Who to blame: Trank or Kinberg?

[SyntaxError]

Well, early reports say that the movie is bad, perhaps even more so than the previous franchise.

Who is more to blame from the primary people evolved in the production of the film? Director Trank or Screenwriter/Producer Kinberg?

Rumours suggest that Trank's time in the directors chair was mired with controversy off-set and on-set, with the material produced being so insufficient that lengthy reshoots were required to salvage the movie. Trank is inexperienced but proved his potential in Chronicle, but was this franchise just too big for him to handle right out of the gates?

Reports that Trank was dumped from the Star Wars movie he was in-line to direct seem to point to the same conclusion. Kinberg's role on the Lucasfilm think tank probably played a part in that.

Meanwhile, Kinberg himself does not seem free of blame. He was the primary screenwriter and producer of the film, as he is with the X-Men franchise. Reports suggest the script is bland and flat, for which he is responsible. Seems to be consistent with his previous works (the script of DOFP was the weakest link of the movie in my opinion). Also was the one that intervened in Tranks' direction and reportedly led the reshoots. Could the reshoots have ruined the movie?

 

[Jason Kane]

Rothman
Watts
Trank
Kinberg
Slater


In that order

 

[GR8GODZILLAGOD]

Both.

 

[Ragnaroknroll]

Fox

 

[Spiderine]

Who ever made the decision to make this film in the first place. No intention whatsoever to make a brilliant entertaining and somewhat loyal film to a property that had already been damaged. Everybody else was simply along for the ride. Hopefully they cease playing this game any longer and do whats right for all sides.

 

[Flint Marko]

Fox.

 

[Farren]

My verdict is out on Trank due to reports that the first half of the film is pretty decent and I suspect that was his main contribution to the film. He probably did screw up the second half at least somewhat for Fox to undertake so many reshoots, but how badly I can't say (and given that I suspect Fox screwed this thing on budget and support for the young filmmaker that may not entirely be his fault).

Kinberg I think is just being his mediocre self by being unable to elevate the material.

Fox, however, I'd pin the most blame on given what I know so far. Fox waited until the last minute to make this film; Fox chose to hire Trank -- who just wanted to make a film that his creative instincts wanted to and I can't blame him for that -- when they could have gone in another direction and rolled out the red carpet with a great budget for this movie instead of probably picking Trank cuz his idea was cheaper to make; Fox set the tone on the production (terrible PR all along and not even managing to get Kata Mara a decent wig are just a few pieces of evidence of how awful that tone was); Fox was once again afraid of making a real CBM; Fox seems to have made things worse with their reshoots.

So, TL;DR: Fox.

 

[starscream22]

Fox

Fox.

I actually blame the people who support Fox.

For over 2 years they acted like the warning signs weren't piling up in front of them.

Worse they tried to make it seem like we were all crazy.

"Duh, if it's so bad then why do they have a sequel lined up?"

Yeah, about that.........

 

[Marvel]

Kinberg reminds me of the quintessential team player. He's proven himself on X-Men for the most part and was asked to try and help here. I think he knew this thing was crap right from the start but tried to shape it in to something less embarrassing however he could. He was doomed to failure right from pre-production (no pun intended) but likes his Fox paycheck and continues to tow the line even now.

I remember him and Zak Penn on forums communicating with fans before X3 talking up the movie as the greatest thing every put to film. It's his job to promote a film at this stage but how many times can he cry wolf before everyone loses respect for him?

 

[justanotherguy]

Kinberg reminds me of the quintessential team player. He's proven himself on X-Men for the most part and was asked to try and help here. I think he knew this thing was crap right from the start but tried to shape it in to something less embarrassing however he could. He was doomed to failure right from pre-production (no pun intended) but likes his Fox paycheck and continues to tow the line even now.

I remember him and Zak Penn on forums communicating with fans before X3 talking up the movie as the greatest thing every put to film. It's his job to promote a film at this stage but how many times can he cry wolf before everyone loses respect for him?

Personally I didn't care for DFOP and Kinberg does a lot of exposition even for GA superhero films...between X3 and especially the first 15 minutes of DFOP I feel like he's not that good at comic films...but it's Hollywood, where you fail upward.

His best work has been his Star Wars stuff,imo.

 

[Dasher10]

It depends on how far up the food chain you want to go. Emma Watts greenlit the film but I don't think she would set aside $100 million for a disaster. She would have gone cheaper.

Simon Kinberg did try to fire Trank but nobody else wanted to do the film since Jeremy Slater's script was pretty awful. He still greenlit a script which needed on set rewrites which never turn out well since the dialog was written on the spot.

As for Trank. He locked Kinberg (and Millar and Vaughn) out of the editing room where he proved to be indecisive when working with OTOY. His original rough cut was bad enough that extensive reshoots were needed and by the sound of it, it doesn't sound like they made the film more fun. More like rushed dialog in the final battle and a plodding pace. The reshoots and Trank causing problems for the effects studio caused the film to go over budget since Ben kept changing size from shot to shot. Then when he finally had a rough cut, he the film would up delayed due to additional reshoots.

So really, I blame Trank. He sold Fox on a vision which he couldn't follow through on. On one hand, Fox deserve some of the blame for hiring him but on the other hand, they were running out of time to make a film. At this point the film is damaged goods. Fox have nothing to gain from another film. It's three strikes, they're out. I don't see a sequel to a film with a 32 Metacritic score and Marvel desperately want cosmic characters as much as Fox want to put X-Factor on TV so I don't see this film being a hit but I do see Marvel and Fox developing a better relationship after the rights revert just like Marvel and Sony after Ghost Rider bombed.

 

[the gael]

There are so many culprit !

The Fox executives : They wanted a cheap movie at all cost to keep the rights, but also launch a franchise. they didn't realized that they had to make a choice. They hired the first guy who told them that he could do it for cheap. The guy was untested !

They never learned why first Class, in the same conditions, worked ! First class worked only because of the Singer and Vaughn friendship (they work very well together) and because Singer was the responsible of the X Men movie success !

In this case, they realized to late that not only, unlike Singer and Vaughn, Trank wasn't a team player, but that he was alienating fans (so FOX would make less $$$). They tried to kick him out of the project. Nobody wanted to replace him (lack of time to make the movie work and bad script, I guess), but decided to greenlit the movie to not loose the right, even if it was already clear that the movie was a trainwreack at this time ! Watts was very Culprit of that !

Trank, probably the main responsible after the Fox executive. Arrogant, whiner, self destructive, unprofessional. He chose a bad tone for the movie, change everything to fit his own agenda, insulted people who didn't agrea with him because "he was a Genius" (as if everyone could care of him) He did so many things wrong. The bad OTOY idea. It was supposed to save money, it was more costy... The so innovative movie turned a very bland and boring things, so Kinberg and co tried to fix it.... turning the final act of the movie into a mess !

Kinberg... He is the writer definition of a "Yes Man", very mediocre in himself, and only as good as the director above him. With Singer, he does a good job. With a hack... he's bad ! The guy inherit a terrible script by Slade, and has to work with a mad director. I don't like him, but I'm sure he tried his best. He tried to saved the third act, but f##ked it even more.

I would say that Watts and Trank are the culprits here.

 

[TheVileOne]

Wasn't Kinberg on this from the beginning?

Also what about Mark Millar? Wasn't he involved with this at some point? He was supposed to be Fox's Marvel Creative Consultant.

 

[TheVileOne]

Here found this gem from Fox's Marvel Creative Consultant Mark Millar.

http://www.denofgeek.com/movies/24033/mark-millar-on-josh-tranks-jaw-dropping-fantastic-four

“From what I've seen and from talking to him – he and I have had dinner a couple of times and we talk quite regularly as well – he's contemporizing it. I think he's just making it work for the screen – he's a great story teller.”

He continues: “What I wasn't expecting, actually, was just how funny and likeable he could make this, as well as getting the more awesome moments on screen – I use awesome in the traditional British sense and not the California sense awesome, you know? The Ridley Scott moments, and the Fantastic Four really are jaw-dropping in the same way you feel when you saw Alien for the first time. There's some moments in this – not to be specific – that are actually gonna be phenomenal on the screen and stuff you haven't seen in a superhero movie before.”

 

[Eddie]

Mark Millar basically got payed to promote the film. He hasn't really done anything of note for these Fox movies. He's just a name they can attach to try to give the film "cred" with comic fans.

 

[TheVileOne]

Personally I didn't care for DFOP and Kinberg does a lot of exposition even for GA superhero films...between X3 and especially the first 15 minutes of DFOP I feel like he's not that good at comic films...but it's Hollywood, where you fail upward.

His best work has been his Star Wars stuff,imo.

Which is what though? His Star Wars movie hasn't even gone in front of cameras yet. Star Wars Rebels is not just his show. A number of other people are attached to that show.

Carrie Beck and Dave Filoni also credited as creators, plus a whole host of other writers and producers.

Honestly, among his resume, I would probably say his best and most successful credited movie was Sherlock Holmes, but a lot of what was in that first movie was already basically made out by other screenwriters.

 

[Dasher10]

Mark Millar basically got payed to promote the film. He hasn't really done anything of note for these Fox movies. He's just a name they can attach to try to give the film "cred" with comic fans.

Actually, he was hired to assist Fox as a producer and make the rebooted X-Men continuity able to be followed. Trank just kicked both he and Vaughn to the curb and didn't utilize them since he didn't want the studio meddling in his film, despite the Fox suits having enough experience to know how to tell a successful story. Trank felt that he knew better and wound up creating a trainwreck which is looking more and more like an expensive mistake.

Fox have some great science fiction series. Namely they have a shared universe all their own in AVP. They don't need the Fantastic Four when they have Prometheus 2, Alien 5 and Predator 4 coming out. That's in addition to Avatar. That's already a massive sci-fi portfolio and Marvel will NEVER allow Fox to cross over the FF with Avatar or Alien. They could easily sell FF back for a hefty profit and then use that money for other films to improve them.

 

[TheVileOne]

Dasher10, the AVP movies sucked and they aren't going back to that "shared universe."

Also Bryan Singer more recently even talked about them crossing over. Apparently when they started this whole reboot thing they wanted a crossover with X-Men.

 

[Eddie]

Eh, Millar did diddly squat on Wolverine, and he didn't even meet Singer until it became public knowledge that he hadn't even met Singer despite being some sort of overall Foxverse guy. He strikes me as having the same kind of "Producer" role Stephen Chow had on DBE. The leads never met Chow, he wasn't on set, and it all seemed to be a grab for attention.

 

[TheVileOne]

Not to pile on Kinberg, but was he not on board with the whole gritty, realistic and dark take from the beginning? I recall him talking it up a lot when this whole thing got started.

 

[Flint Marko]

Millars never been an integral part of Fox's movie verse, despite what the publicity would like you to believe.

 

[Comic Book Guy]

How about both. And lets not forget the geniuses who run Fox.

 

[psylockolussus]

If I have to blame someone, it would be Fox, for demanding reshoots after reshoots? Then maybe Simon Kinberg

None of the scenes

Spoiler

looked reshot before the "1 year later" section.

I'm not gonna blame Josh Trank since the film really started well.

 

[Double B]

Why_not_both.gif.

 

[psylockolussus]

If Kinberg also demanded to do reshoots then I would say both. But the first forty-fifty minutes were really good. Then...

Spoiler

The 1 - year later card came out and there's Kate Mara wearing her wig, obvious reshoot scenes and things went downhill.