This is a sad state of affairs, though honestly I’m not sure if I could bring myself to see another Fantastic Four movie from this cast and crew.

I remember, around this time last year I was amazed at myself for actually getting excited for seeing the Silver Surfer make it to the big screen after the admittedly pretty cool trailer but all that soon vanished about two minutes into seeing the final product at my local theatre.

The Fantastic Four, for nearly 50 years has kept comic book fans coming back month after month to read the adventures of the four iconic characters but it’s cinematic incarnation has only resulted in two shitty movies. And unless a much talked about Silver Surfer spin-off gets underway, it would seem both 20th Century Fox and the four leads are sick to death of the fan backlash for this franchise and though it still makes money, they are going to call it a day.

From MTV…

“I’m pretty sure we won’t do [another] one,” insisted “Fantastic Four” star Chris Evans, who excelled in two films as the Human Torch. “I’m assuming that one is a closed book.”

“After the first one was released we got wind of potential titles and plots [almost immediately], and I’ve heard nothing from anyone at Fox [yet],” he grumbled. “We had all planned on doing [another] one but if there were going to be a third I think a week after the second one was released we would have heard.”

“It takes up a lot of time. It’s a big commitment,” he said. “I’m happy with walking away.”

As much as I go on about how dumb and ridiculous these movies were, I do believe there was a place for them in the industry because they were almost exclusively aimed at young children, a superhero movie parents would be happy to take their children to see.

And it wasn’t like the franchise was unsalvageable. Chris Evans was always fine as the Human Torch, Ioan Grufford COULD have been ok as Reed if he just notched up his charisma… dump Jessica Alba for an older and more assured blonde actress… dump Doctor Doom (because they have wasted that character)… change the voice of the Silver Surfer to Doug Jones... don’t make Galactus a frikkin’ cloud… choose story over action… and maybe have a big team of super villains this time for the four to unite as one to face.

Do all that and you might be getting somewhere with this franchise.