More Details Revealed On Big Fantastic Four Action Scene That Was Cut

Among positive box office returns and critical praise, another thing that Fox’s Fantastic Four [...]

Among positive box office returns and critical praise, another thing that Fox's Fantastic Four film missed were thrilling action scenes.

As clips from Fantastic Four's early trailers show, the film had a scene or two of Marvel's first family in action, which never made the final cut. Chief among them were glimpses of The Thing launching from an airplane, then him beating something into submission. As intense as those scenes appeared, no one knew what else they contained or when in the film they would have appeared.

Well, Entertainment Weekly was among the curious, and did some sleuthing for the inside scoop on those scenes. After speaking with numerous people involved in the film, EW reports that the missing action sequence would have started immediately after the One Year time jump that occurred right after the Fantastic Four endured their painful transformations. Instead of opening with the government watching Ben Grimm, Sue Storm, and Johnny Storm in a special facility, the movie reportedly would have opened directly with the missing action scene, tossing the audience directly into a Fantastic Four mission before tracing back and explaining the team's situation.

According to EW, this is how the scene went down:

A Chechen rebel camp in the wee hours of the night. There's no explanation for where we are, but there are soldiers speaking a foreign language, and they are loading up some heavy-duty weaponry.


Crews are filling truck beds with the gear, preparing to mobilize – then a siren goes off. Everyone freezes, and one by one they turn their faces to the sky. A stealth bomber whispers by overhead, and a large object falls from it, streaking through the air at great speed.
The object – a bomb, a missile? – collides with the earth in the center of the camp, sending debris is all directions. The soldiers take cover, then tentatively emerge and walk toward the crater, where there is a giant pile of orange boulders.


Slowly, the rocks begin to move on their own, becoming arms, legs, a torso, a head …This rock-figure lumbers out of the smoke, and the soldiers level their weapons – then open fire. As The Thing lurches into view, bullets spark and ping off his impenetrable exterior.
Rather than some elegant, balletic action sequence, The Thing moves slowly and deliberately. He's in no hurry. The storytelling goal was to show the futility of firepower against him as he casually demolishes the terrorists. It's a blue-collar kind of heroism.
When it becomes clear this rock-beast cannot be stopped, the surviving Chechen rebels make a run for it – and that's when a hail of gunfire finishes them off.


From the shadows of the surrounding forest, a team of Navy SEALS emerge with their guns drawn and smoking. The cavalry has arrived, but the enemy has already been subdued.
The film would then have shifted to a bird's-eye view of the camp, an aerial shot showing waves of American soldiers flooding in to secure the base. Just when it appears the American soldiers may be ready to clash with the rock monster, The Thing gives them a solemn nod, and they clear a path. He lumbers past them, almost sadly, a heartsick warrior. Then he boards a large helicopter and is lifted away.


Only then does the movie cut to that conference room, where Tim Blake Nelson's Dr. Allen is crowing to his military overlords about how this mutated team of scientists is helping do the heavy lifting for America's rank-and-file soldiers.


As for why the scene was ultimately cut, EW reports that there were many conflicting stories. Some said that Trank decided he didn't want it after waffling on it for too long, others claimed that Fox didn't want to finance the effects-heavy scene at all, and others reported that Fox only decided to finance the scene extremely late into the movie's production schedule without Trank's involvement, leading Trank to kill the scene entirely.

Regardless of who's to blame, it seems like Fantastic Four missed out on a pretty action-heavy moment. But what do you think, readerS? Would you have wanted the above scene in The Fantastic Four? Let us know in the comments.

Fantastic Four 2 is scheduled (for now) for a June 2, 2017 release.

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