Has Fox Cancelled Fantastic Four 2?

It appears that 20th Century Fox has removed the planned sequel to this year’s critically and commercially disastrous ‘Fantastic Four’ reboot from its future release schedule.

The move has sparked further speculation that Fox may let the rights slip away in 2022, opening up for the first family of superheroes to return to Marvel Studios and the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU).

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News of the film’s removal comes from the BoxOffice.com Twitter account, which states plainly: “Fox has removed 'Fantastic Four 2’ from their release schedule.”

The film had been pencilled in for June 2017. It is believed that Fox needs to have a new film in production by seven years following the release of the last film, as part of their rolling deal for the rights to the heroes and their foes.

This previously meant that Fox would have lost the rights this year, prior to the production and release of the reboot, and means Fox has until 2022 to make a new film - should they even want to.

Financially it wouldn’t make sense given the poor performance of all three films so far and particularly the performance of the most recent movie. However, Fox may not want to relinquish the series to Marvel knowing they would likely capitalise on what it offers to them and their series.

Fox could certainly take the hit though, as they still hold the 'X-Men’ license and likely will for a very long time to come. A return to Marvel would also delight fans, not because of The Thing or Mr Fantastic, but because of Doctor Doom.

We’re still not letting go of our dream of Mads Mikkelsen playing Doom, and we never will.

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Picture Credits: 20th Century Fox.