Chris Columbus Was Kicked Out of ‘The Fantastic Four’ for the Dumbest Reason
One of Marvel’s first attempts to adapt "The Fantastic Four" comic book failed miserably, and it might be Chris Columbus who saw what the problem actually was.
It’s been a long time coming for The Fantastic Four’s first successful adaptation released this year, but things could have been way different had Chris Columbus was at helm of a previous movie.
Released in 2005, The Fantastic Four starring huge Hollywood figures like Jessica Alba and Chris Evans went on to gross $333 million against its $100 million budget, but mostly securing negative reviews from both critics and viewers.
This, however, wasn’t something so shocking to Home Alone and Harry Potter’s director Chris Columbus who was initially on board for the movie, but came off of it after, well, not liking the original concept.
Chris Columbus Was Fired From ‘The Fantastic Four’ For Having “Too Much of an Opinion”
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Even though Marvel now tends to look out for more original ideas from writers after a series of major box office mishaps, it wasn’t just as easy to go with something of your own back in the day.
During his recent appearance on the Fade to Black podcast, Columbus recalled feeling weird about the whole process of working on The Fantastic Four and later seeing his initiative backfire when the superhero studio dismissed him from the set.
“We were in a weird situation. On the first ‘Fantastic Four,’ I had worked on a script. There were a lot of writers involved. I met with the director and had some ideas”, the director revealed, adding that he’d wanted the movie to look more like Jack Kirby’s original comic book and not so much like Marvel’s epic blockbuster with a way less compelling plot.
However, the studio’s bosses didn’t waste much time afterwards, making it clear that they wouldn’t accept such creative freedom.
“I left that meeting and on the way back from my house I got a call from the head of 20th Century Fox saying I was fired and had too much of an opinion”, Columbus stated.
Chris Columbus Wasn’t In the Mood for Superhero Movies Since Then
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At the time, the director was more than interested in helming some Marvel-ish stories and even tried to land the Spider-Man adaptation before Sam Raimi actually did it.
Considering this, it’s easy to understand why Marvel’s decision to fire Columbus from The Fantastic Four hit the latter pretty hard, but there was another reason why the director felt like he simply wasn’t meant to make a superhero movie.
“Over the years people have done it so well that I personally lost interest in making a superhero movie. I realized I don’t have a desire to make those movies anymore because people are doing them better than I ever could at this point in my career”, Columbus added.
