‘Fantastic Four’ Writer Revealed His First Draft Introduced a Villain as Dangerous as Thanos
The Fantastic Four reboot earned a lot of criticism from both casual and hardcore Marvel fans. It’s a long list of issues, but writer Jeremy Slater explained how the first draft had another direction entirely. The 2015 Fantastic Four reboot almost introduced a villain as dangerous as Thanos.
‘Fantastic Four’ reboot featured Doctor Doom as the main villain
The 2015 Fantastic Four reboot re-introduced Marvel’s most popular family to the world. The story follows Reed Richards (Miles Teller), Susan Storm (Kate Mara), Johnny Storm (Michael B. Jordan), and Ben Grimm (Jamie Bell) after they get superhuman powers.
This iteration of Fantastic Four also brings back Doctor Doom (Toby Kebbell) as the primary villain. The superhero team must work together to stop him from destroying the planet. However, both critics and audiences panned the comic book movie.
‘Fantastic Four’ writer Jeremy Slater revealed his first draft introduced villains Annihilus and Galactus
Comic Book interviewed Slater to talk about the Fantastic Four reboot, including the villain changes that happened after the first draft. He revealed that he initially intended for Fantastic Four to include villains Annihilus and Galactus. However, the studio cut them both to put more focus on Doctor Doom.
“We had Annihilus in my draft of the original Fantastic Four when they went to the Negative Zone for the first time they were attacked,” Slater said. “In the very first draft, they were attacked by Galactus and the whole plot, it was Galactus had fired his sort of cosmic radiation through the portal and then you found out Galactus was sort of tracking that radiation back and was on his way to Earth.”
Slater further explained that the studio thought that the premise was “too much.” As a result, they made major changes. However, he still tried to do what he could in the second draft.
“In the second draft, they actually encountered Annihilus and he was 20-feet tall and cybernetic,” Slater said. “I pitched him as the T-Rex from Jurassic Park and the way he would be sort of hunting and attacking them, and it seemed like he was the one who killed Victor and they barely got back through the portal in time but it felt like a really fun twist or fun way to use Annihilus that we hadn’t seen before.”
Jeremy Slater wants to see Annihilus and Galactus join the MCU
Slater ultimately didn’t get his way with the Fantastic Four villain idea, but that doesn’t mean that these characters will never hit the silver screen. He still holds out hope that the world could see it in the future of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
“For one of a thousand reasons, that was something that got changed in that movie,” Slater said. “But the good news is he [Annihilus] hasn’t been used yet. He’s still out there, and he’s awesome.”
Slater concluded: “So out there I have no doubt Annihilus is showing up at some point, it’s just a question of is he Fantastic Four or is he part of the different cosmic universe MCU stuff? I don’t know.”
The MCU’s Phase Four is bringing Fantastic Four to the silver screen, so Annihilus and Galactus could perhaps join this cinematic universe in the near future.
