A Geeky Viewpoint

Sony and 20th Century Fox have over the years had a solid working relationship as film studios, including several unwritten agreements to not step on one another toes or directly compete with one another on numerous projects and sharing of resources.   In the Marvel Universe Sony allowed 20th Century Fox to use Kingpin from the Spider-Man IP in their 2003 Daredevil Movie.   

The great Sony hack reviled that Sony was well versed on everything that 20th Century Fox was working on, and considering; including details on a potential X-Men - Fantastic Four crossover.

 

20th Century Fox does not have a good relationship with Disney or Marvel Studios, bad, contentious, ill-willed are probably much better words to describe their relationship.  

In 2012 Co-Chair Tom Rothman stepped down leaving Jim Gianopulos as Chair of 20th Century Fox.   Tom Rothman by all accounts was not a superhero kind of guy, the jury is kind of out on Jim.   However when George Lucas sold LucasFilm Studios to Disney in 2012 without even allowing 20th Century Fox to bid, needless to say Jim Gianopulos was not a happy camper.

In 2012 Marvel Studios (and Marvel Entertainment) were in discussions with 20th Century Fox on the return of the Fantastic Four IP to Marvel.   According to rumor at the last moment 20th Century Fox decided to move forwards with production of a reboot, Marvel Entertainment CEO Isaac Perlmutter went beyond ballistic to batshit crazy.    To this day their are no posters or pictures of the Fantastic Four in Marvel Entertainments Headquarters.

The rumors continued that Alan Fine,  President of Marvel Entertainment, read the script of the reboot and said something along the lines that "this is worse than The Amazing Spider-Man 2." 

A comparison of the box-office returns of The Avengers: Age of Ultron to The Fantastic Four will be telling.   It goes beyond which movie makes the most revenue, because that is a no brainer, but rather which one outperforms and which one underperforms.

A:AOU may have an outside chance to hit $1 Billion domestically, I am guessing somewhere in the neighborhood of $750 Million is more likely.    

The FF movie on the other hand is a complete wildcard.  It could be as high as $200 Million or as low as $85 Million with a fair bet that $150 Million is going to be pretty close. 

 

Where this comes into play is how much money the movies make in revenue for the individual studios.   Everything from Marvel Studios has turned out well so far, 20th Century Fox on the other hand is only batting .500.  
20th Century Fox is not investing big into Fantastic Four, reportedly around $100 Million in comparison Marvel Studios is investing $180 Million for Ant-Man.   To turn a profit domestically Fantastic Four needs to earn around $140 to $145 Million, that way any money earned overseas is all profit.   With a fair bet that $150 Million, that really doesn't leave any margin for error.  A rough formula suggests for every $1 less than $145 million the movie will need to earn $3 overseas.  Example if FF earns $120 Million ($25 M Short) it will need to make $75 Million overseas.  

You can be successful with a decent overseas revenue, see The Wolverine, unfortunately that is the exception not the rule.

The worst nightmare for 20th Century Fox is Fantastic Four earns $115 Million Domestically and $180 Million overseas.   While it sounds like a big number it barely makes enough to cover the expenses and not enough to finance the sequel in any way shape or form.

 

Another item to watch for is Fantastic Four is using OTOY for almost all of its VX (CGI).  OTOY is a cloud rendering system that in theory is 1/4 to 1/3 the cost of traditional VX.   The question is how well will the VX from OTOY be in comparison to traditional VX used by Marvel Studios.   In the trailer we have not seen many VX shots so as an audience we have no way of knowing, yet even Ant-Man has shown us multiple VX shots.   I'll just say it is not a good sign so far.

 

The audience reaction to the Fantastic Four will be another and probably the final key metric for the success of FF.    Initially fans of the 2005 FF film were okay with the film, scoring the film with a median score of 6 (on a 10 point scale).   After the release of the FF: Rise of the Silver Surfer the median score for the original dropped to a 5.   Fan reception below a 8 (The lowest score in MCU excluding Hulk standalone movies) is probably going to be considered a failure. 

 

I can hear it now: That's a lot of discussion on FF, why?

The FF is a reboot of a movie franchise that is not 10 years old so the comparisons to Spider-Man and The Amazing Spider-Man are fairly natural or predictable.  With the failures of TASM people are going to want to know did 20th Century Fox learn from Sony's mistakes or not.
To me the answer is, well no, or probably not really.  20th Century Fox is telling an origin story over, trying to tell a coming of age story, and deviating from the accepted story line.
   
If you had seen Spider-Man (2002), you know any of the 500 times it was on TV before TASM (2012) was released than the rehash of the movie meant that 45 minutes or so could easily have been chopped out.  So far this month alone the 2005 Fantastic Four film is on TV 74 times.  
Marvel learned this from Hulk to The Incredible Hulk, where the reboot origin story was 5 minutes during the opening credits.

It is interesting that Josh Trank's version of FF is a coming of age story, well not really interesting but some word with similar meaning.  Josh Trank's best work thus far is Chronicle, a coming of age story about three friends who get super-powers and what happens to them.   So FF is a coming of age story about FOUR friends who get super-powers and what happens to them.   See the difference, oh yeah and the budget $20 to $100.  
The other problem with a coming of age story is the original story of the Fantastic Four, you know four OLDER individuals who gain powers later in life and how it changes their adult lives.

Which leads to the question, What happens if Fantastic Four underperforms at the Box Office?
For the record I am going to say underperforming is less than $150 million domestically and under $200 internationally.  
If FF falls dramatically short, say $115 and $150, I am guessing the second film is delayed or cancelled and 20th Century Fox and Marvel have discussions about giving back the license.
If FF falls short by a little bit, the third movie (crossover) is not going to happen.  The Second film may be delayed and Josh Trank replaced. 
If FF outperforms expectations than a lot of bloggers are going to have crow for supper for a while.

What are my expectations?
I have a hard time seeing FF outperforming expectations.   In the world of Sci-Fi movies, not just super-hero, but Sci-Fi movies in general (including supernatural horror, futuristic, alternative history, monsters and so forth) very few movies, not made by Marvel, have out performed expectations.   Christopher Nolan's Batman Begins is on a very short list that includes Avatar and ...  well ... that maybe it in the past ten years.   A few like Godzilla and Interstellar either barely beat or just missed their expectations but not many movies truly beat expectations.  The only question is how far below expectations do I expect FF to fall.
With that in mind I have a hard time seeing Fantastic Four II being released as scheduled in ultra competitive 2017 time frame.  

If 20th Century Fox did not control the X-Men IP, I am currently giving it a 25% chance that the license will be returned to Marvel before the next movie is made. A 50% chance that an agreement with Marvel would be made similar to the one between Sony and Marvel.  The remaining 25% chance that 20th Century will continue the course with Fantastic Four.   The percent chance that 20th Century Fox enters into a deal with Marvel Studios would be much higher if there was not so much animosity between the two groups.

Just Putting this in writing.
I do not anticipate that Marvel has any interest in the Fantastic Four under its current configuration of twenty-something characters. 
I want to be one of the first to say that I wouldn't be shocked if Marvel were to look at Ioan Gruffeld, Jessica Alba and Michael Chiklis plus a replacement for Chris Evans if a crossover agreement were to happen.



Enough about the Fantastic Four, what about the X-Men?
The last two X-Men Movies, The Wolverine and X-Men: Days of Future Past, underperformed at the domestic box office ($132 and $233 Million Respectfully).   Both movies, on the other hand, outperformed expectations in the international box office ($284 and $511 M).
Executives at 20th Century Fox believed The Wolverine was a solid enough movie to make $65 M opening weekend with an outside chance to hit $75 M and end up in the $175 M range overall before the release of the film.  The movie fell roughly 20% short on both numbers.   X:Men Days of Future Past also fell 20% short of both opening weekend and total domestic.  The two movies combined to be approximately $100 below expectations.    That is a lot of jing, considering it was the budget of The Wolverine.

X-Men: Apocalypse is budgeted to be the most expensive film ever made by 20th Century Fox, in the neighborhood of $250 M.   There is hope at 20th Century Fox that using the OTOY system in the Fantastic Four can be used of XM:A and a savings of about $50 M can be seen.   With XM:A about to go into production I would have expected to hear rave reviews about OTOY and plans to use it wide spread by now.   As I have not hear those rave reviews I am thinking there is an issue and that traditional VX is going to be used in XM:A.

To keep up with the increased expenses XM:A will need to earn $270M domestically.   With XM:A being released in IMAX (the preceding films were not) it should bring a 10% to 15% increase in domestic revenue as well as the usual ticket price increases.  Additionally Deadpool will be released 90 days before.   Simply put it will need to sell 50,000 to 100,000 more tickets than XM:DoFP.   If Deadpool brings in similar numbers to The Wolverine coupled with the fact XM:DoFP was well received its not hard to imagine XM:A making those numbers.   That's not the problem, the fact that XM:DoFP underperformed by 20% puts the real number that XM:A should reach at $320M is the problem and its hard to see the movie hitting that mark.

X-Men: The TV Series
Way back in early 2000's there was a lawsuit involving Marvel Studios/Entertainment and 20th Century Fox concerning the rights both have for the X-Men Universe.   The result of the suit clearly indicated there are two sets of rights.  Marvel controls the X-Men Universe on TV and similar platforms while 20th Century Fox controls ALL mutants in Theatrically Released Motion Pictures.

So when rumors started circling that 21st Century Fox (20th Century Fox parent Company) was exploring a X-Men TV show for FOX (the TV Network) my ears perked up.   In many ways this is similar to the rumors about a Spider-Verse Movie with a female lead, it can only happen if there is an agreement between Fox and Marvel.   The rumors have died down lately, but something to watch for.

The Fantastic Four and the X-Men    
Before further discussing the X-Men IP the question becomes how linked are these two IPs in the eyes of Marvel and 20th Century Fox.   I honestly cannot answer.  I can suggest based upon public comment prior to Fantastic Four going into production that there is little or no link, however in the same breath I would add that people at 20th Century Fox would like there to be. 

From where I sit writing this I cannot see Marvel Entertainment/Studios coming to an agreement with 20th Century Fox on just one of the two IPs, if it is just one, it will not be the X-Men.  
Up above I suggested that there was a 50% chance that 20th Century Fox and Marvel come to an agreement, but that's not a true percentage chance.   With the animosity between the two studios that number should be closer to zero, but we aren't talking X-Men, we are suggesting the Fantastic Four.

What could Marvel Use?
Wolverine, Beast, X-23, Professor Xavier, an older Fantastic Four AND villains. 
The heroes would be a nice little addition to MCU, its the villains that Marvel Studios needs, especially big time named villains.  Doctor Doom, Galacatus, Magneto, Mystique, Jugernaut, and Sabretooth.  


Let's cut to the chase: Does 20th Century Fox and Marvel Studios make an agreement similar to the one that Sony Production Entertainment did with Marvel Studios earlier this month?
No.

If they make an agreement it will be a MUCH BIGGER agreement, involving TV rights, marketing and character licenses; not necessarily more money involved. 

The odds of that agreement are probably a little less than a coin flip.  An under performing Fantastic Four probably will lead to that push, which may occur before the movies release, but I don't think Marvel will go along with it.   Let's be clear however if Deadpool and X-Men: Apocalypse are going to beat expectations, and Wolverine 3 as well, than 20th Century Fox needs Marvel's help. 

An agreement between the two studios will clearly allow FOX to create and air an X-Men themed TV series, and maybe even a Fantastic Four theme TV series as well.