic book history, superhero movie chaos, and nerd debates you won’t want to miss. #FantasticFour #Fant4stic #DoctorDoom #SilverSurfer #MarvelMovies #FoxMarvel #FantasticFourReview #SmarkAvengers #ComicBookPodcast #MCU #MarvelPhase6 #JessicaAlba #MichaelChiklis #MilesTeller #BadSuperheroMovies #SuperheroFlops #MarvelCinematicUniverse

Oh, John, can you do me a favor and turn your camera on and off? Let's see. Is this going to be a John reveal? No. There you go. I was going to say John reveal. Looking good, buddy. Looking good.

Like I'm like a Millie. Everybody, welcome to Smart Avengers. Maves Cory. And with me, it's Dylan and John. How's it going, guys? Good. So good. It's a hard way to tell just exactly how much of that's going to be in the intro.

but here we are. All of it. All of it? None of it. If you, 20 minutes to Katie Perry talk and... I don't want the Katie Perry stands to come after me, though. They'll get all angry at me,

and I just don't have time for that. Have you seen how people react to her online these days? I feel like there aren't enough Katie Perry stands to come after you. I seem to be feeling far between. No, the one with the space for God's sake. She's a hero to women. Yeah, she brought a flower and then kissed the ground when she got back.

Right, because Spirit scared her so much that she's like, I'm never going to space again. I saw so many aliens. I'm never going back up there again. That's what she said. It's a direct quote. That's what she's a direct quote. I wonder how you're going to deny that? Well, anyway, today is going to be the first of a two-part celebration of Marvel's first family,

the Fantastic Four. It's a group we've not really talked about ever on the Spark Avengers. I think, seriously, I don't think we've ever even mentioned the Fantastic Four, except for a one-off when we were talking about the human twerch and it being the Jim Hammond version and not Johnny Storm.

I think that's literally the only time we've ever brought up the Fantastic Four, except for, yeah, I think it might be it. There must have a lot of time. There really isn't. I don't know, man. There really isn't. I feel like we've talked about the Avengers

more than we're talking about the Fantastic Four. And I'm talking about... We have talked with... Yeah, we have talking about the Avengers a lot. Well, they're very popular. So many of them. That being said, if you were listening to this,

it means that the new Fantastic Four movie, Fantastic Four First Steps, is out next week, and you should go watch that. But until then, we wanted to take some time to celebrate the Fantastic Four's big silver screen

debuts before that. And today, much like we've talked about the Sony films and the MCU and Batman, we have to redo the Batman episode at some point still. That's a lost episode, quite literally lost because the recording is gone forever. But regardless, we're going to talk about three movies today. We're going to talk about 2005's Fantastic Four, 2007's Fantastic Four Rise of the Silver Surfer, and then the 2015 Fantastic Four movie. are you guys ready to get all up in Mr. Fantastic's stretchingness and the thing's heartness

and the Fantastic Four Human Torches' flamedness and Invisible Woman's Invisibleness. You probably could have framed up there. I was on a path and I just kept going and I just, you know, I could stop now, but I should just finish. Started off good. Yeah, Mama didn't raise no good. So, full disclosure is that before this episode, I thought I'd only seen one of these three films. Yes. Which was the first fantastic four film.

And I wanted to do some research for this episode. I didn't have time to watch all three, unfortunately. So I watched the first one, the 2005 one. And it turns out that I had not seen this film. I have never seen the film. I watched it about three hours ago. I took some notes. So you guys probably don't remember it as freshly as I did

because I wrote down some notes. So that's the only one I'm going to be able to talk about with any kind of clarity and confidence is the first one. I saw the first two that we're going to talk about, but I saw them years ago. So it's going to be a lot of going from memory. And then I recently watched the 2015 one because I had not seen it to such a degree when we were talking about making this and you mentioned who the villain was and he was in that. So I have seen the three of these, which is very odd for us to do a movie episode where I actually have seen the movies.

I hope John seen none of them. That would be perfect. It would be. John, have you any of these have you not seen? I have seen all of them. you go. Story checks out. So before we dive into it,

there's a long and storied history of the Fantastic Forest attempts to get on the silver screen. Like I said, they were the first family of Marvel to the point that many people believe that the characters were based off of the creators, that Mr. Fantastic was basically Stanley in a lot of his approach,

and the Jack Kirby was very much the thing and whatnot. But there was a lot of care and love putting it to the Fantastic Four, which is really funny when you think about how the MCU for the last 20-ish years, there's really been no mention or focus of the Fantastic Four up until recently. Yeah, they really couldn't give a fuck, which is astounding. Because, like you said, the Fantastic Four were like the Lynchpin for a long time of Marvel.

They were like the big, like, you could always rely on them. always quality comics and then for some reason they just didn't translate it to the film very well the first like hundred issues that they're fantastic for as well like Stanley and Jack Kirby were basically introducing all the like familiar foundations of the like shared Marvel universe as well like so many of the building blocks that

everything else got built on would lay down in those first 100 issues. So yeah, like, it's really impossible to state how important they were to, like, Marvel as, like, a comic book company, really, especially in those early days when they were getting back

into superhero comics. Like, without the Fantastic Four, there would be no Marvel, as we know it today. That's true. So the fantasy The Fantastic Four's attempt to get in movie starts back in 1983 with German producer Berned Eichinger, who met with Stanley at his home in Los Angeles to explore obtaining an option for a movie based on the Fantastic Four. The option was not available until three years later when Ishinger's Constantine Film Company

obtained it for Marvel Comics for a price the producer called, quote, Not Enormous, and has been estimated to be $250,000. Warner Brothers in Columbia Pictures were interested but were cautious of Isinger's $40 to $45 million budget. With an option scheduled to expire on December 31, 1992, Isinger

asked Marvel for an extension because, as John will probably speak to at greater length at some point, when you get the rights to make a movie, you actually have to make the movie at some point. And around this time, Brad had had the option to make a fantastic floor

movie for about eight years and hadn't come close to starting one. So, when Marvel did not agree to give him an extension, he decided that the only way he could retain his option was by producing a low-budget Fantastic Four film reasoning in an interview in 2005, quote, they didn't say I had to make a big movie. So in 1992, he approached the man, the myth, the legend, that is Roger Corman, with the idea of making a film for $5 million to keep the rights, which eventually decided to bring it down to a budget of $1 million. We will be discussing Roger Corman's Fantastic Four movie

at Greater Link at another time. I'd love to watch that film someday. I would love it as well. Wouldn't that be fun? Marvel Comics along with Avi Arad and a close friend, Ralph, Winter, paid in exchange for the film's negative. 20th Century Fox could go ahead with a big budget adaptation as well as a possible spin-off film starring The Silver Surfer in 1998.

Fox hired Chris Columbus to write and direct a Fantastic Four movie in 1995. Christopher Columbus, famous for many, many movies. The ones always come off the time I head are of the Home Alone movies. John, is there any other, like, Chris Columbus movies you think of immediately? I think he was involved in at least the very first Harry Potter movie, maybe a couple more. Okay. But Chris Columbus developed a screenplay with Michael France, but decided to step down as director and focus on producing a fantastic for under his 1492 Pictures Company. Peter Siegel was hired to direct in April of 1997, but was replaced by Sam Wiseman at the end of the year.

Fox brought in Sam Hamm to rewrite the script in April of 1998, an attempt to lower the budget, which was projected at that point to be $165 million. In February 1999, with development taking longer than expected, I should, and Fox signed a deal with Marvel to extend the control of the film rights for another two years with the summer 2001 release plan and hiring Raja Gossnell to direct. However, Gossna decided to do Scooby-Doo instead and dropped out in October of 2000. So now we're in the 2000. It has been 15 years of trying to make this movie. In April 2001, Peyton Reed signed on to direct Fantastic Four and Mark Frost was brought on board to do another rewrite. Reed departed the project in 2003, explaining in a 2015-15 instance.

interview, quote, I developed it for the better part of a year with three different sets of writers, but it became very clear after a while that Fox had a very different movie in mind, and they were also chasing a release date, so we ended up parting company. Reed's version was described as being influenced by the Beatles of Hard Day's Night in 1964. A role from 1964. Reed would later reuse this idea for Marvel Cinematic Universe's Ant Man and the Wast's Quantum Mania. Mads-Mickleson apparently re-editioned for the role of Reed Richards originally, but I Ion Grafad was cast instead.

He recalled the auditioning as, quote, humiliating. Andrew Walker auditioned for the role of Johnny Storm, which eventually went to Chris Evans. Other actors that joined the film were Jessica Alba as Sue Storm, Chris Evans, Johnny Storm, Michael Chickles as Ben Grimm, and Julian McMan as Dr. Victor von Doom. Sean Ashton was one of the candidates to direct the movie, his reasoning for wanting to direct it, despite never having directed a movie before, and not being familiar with the comics anyway, was that he wanted to step up and filmmaking and felt fantastic for it would allow him to leave a mark. Despite not getting the job, Tom Rophan was impressed with his determination and hoped to work with him on a future project. Robert Downey Jr. was also originally considered for the role of Dr. Doom back then as well, but he would be later to be cast the cast as the character in the MCU, where we will see him in

2006. Sean Aston also apparently wanted Christina Aguilera to play Sue Storm. That would have also in a very different movie. If you know, you're Christina Aguilera in 2005 history. So, Tim's story was signed on to direct in April 2004 after Fox was impressed with his early cut of Taxi in 2004, and him being a fan of the comics, Simon Kimberg

wrote uncredited drafts for the script, and after seeing The Incredibles, Story decided to make a significant script change and add more special effects to avoid similarities, and that's where we finally get to 2005's Fantastic Four. They added more special effects?

My God. Uh-oh. You have to remember. You have to remember. This was 2005 in special effects. Oh, I remember. So they started showing teaser trailers during Elektra and Star Wars episode 3, Revenge of the Sip.

So that's pretty telling. I mean, they obviously had very big hopes for the movie, of course. But Fantastic Four was moved to, from July 1st to July 8th to avoid competition with Steven Spielberg's War of the Worlds, which I don't know if you guys, if you've ever seen Steven Spielberg's War of the World's, completely forgettable movie. So this is basically like a race between two tortoises if that was the idea of trying to avoid that. But anyway, Fantastic 4. I have seen it.

John has seen it. Dylan, you have most recently seen it by the sound of it. Unless John has watched it in the last two hours. No, I last watched it two years ago, so... I was watching it right now while we're talking. Oh, how's it going? It's on the bit where they cause havoc on Brooklyn Bridge and then save the day, because they're heroes.

Even though they caused it all in the... Even though they caused a fuck a problem on the bridge. Yeah. I thought you were going to say that you were at the part where Jessica Alba's in her brawn panties for no reason. Who's the reason? The major and Lee Sue Storm. Is there?

The mom of the team. The best older sister anyone could ask for. Just brahands. Yeah. All right. Good reason why. So how do you guys want to tackle? silver, not the Silver Surfer,

how do you want to tackle Fantastic Four? Well, can I like just read my notes like, because I haven't seen the other two films, so I will have zero impact on those two films. I will have nothing to say about them. Sure. But I will have something like this one.

So, John, you can, you probably remember it pretty well, so you can like, help me out here. You know what you mean? Yeah, yeah. I haven't taken notes about the plot right. I think they're just general notes about what I thought. So I want to try

to recall a lot of stuff. But the first thing that really stood out to me, and I wrote this in my notes a bunch of times, was that, well, first of all, I said, it's interesting that they went with the idea of Reed Richards

and Susan Storm having split up before the film. They were clearly a couple before the film, and then at the beginning of the film, there's like tension between them because Sue is going out

with Dr. Dune right? Mm-hmm. So a lot of the way through these notes I'm like, I don't like that. I don't like that.

I don't. Because again, the Fantastic Four, one of the things about them is they're so a group, they're a very, very good group,

a good core of four people that would have different personalities but work very well together. I thought it's interesting to right off the bat habit where

two of those core people are at odds with each other. Right? Remember this. This is going to come back a lot. They wrote it down a lot. That was weird. Another note I wrote down was there's a bit where

Johnny Storm is on a motorbike and he's kissing a girl who's in a car and they're both driving down like a road together. Yes, this is true. Wild Velvet Revolver plays to the background. I'm like, this really is doing it.

Johnny's wearing an affliction t-shirt. He's got boot-cut jeans on. I'm pretty sure it was Velvet Revolver. I didn't double check. It sounded like Velvet Revolver. It was either them or Audio Slave, if they were going 2005. It was definitely not Audio Slave.

You would be a fan of Audio Slave. I would be a fan of all of these bands. Even clueling? Velvet Revolver? Velvet Rover fell off like really hard. Like their first album was good. Yeah, they made two albums. The first one was good.

The second one was, let's be honest, old dog shit. And I suspect that song was off the second album because I didn't know what it was, but it sounded like Scott Weiland. So I'm going to say that that was Velveter Wolver. My next note says, 20 minutes in, my impression is that this is

bad. That's not a good. The next note I have is I think it's an odd choice to have the Fantastic Four who are well known for being one of the most tight-knitted groups in Marvel History and most of the film fighting with each other. Right? This happens

so much. I don't understand this. John, can you explain this? So like I said, at the beginning, Sue and Reed aren't a couple. Obviously they become a... Well, they were a couple. They aren't at the beginning. They will become a couple later on. they're with each other

Johnny and Ben obviously have a bit of an antagonistical thing but they're like they feel like they're getting at each other more than just

like gentle jabs with each other they feel like they don't like each other um Johnny's just like a very unlikable character all around so he ends up with everybody the wrong way everybody just ends up like

they're fighting with each other and like this is a really strange way to portray the Fantastic Four. The beginning of the film happens where Reed is going to Dr. Doom's company to get I think they work

together and their but Doom is like the head boss and Reed works for them and they're doing a space mission on behalf of Duke company. So the Fantastic Four and Victor Von Doom all go to space in his spaceship

and there is an issue with the calculations. There's a bit of a problem. Ben Grimm is outside the space ship in the space. And there's a bit where he's doing a mission. And Johnny Storm's like, oh, no, it's about to explode. Just jump for it. And Ben just like jumps. And then because it's space, he like jumps off the thing.

and then it just like just does this for a fucking long long time right and the shit's exploding behind him and he's just like like this right and then Victor Rondeo's like fuck that noise

I don't want that on me he tries to close the airlock and sue is like I gotta save my friends who I don't like I've made it clear I'm not a big fan of any of these people and so she gets caught up with the rest of the Fantastic Four with the space radiation

as it is. And whatever. All of them come back down again. And they all develop symptoms. In like, all of the Johnny Storm bits are like really cringy. They're just real cringy, man. There's a bit where he's like flirting with a nurse. And then he's like, let's go snowboarding.

Then they start snowboarding. But then he turns into fire. And then he like flies off the edge of a nurse. Cliff. When she finds him, he's in this big melted hole in the snow. He's like, want to join me in the hole? And she's like, okay.

I'm like, that... What the fuck? Now, mind you, this is... Real quick, this is why a lot of people when they originally announced that Chris Evans was going to be Captain America, we're like, ugh, I don't know. Because this was for a lot of people,

their first exposure to Chris Evans was this and not another teen movie. To be fair, he's very good to be in the line. It's just crap material. Exactly. The material across the board is woeful, right? It's very bad. It's a very weird way to tell a Fantastic Four story.

I don't understand. So at some point, the Fantastic Four realized they have powers, and they try to figure out what's going on with them. At the same time, Dr. Doom is showing a lot of, well, he's Victor one doing it at the time, but he's showing a lot of problems himself where he can, like, interact with metal and he can shoot, like, weird, force things out of his house.

Mm-hmm. Part of his face that starts becoming metal. Right? Yeah. Okay, sure, right? That's what happens. You go to space. Katie Perry will attest to this.

Go to space. The face starts into the metal. Right? I've turned into that Joe and Rivers robot from spaceball soon. We're just waiting for it. Wow. I've written down. I'm not a fan of whatever is happening with Dr. Doom.

It was just weird. It's just, I didn't like that whole... He seemed like a good actor, but not the right guy. And also... You think Niptuck was a good actor? That's surprising. Well, I mean... He was not good in this.

Right? a lot of the shittiest to work with is awful. I think the only he's ever good in was nip-talk. He might be the worst written character in the whole film. It's just,

it's real bad, right? Okay, so real quick, if we want to dive into that a little bit, a little bit, because this is going to be a thing with these movies and the concern I think people have

with Robert Diney Jr. playing the character in Doom's Day. For some reason, Victor von Doom is a character, that movies are terrified of. And I understand he's kind of outlandish. He is a guy in a walking suit of armor

that is a dictator of a country where the people love him despite being a dictator. And it is very comic book. But for some reason, in every one of these adaptations, they are afraid to embrace the absurdity that is Victor von Doom. And I think this is an example of it. Because it's like, well, we have to tie him closer to the origins of the character.

Because that's something all of these, all three of these movies have in common is the idea that Victor von Dune was with them when they went to space, which is not what happened in the comics. Right. It happened in the ultimate comics, but, yeah, not the mainstream. Old Miller. No. But no. So the mainstream, the mainstream, like. Like Fantastic Four, the origin was Victor von Dume was college roommates with Reed Richards and got expelled because he was experimenting on, you know, dangerous things.

Like, that's it. That's the tie-in. Right. And you can tell that story, like, really well. And I don't know why people don't. Like, this didn't work. None of this work. None of it works.

And we will talk about it with the other two movies. it does not work period. Dr. Doom, I would say possibly one of the worst written characters in the film. And that says a lot. But he keeps showing up and he's like his businessman. He's trying to appease other people. But he starts going mad with power or whatever

and he kills a bunch of people. It's really hard to get your head around exactly what motivations or the end game is. there's a bit where Benjamin the thing is in a bar and he's like oh I can't hold the glass because my big rock hands

crush the glass so how am I supposed to get pissed now a blind lady notices that he crushes the glass or whatever and she she has a little you know one of the little retractable sticks to be fully blind people sticks

so that's how you know she's blind that's how you know she's blind because she has one of the sticks right and one of my notes was later on she gets up and like touches Ben's face in like a really not cool scene is just weird and then she goes

oh see you around sometime and then she walks out of the bar without using the stick I'm like guys guys she's blind so we have we got a lot of movies to get through real quick I don't because I know we can probably It's good as quick as they can, okay?

Yeah, yeah. Yeah. I will say that real quick, because we mentioned it, I think Michael Chickles, I was not a fan of him in the role of the thing. He felt like he was way older than everyone else. Everybody's supposed to be, like, peers, and he just felt like everybody's dad.

Like, everyone's grumpy dad that was on set. Well, the issue with him was his character, again, was fucking, just, he was a miserable man from, like, most... I'll get to this. I'll get to this, okay? So after this, Ben's very depressed because he's a thing and he wants to be human again

even though the blind lady just said that she liked it. Not good enough. I want to be able to hold a cup again. So Dr. Doom was like, I need to dismantle the Fantastic Four one by one and I'm going to start Ben Grimm. So he finds him at a diner

and he starts to like schmooze with the thing. The two notes I have about this are, number one, one, whenever Ben and Doom were talking in the cafe, Ben doesn't seem to notice that Dr. Doom

has a bunch of weird metal shit on his face. Like, this is a normal conversation you guys are having. You didn't think that was weird? Second of all, Dr. Doom has been a total

dick to Ben all the way through this film. Yeah. Like, just a miserable man. And now he comes and sits beside him and says, hey, do you think maybe

your best friend in the whole world who up to this point you've shown you're his best friend and you hate me do you think that Reid's not really looking after you the way he should be and Ben's like yeah you're right man that I don't trust and have established up to this point that I do not

trust you because you don't like me I'm going to listen to you and that turns into a big part of the film because then Ben goes to see Sue and Reid who have made up and they're getting together and he's like oh you guys are being a lovie done me instead of working on my condition

fuck you and then they fight again and then he sees Johnny Storm and he fights with him and I'm like again you have the Fantastic Four fighting with each other why is this happening I don't understand so that that bit really confused me like that's bad writing

it's just out of nowhere go this guy that you don't trust now you trust him that guy you do trust you don't trust him that's this is this sucks I don't fully understand Dr. Dume's big plan I wrote that down? Because I don't really know motivation, the purpose, the plot.

He tries to get... Dr. Doom has made a replica of the accident that happened in space. Because they figure if we can reverse the space, whatever, it happened,

then we can go back to being normal. And Dr. Doom is funding this. So at some point, he gets the thing. to go inside the machine because he's like, if you go inside the machine, I can reverse the polarity and you'll come out a human. And Dr. Doom

does this by accelerating the power in it with his hand because he can do that. And the door opens and the thing comes out and he's a human again. He's like, thanks, Dr. Doom, for giving me what I wanted. This is all I've talked about,

this whole fucking fellow. This is what I wanted. And then, then, so then obviously because the thing is now I got what he wanted, he's like, oh, maybe I didn't want this after all. I hope you're not mean to Reed Richards, the man who I just fucking beat up and hate now. So then Dr. Doom finds Reed Richards and is like, I'm going to beat you up because they don't like you either. And the thing is like, oh, now I'm having second thoughts. maybe I should have been nice to read all along. Again, shitty writing.

It's just like it's happening too quickly. At some point during this, Doom puts the mask on. Right? So he has the mask in the hood and he's talking with the robot voice. No reason.

Mm-hmm. They don't explain that the reason he put... In the comics, he puts a mask on because he's incredibly being. They don't explain that in the film. He just has a mask and he puts it on. and then he is the hood and he's Dr. Doom

and you're like, what the f-why? Why has that happened? So then they have, Doom like Trace said, separate the Fantastic Boar and he gets rid of, he freezes Mr. Fantastic. Somehow, he just had a big freezer, I guess.

Don't worry about it. He freezes Dr. Mr. Fantastic. He gets rid of Johnny Storm, he flies off after a, ballistic missile. And then Sue is like, we got a sea of Reed. They don't know what's wrong with him.

They just go, we got to save him. And the thing is like, I guess they better go back in the machine and turn back into a big rock monster to see of the guy that just that he hated like minutes ago. So angry about this.

So then Doom is like fighting Reed and and Sue. And then the thing appears and he punches Dr. Doom. and then he says, oh, I've been waiting to do that. And I'm like,

how long have you been waiting to do that? He gave you everything you wanted. It's so confused about this whole fucking thing. Like, you've been waiting 10 minutes to punch him? What do you mean? So angry about this.

Just bad writing. So then they get to a bit where they're fighting out in the street, right? And, um, uh, uh,

uh, uh, uh, uh, um, and he's about to hit the thing with a big, like, a big, like, metal post, right? He's about to, like, jab it in his head.

And then Mr. Fantastic's behind Dr. Doom. He's like, don't do it, Doom. And Dr. Doom's like, oh, hey, Mr. Fantastic. Just wait a second until he killed your friend right here. And he goes to jab the thing with the thing, with the thing with the thing. The thing with the big metal pole. But he stopped because of the force field

in front of him by Sue Storm. I'm like, don't you think the guy with the fucking stretchy powers could have like stretched over there and picked the polo? Mr. Fantastic was just watching Dr. Doom stab his friend in the head. He didn't do, he didn't attempt to, one of the notes was like, for a guy with stretchy powers, Mr. Fantastic is standing around and letting stuff happen

without doing anything about it. Madness. They do this. bit where they encase Dr. Doom in like a big fiery tornado that is really, really big in the middle of the street. I'm like, how big are the streets? How big of the streets where this giant thing happens? And there's no like collateral damage to anything.

The buildings don't fall apart. If you see it, if you see how big it is compared to everything else, you're like, no street in the market is that big. I know everything's big in the market. It's not that big. ridiculous. So what happens after that, Dr. Doom and his big metal armor gets melted because that's what happens in the big inferno. And then Doom's like, you think that's

going to stop me? Because it should. And then Mr. Matalzic's like, no, that's not going to stop you. This will. And then the thing gets a fire hydrant and squirts water over him. And so the hot metal cools down and he like freezes in place. Right? So he's dead. He's definitely dead. And we can all agree that combination of things, he's dead. I mean, I feel like getting molten metal, like your metal mask melting onto you would, if not kill you severely take you out of the fight. But as we've already established, he had a little metal bits in his head anyway. He was becoming metal. If it's like molten metal, like that's going to just absolutely cook everything. else underneath it.

If he has metal skin, he gets hot. Theoretically, that's going to cook the inside of you. You become a giant oven. Correct. Correct. If he's got metal skin, that heat is going to melt that as well. He's just all going to melt. But instead of that, they go, that's not going to stop me. So then

they squirt water on him and he just turned in like a statue. Which again would kill you. No, you can't breathe. You're all just like, fucking whatever. So they did that and then they all go back to like

oh now we're the Fantastic Four we're best friends again all you know fun stuff and then they put Dr. Doom on like a container and a ship and they ship him off

to Latvaria a Fantastic Four don't do that people that work for Dr. Doom's company took them away from this crime scene and put him on a boat and I'm like you guys just let that happen

and Fantastic Four were like don't worry, that guy that almost killed us in this entire city, yeah, you take him. None of our business. And then that's the end of the film. That's the end. So, John, go ahead and hit us with your two cents on that. Well, I think Dan

sort of touched on it there, but like, as an origin, it's a bit rushed. They are trying to like do too much and not give it enough time to breathe. So we basically join, you know,

Like the characters, when they've kind of got this established past and we're kind of left to sort of figure out how it all fits together. Then they quickly go up to space and then as soon as they get the powers and come back to Earth, it's like, oh, yeah, like quickly the Brooklyn Bridge incident happens and they save the day cleaning up the mess that they made in the first place. and then somehow they're big celebrities and heroes and stuff and it's like well hang on slow down just give it a chance to breathe

the thing on the bridge the thing is just sitting on the bridge and then a guy's going to commit suicide and the thing is like hey don't do that and the guy's like what the fuck is this and then the thing's trying to calm him down the guy jumps like he falls

like onto the bridge with the cars and stuff so the thing jumps on the bridge after him and just like destroys a fucking truck. It's coming to them. So they're the ones that caused this whole problem. And then they solve it.

But it just escalates. Like all this shit just starts happening and then they like solve the problem. And then everyone's like, oh, thanks for saving us. And like, saving us from themselves. Exactly. What you mean? So the problem is that... There's a severe

lack of horror work in this movie. You remember we talked about this when we talked about Eternals, where it's like they were trying to introduce too many characters in one movie. This movie would have been significantly better if they had focused primarily on, if you're going to do this, read Ben and Victor. Sue can have some scenes, Johnny can have some scenes, but if this is your source of conflict or these three personalities clashing, that should be. be your priority. And there was a lot of just Johnny Storm dicking around. There's honestly, there's way too much dicking around in

this movie in general. There's a lot. There's a lot of the characters just dicking around. Yes. A lot of, well, there is a lot of Johnny Storm dicking around. I will say this. I think if you are going to do a film like that, you can easily work Sue Storm in there with that kind

of Reed Sue Doom triangle. That can, because obviously there's issues between and Doom with Sue in the middle. The way that this film did it was not the way you should do it,

but I think it could be done in a better... It could be, but again, and I just focus... Because this is like 2005, the idea of having a three-hour movie is not here. So you have a time constraint. I feel like you just focus on those three characters.

And you would have had a... You would have had a salvage a movie. You don't need to have... Sue Storm being, you know, messing around with Victor in the beginning of the movie. Because in the comics, like Reed and Sue were already an item when they go up to space. So, like, you don't have to do all of that shit. You don't have to introduce everything from square one. You can trust the audience to go in with, oh, here's Sue.

She's involved with Reed. You can even hint that she used to have something with Victor if you want to go to that route. But again, I really hate the fact that they based these two movies in particular off the Ultimate Universe, and we'll talk about that probably a lot more with Verizon Silver Surfer. Yeah. Anyway, it's not a good film. So I would imagine that the second one's probably not a good film either. For the record, when I went to watch this film, it had like a 5.7% out of 10, I guess.

So it was a 50, I'd say 57%. rating. Yeah, I gave it 2.5 on my letterboxed. So, real quick, box office-wise, this movie did make $333 million. Rotten Tomatoes, it comes in at 27%. E! So not critically well done. So this movie was followed up by 2007s Fantastic for Rise of the Silver Surfer.

So obviously, the movie did it. enough numbers that Fox went ahead and Green lit a sequel to it, and they decided they were going to try to tackle fucking Silver Surfer and Galactus as well. Of course, we can't be, you know, too far gone without Victor Bond Doom showing his face, so Nip tucks back. And, yeah, movie starts off with Reed and Sue getting married, because the last movie ended with them getting engaged. their wedding gets interrupted by an unidentified flying object that is approach to New York City

which resolves probably I think the best scene in the whole movie which is the fantastic the human torch silver surfer chase scene because there's some really there is the special effects are dated but they are pretty interesting with showing how the silver surfer interacts

with his board I especially the moment where he like stops Johnny and basically just turns off his power So pretty good scene, and that's where they learn about, you know, the cosmic energy of the Silver Surfer and his mission there to basically warn them of the approach in Galactus, because he is there to scout planets for him to consume. That leads the Fantastic Ford to working with Victor von Doom because the world has to unite, and Victor is representing Laveria. and he got out of his living statue because the Silver Surfer happened to be flying by. Well, that's all the explanation I need. Yep, that's all the explanation you get.

Good enough. But yeah, he gets, Silver Surfer gets captured in Siberia. He gets tortured. He ends up forming a weird kind of connection with Susan Storm, where he learns about Galactus and that he's stuck being his servant to keep his planet from being destroyed. Dr. Doom steals his surfboard and hooks it

up to a machine so that he gets the power cosmic and Galactus shows up a invisible woman dies somehow? I can't remember. John, how does she die? I believe to get stabbed by Dr. Doom.

What a dick. What? So the big fucking villain is Galactus, and they're like, well, Dr. Damos Stahmell won't have a fantastic board. Stabster. Who won't you can make a fourth field? Stabster with a metal spear made from cosmic energy, which, as we saw with Johnny Storm, the cosmic energy has the ability to turn off their powers. So it sounds like it's probably how that works. Okay. Okay, I'll give you that one. They set it up.

They actually wrote something. They set it up with the human tors earlier. They followed through with it. Checkoff's cosmic energy. Okay. I'll take, I mean, it's not often. do that, but fair enough. Silver Surfer uses the power of friendship and a surfboard to bring

Sue back to life, which is nice. Whoa, wait, say it again. Brings her back to life with the power of his surfboard. And friendship. And friendship. That's why I assume it is, because they had to have that bond where she got into his head and they talked about

why he works for Galactus. Okay. So if you want to bring somebody back from the dead, A, surfboard, B, friendship. Yep. Oh, and why I completely forgot, there is a lot of comedy scenes where Johnny, because he, after his encounter with the server surfer, his powers become less reliable, and he starts, like, showing signs of having everyone else's powers. So he kind of becomes Super Scroll.

No, well, they sort of end up switching powers with each other. If he touches one of them, it will take their power, and they'll take his power. Oh, that's right. That's right. Because we have to get another scene with Michael Chickles, not in the thing. Costume. Exactly, yes. So anyway, Silver Surfer fixes that.

So wait, does that mean Chris Evans is all, like, thinged up? Yeah. Yep. There's a scene where he gets all thinged up. He gets invisible powers. He gets... Silver Surfer heals him. They fly and they blow up Galactus.

Reed and Susan get married. Yeah. credit, there's a dead silver surfer floating through space and his eyes opens and he's back to life and then that doesn't go anywhere because they don't make any other movies. John, I tried to hit the highlights. Did I miss anything that you would consider crucial?

I mean, you hit pretty much all the major beats of the story there. Which, by the way, was this? We do want to bring up real quick. Doug Jones did all the motion capture for the Silver Surfer and Doug Jones is fucking phenomenal. We love Doug Jones here. Lawrence Fishburn did his voice.

Yes. Was this the film? I haven't seen this film of the one after this. But I know that one of these films, Galactus is like a clod? Yep. Yep. Is it this one? This is Ultimate Fantastic Four.

This is what I was referring to. In the Ultimate Fantastic Four, Galactus is a giant cloud in space. Okay. There's a scene where the cloud has like lightning going on inside of it, and you see the outline of the galactus helmet inside of the cloud, but that's all you see. Because if I'm going to guess,

probably Mark Miller being the barrel of fun that he is thought that having a giant man who ate planets was too silly and that we needed to have a giant cloud instead. I don't think a clog that eats people, that he's on us is sillier than a humanoid of these planets. I will say, it is a pretty interesting visual

in some scenes, the giant space cloud approaching Earth and completely like, looking like it's getting engulfed, that looks pretty cool. But if you strip back and you know what Galactus is and you go, that's Galactus, huh? It's not exciting. No, it didn't seem like it. But yeah, no, they brought back Doom. Because, you know, we have to have Doom.

And he was a bait and switch villain. But, I mean, it was like one of those things like he knew he was going to turn on him. Like, why wouldn't he? So it almost felt pointless. but they needed a physical enemy to fight because they were going to establish the silver server as an all right guy in galactus is a giant cloud they needed to have a physical fight scene with somebody that they can make toys of to their credit i don't think it's an unbelievable thing to have an earth-threatening occurrence that would cause

the Fantastic 4 to have to team up for Doctor Doom only for Dr. Doom to turn on them for his own benefit. That is the most believable thing I've heard in these two films. Well, like the plot of this movie is basically taking not just elements from the Ultimate Fantastic 4, but from like Galactic's first appearances

in the mainstream comics like a Fantastic 4, 48 to 50 where the Silver Surfer shows up and kind of heralds Galactus's arrival and then the Fantastic Four have to stop him. And then there's like another like the story which came a little bit afterwards, 57 to 60 in the comic books

where Dr. Doom steals the Silver Surfer's powers and then kind of, uses them to, you know, try and take over the world. So, like, this, I mean, I'd like the fact that it kind of took some inspiration from the comics here and kind of melded those two stories together. And I think it ended up making, especially because they didn't have to worry about, like, origins and stuff anymore. It made this movie way more palatable than the first one.

like it doesn't feel as rough and as like haphazard there seems to be more of an obvious story which is going on whereas like you know

Dr. Doom in that first movie who knows what his grand scheme was because he sure didn't no um so yeah like it was just bad revenge

yeah basically what's he get revenge for like I don't... Well, because the experiment failed. When they went up to space, the experiment failed currently...

Costas company... Yeah, yeah. Like, if you see the film, it doesn't... None of it comes across very well. But regardless of that, John, you said you gave

the first film two and a half stars? Yep. What did you give the second one? I gave this one. three stars. Okay, so half a star better. I would say that's not incorrect.

Corey, you said this had like, the first one had like, what was it, 27% rod tomatoes. Do you know what this second one had? Well, so it made $301 million, so $32 million less than the first movie did, which isn't uncommon

with sequels to see a variance in that. But it did 10% higher, it got 37%. even 37% not a good score for no no but I mean it does it does suggest this was a more focused film like they did

they weren't all over the place they had a central plot line they followed so it is a bet it is of the two I will tell you it is the better of the two there's not a big the dicking around the dicking around that comes in this one

is the Johnny Storm accidentally swapping powers the people bit that is the I mean, it would be hard to be a worst film than the first one. The first was pretty bad. Oh, boy. Well, you set us up perfectly because we're going to talk about 2015's Fantastic Four.

For the record, I was in two minds. Should I have watched that one or the one I watched? Because I heard that the one I watched was bad, but I also heard the one, the 2015 one was very bad as well. I'm like, I don't have time to watch all these bad films. So, you know, I'm a busy guy. So real quick, this is pretty much a very much. what happens. So they were going to, Fox announced they were going to reboot the film, the, the, uh, the franchise in 2009. Uh, so two years after the Fantastic Four, they were like, we got to restart it. Because at that point, Iron Man came out and took every, and just gave everybody's lunch. So they, they fired, uh, not fired, uh, they hired Josh Trank to come in and develop the film and direct. Rink? Josh Trank, yes.

John, what is Josh Trankham for? Well, he kind of came on the scene after directing Chronicle, which was like a low-budget, um, footage superhero movie where a bunch of kids get hours. Um, so... Well, I think you've seen the home. Yeah, he felt like, oh, he could be a good fit for this, because he's kind of dabbled in this genre before

and done so on a low budget, but with high quality. So you'd think with a bigger budget, maybe that would increase the quality even higher. All right. Oh, dear. So he was right to direct in July of 2012, and the main characters were all cast in January of 2014. Principle of photography started in May of 2014 and Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and lasted for two months. Unsatisfied with the original cut, Fox demanded reshoots, which took place in January. of 2015. The movie premiered August 4th of 2015 in New York City and then was wider released in August 7th. To give you an idea of how that went, this was considered a box office bomb. So not only did it perform less than the 2005-2007 Fantastic 4, it also reviewed less than the 2005-2007 Fantastic 4.

Um, what? To kind of give you an idea also, we'll jump into it. Um, they received several Golden Raspberry Awards. The raspberries, the award ceremony for worst movies in a given year. Uh, but they, they received for worst director and worst picture. And, uh, Trank voiced his displeasure with the final film, uh, which he attributed to studio interference, which is not uncommon when you think about Fox. So, uh, John, do you want to give us a quick rundown of 2015's Fantastic Four?

Sure thing. So basically, Reed is like a smart kid out of high school or college, whatever it is. His birth buddies with Ben Grimm, and then he gets recruited into this sort of think tank for

promising young minds called the Baxter Foundation, where he meets with Stu Storm, Johnny Storm, and Victor von Doom, who are all part of the program, working under Stu and Johnny's dad, Frankenstorm. And together, they're all working on this project to create like a quantum gate to another dimension.

I don't know why, but, you know, it's science. They just do it because it's there to be done. so they managed to you know get this gate working and the five of them you know sue johnny ben reed and victor decide to go on a mission

through the gate to see what's on the other side and they end up in a place which gets called planet zero which is like this weird kind of shifting world of like dangerous energy I guess and they you know like that's where they get

hit with the cosmic powers and Victor gets left behind seemingly dead whereas the others managed to escape back to Earth but now they've all got their familiar powers and then

basically the movie just decides, okay, well, this has happened, but now we're going to just jump forward a whole year where Reed has been on the run and the rest of the team have been working with the military. And like the military are trying to capture Reed

and try and bring him back in. And with the help of, you know, Stu, Johnny and Ben, they managed to do that. John? Dylan, your Facebook expressions right now is indication you watched the wrong one if you were going to pick one to watch.

I feel very confused. Continue, John. Oh, boy. It doesn't get any more clear as it goes along. So, yeah, they bring in Reed, and rather than throw him in jail or experiment in him or whatever,

he gets drafted onto this team, because the military apparently want to head back to Planet Zero for some reason. So, yeah, he basically helps them rebuild the Quantum Gate and they head

off to Planet Zero with a military team. But they run into Dr. Doom, who because of the cosmic energy and hit him previously, he's now,

been fused into his like space suit and he just looks like a plastic melted action figure basically he has like some telekinetic powers and I guess he wants to

protect his newfound home from Earth and like that's fair enough right I guess but so to protect his planet he decides he's going to destroy earth.

Fair enough. I mean, with time, after 2015, we've seen what we've done to it, so I'm like, yeah, you know what? Maybe he was right to fucking kill it in 2015. I guess. But, you know, he opens up

a portal because every good superhero movie needs a gigantic portal which like shoots up into the sky. but yeah they're fantastic four show up and stop him easy pizzy

punch him into the portal he gets killed or disintegrates because why not and then they go back home and that's the end of the movie wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait

so he had the portal and he set the portal up into the space because the portal was going to like transport stuff from one place to the other? Well, I I think it was just going to transport

like maybe disintegrating energy to Earth. Maybe that was it. So if he goes to the portal that he disintegrates. Yeah, yeah, that makes well, I was going to say it makes sense.

It doesn't make sense. But it's an explanation. Yeah, let's assume that that is the explanation that is the official one. I mean, I feel like we've explained that film. more than they have, but let's just run with that as the official

like, okay, that makes more sense than just saying do him open the... And then he went into the portal and he died. He gets punched into the energy beam that is creating the portal. So he's getting... Oh, there you go. So he's not into the portal

itself, but into the machine that's creating the portal. That, I guess the raw energy needed to do such a thing is potent enough to rip him into pieces. Um, but yeah, it looks like the, the reason he made the portal is the portal starts to basically eat the earth. So he's basically just going to, he created a giant portal vacuum cleaner and he was just sucking it up, old Henry Hoover style. Makes sense.

So that is now my visual is that little red vacuum cleaner, just consuming chunks of the earth. That would have made a better film. Yeah. So, so John, you were wrapping it up? Yeah, that's basically the end. They killed Doom and then head back home and the end. The group is rewarded by the U.S. military for the heroics by being given a new base of operations in a central city

to study their abilities without government interference. They decided to use their powers to help people and adopt the mantle of the Fantastic Four. Those are the last couple sentences on the Wikipedia entry. What was the cast for that one? Well, we had Miles Keller is Reed Richards slash Mr. Fantastic.

Okay. We know him from Whiplash. Is that that film, John? Mm-hmm. Yeah. Michael B. Jordan is Johnny Storm. That movie, that caused a lot of controversy because people are upset that the Human Torch was black. Doesn't make a difference.

Kate Mara as Sue Storm. So instead of being biological brother and sister and they were now adopted brother and sister. That's fair enough. Jamie Bell as Ben Grimm. I don't know who that is Billy Elliott What

Billy Elliot's the fucking thing Yeah What And Kobe Kevall as Victor von Doom I don't know who that is That Billy A as well Maybe Probably at some point you played Billy Elliot

Everybody's played Billy Elliot at some point in life Yeah it's the new James Bond Yeah, we've all done it. Weird. But yeah, so that is the 2015 Fantastic Four, and as John described it, here's some things that the 2015 Fantastic Four did not have that the Fantastic Four traditionally has. Color, for one. It is the most drab movie you will ever watch. Everything is grays, blacks, and gun metal.

There's no color at all in this movie. Family Dynamics. Not really there. They don't seem to really have any chemistry between themselves. Victor von Doom's costume, arguably worse than the 2005-2007, because he just looks like he's covered in aluminum foil. Yeah. Because it's like supposed to be his melted spacesuit on him.

Instead of having like metal skin, he's just like composed of melted space suit. So, uh, visually you can't even tell. It's just, it's just sort of like a big, blurry mush. Yeah, it looks terrible. It has no form. It has no shape. It's like a blob.

No. Um, so John, what did you give this on, on your letterbox? Oh, I gave this the lowest possible score of half a star. It's, it's an unmitigated disaster. of a movie.

Just, like, everything about it is so bad. The pacing, the tone, the script, the fucking costume design, the CD. Like, it's just bad all over.

It feels like they were trying to make a their version of, like, the dark night. Of, like, let's have a dark and kind of grim version of the Fantastic Four, where it's like the Fantastic Four, the Kitchiest superhero movie ever.

And that's the one thing about the Marvel version that's coming out next week that I think is probably its biggest perk is that it is completely embraced that 1960s, kitschy kind of campy aesthetic. So box office-wise, 2005's Fantastic Four did 33,000. 333 million. Fantasy 4 rises Silver Surfer, 301 million.

This movie, Dylan, 167 million. About half. About half. 2005 is Fantastic 4. Rotten Tomatoes, 27%. Fantastic 4,

Rise Silver Surfer, 37%. This version, 2015, 9. I really wish it had been 7%. Just to like... Keep the consistency.

Yeah, 9%. So, Dylan, to kind of keep you, to keep us straight here, I have this in the same spreadsheet that I have all the other movies we've talked about in the last two years or so. This did worse, rotten tomatoes wise, than Madam Webb. Right. By a lot. And I think Madam Webb was so far, I can't remember what Craven the Hunter did. But Madam Webb was the worst rotten tomato wise, I think we'd seen. or we discussed about at length. So this now takes the cake at 9%. What did Madame Webb have? 12.

This was... Madam Webb was 12% better. Madam Webb was worse than the Fantastic Four film that I was? Yes. Because... Here's a thing.

John... Well, okay. John, you give it like two and a half stars. I guess because you've got the... you have five stars, it's like hard to because two and a half stars is like average.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, there's things I like about the first movie. Like, I thought Michael Tickliss was pretty good as the thing and, you know, even Chris Evans. I thought they were all fairly okay.

The Fantastic Four were like, I honestly thought Johnny Storm was the best acted at all of them. Yeah. I thought that guy, like, that's... Which is telling, considering the future, I don't know much else that the other three have done in comparison to Chris Evans, who then went on to be Captain America in, like, 50 movies.

Well, that's the thing. With the benefit of hindsight, look back at it now and go, that's good reigns that he could do an incredibly annoying jerk like Johnny Storm, and then, like, a very straight-laced and serious and patriotic character like Captain America, of those two very different characters. And he played them both very well. Very well. I thought the main cast of that original one,

they were all pretty good at what they did. The problem was they had a lot of shitty material. Yeah. So that's fair enough. But I haven't seen this new one to see. I would say that if that's your opinion on that one, that's going to definitely be your opinion on this one, but to a worst degree, because those, you know, those four actors that are cast, Miles Teller, Michael B. Jordan, Kate Mara, and, um, is it Jamie Bell?

Yeah. All of them very accomplished at other things they have done. Um, that movie is the material they have is absolutely rotten. And like I said, it just feels like studio, the studio wanted to make a, an answer to like, Dark Knight, and they absolutely picked the wrong source material and the wrong story, and, yeah, just wrong all around. Because, like, the positive reviews for this movie that I have seen, the positive reviews are basically kind of pretentious people sounding, where they're like, oh, the young actors did such an amazing job with the material that they were given. Unfortunately, the material was not very good.

Yeah, well, that seems to be a theme. Yes. you know so but my point was my point was going to be that if I you can you shouldn't but my point I was waiting for you to respond to that I appreciate that you did

my point was going to be that after having watched that fantastic four film I did not care for a lot of it and I wouldn't have said that that was an average I would have said that was below average for me and I'm not like a snobby

but I've seen like seven films so it's not very good I guess John because you've seen so many different films that for you that probably is around about the average range because you probably seen shit that's way worse than that oh yeah yeah

but for me I would not have made that a like a 50% film and for you to have said that that was like a half star film which what's that in percentage wise that's like 10% or something. You know, pretty the average.

Like that's, I can't even imagine that film. Do you mean? I can't even, because people ask me that a lot. They're like, what's the worst film you've ever seen? I'm like, I don't know if I could, you know. I think it was The Davil Inside. I think that's the name of that film. I saw this, like, awful horror film in the cinema.

And the trailer made it look really good. And I saw it in the cinema. And I got really annoyed. because I'm like, I spent seven pound on that. Like, cinema tickets are expensive. And I spent seven pounds on that, like, what the fuck? And that was the only

film that I remember, like, fucking hating and was this close to walking out on. But I'm like, I spent seven pounds on it. I'm going to get my money's worth. I didn't. But, like, other than that, I can't really think of, like, a film that I fucking think is, like, abysmally bad. And all of the feedback seems to be the

This film is as close to it, bismally bad as you can get. Doesn't it make you want to watch it now just to see for yourself? Yes, but this is what happened when Morbius. I was like, Morbius can't be that bad. And then they watched it, and I'm like,

well, I'm an idiot. I'm the idiot. So, they did not, so here's the thing with, like, superhero movies. I feel like they knew this was going to be a bust. I feel like they had to have known it was going to be a bust. Because the superhero movies, traditionally, they're going to, they rush to put out toys and, like, some sort of a, like, fast food tie-in.

I remember seeing, like, I think I told this before, I lived next door to a grocery store, and I went into the grocery store for months after that movie was in and out of the theater, and they were still, like, Fantastic Four branded, like, soda. And it was not, like, a big brand, like, Coca-Cola. Pepsi. They're like, they couldn't even get like a big name soda sponsor to put their fucking logo on. So like, I feel like they had to have gone. There were no toys that were made for this. I feel like they had to have known this was not going to go well. What was the brand of COA that it was?

That's a great question. Let's see if I could find it. We'd give a shout out to the theory failing soda company that sank all their money into the Fantastic Four film. We lost it all. tie-in soda. Nope, that's for the most recent one. I want to look for 2015. I trust Mickey Mouse to

know how to brand people. Crush soda. Okay. Crush orange, crush grape, crush strawberry, crush raspberry, I want to say. Are they now defunct? No, they're still around. They're just

cheap soda. Someone's trying to sell... But they took a hit with a lot. eBay, though, it looks like. Oh, man, I can buy four unopened cans of soda from a decade ago for $13. We should do that. We'll drink them on the show. We should.

Yeah. I feel like if I mail that to you guys, it would be considered chemical warfare. Wow. I posted a picture of the cans on our Discord chat, and you can see what the characters look like, Dylan. Yo, look at those guys. Wow, Mr. Fantastic looks like he's seven years old. Yep.

The thing looks great. The thing looks pretty good. I mean, but that's, you know, they went from a rubber suit on Michael Chickless to, you know, computer generated. It looks pretty good. So, obviously, making a Fantastic Four movies is a little more harder and a little more complicated than we thought it was going to be, right? evidently so. Well, it seems that way. So in a week, we will be able to go out and watch a new Fantastic Four movie and see if Disney and MCU can get it right. Now, mind you, the last movie, the last MC movie we talked about was Thunderbolts, and the discussion was like, wow, it was actually pretty good.

Considered a flop in the theaters. Didn't make a lot of money. That's wild to me that they were considering. consider that to be a flop because that was a great phone. It did not make a lot of money. Well, sometimes in art, you don't need to make a lot of money to make a lot of impact. I don't feel like Disney's been in the art business for quite some time. I agree. I feel like they have lost whatever artistic spark they may have had a long time ago.

A long, long time ago. So that's next week. However, we're going to be watching Fantastic Four next week. if things still go according to plan next week's episode Dylan you will finally get to watch Roger Corman's Fantastic Four which we alluded to at the very beginning of this episode talking about the history of the film franchise

it has a budget of a million dollars I'm not sure if you're familiar with who Roger Corman is but I can give you a great rundown go for it Roger Corman is considered one of the greatest directors of all time because he's done hundreds of movies. Famously, most, if not all of them, without a budget, and was active for decades.

I mean, the man did everything from creature features to giant monster movies to the Fantastic Four. There was not a budget too small for that man not to make a movie as you'll see him make a big-time superhero movie with a million dollars in 1992. I can't wait to talk to you about it. Dylan, this is a movie that has a documentary about the making of the movie, because very famously, the actors in it weren't really sure what was going on while they were filming.

I heard that they didn't know that it wasn't supposed to be, like, shelved. They thought that this was really going to be a big theatrical release. And they had no idea that this was just a way to keep the rights going. And was never supposed to be released. Yeah. So I'm intrigued. Yes. I think you should be. I think it's fun. And if we do next week's episode and we're not talking about or watching Roger Corman's Fantastic Four, then you will know something has gone horribly wrong. Yeah. We'll be talking about how nuclear fallout has irradiated all of our bones.

Oh, I thought you were just going to talk about Katie Perry and Hot Dogs again. I think, dude, I mean, I'm going to do. I mean, I'm going to do. I mean, I'm going to do. to say this right now, well, I don't know how much more talking about Kitty Perry we can do. However, I constantly surprise myself. But not be surprised if more

it's on the horizon. Something that's not a surprise is John watches a lot of movies. John, what's your movie count at so far for the year? I am on 493. Oh, getting close to break in a 500 before the middle point of the year.

Yeah. Dylan. Not far away. Wait, wait, wait. What was your... Oh, go ahead, Jill. You were asked the same question I was going on. I was going to say, what was the last...

Yeah, what was the last film you watched? The last movie I watched was the Mr. Bean movie from 1997. Oh, it's a classic. Dylan, what are you up to one night a week? I go, like, killing people. Is that the night you were talking about? No, no, the other night.

Oh, on Monday nights I do a radio show. On Monday nights, 9 o'clock to 11 o'clock, UK time. You can Google what the 9 o'clock is. You can figure it up. Yeah, if you live in, like, Germany, you can figure it all, you know. I play all sorts of, like, fun music. like a lot of grungy like Pearl Jam and Song Garden, so they're all of pilots,

a lot of 90s stuff. Then I try to play a lot of new stuff you haven't heard, not new stuff, but like stuff you haven't heard before, you know, like Cave In or Moontooth were really good. I played them, a bank called Extreme.

You ever heard of a band called Best Coast? Can't say that how? The name rings a bell. They're really good. You should check them out. So I try to mix it up, like some old stuff, some new stuff, you know?

some stuff you've heard before, some stuff you've never heard. Blind Melon. I play a lot of Blind Melon. Elliot Smith, love that boy. So if you like all that stuff, tune into the show. There'll be a link in the description, I think. Bynce Digital Radio.com.com. You can listen to it worldwide if you have the internet. So you can do that.

There you go. And then I have my other show, Large Old Cup. Stream of Consciousness slash Spoken Word podcast. We tell stories and ruminate on. things and what have you. But that's going to be it for us today. Go out and see Fantastic Four next week, but first listen to us talk about Roger Corman's Fantastic Four as we watch it live.

We'll see you guys next week. Later. Bye. Bye-bye.