Doom Is Nigh?

Well, That's interesting.

I made reference on the IFC post to how Fox can make a good Fantastic Four movie. It was announced today (Friday, 20July) that they're taking one of the first steps, perhaps. That step being "No Doctor Doom in the first movie. Give him his own film instead."

In the craze to make villain based films, they own one of the greatest in comics. A Doom movie could run the complete Hero's Journey and set him up as a truly meaningful confrontation when he collides with the FF. Keep Reed's involvement down to less than 2 minutes.

You've got the tale of a brilliant kid - Tony Stark type brilliant, who loses his father to a corrupt government,and then learns that his dead mother was a witch, and that he has inherited her gift for the dark arts. He comes to realize that his mother died an unconfessed witch, now suffering in Hell. He travels across the world seeking the knowledge, both scientific and occult, to breach the barrier between realms to rescue his mother from damnation. Dren happens (See Reed Richards' 2 minutes) and his experiments are explosively destroyed. Forced to leave, he finds his way to an ancient Tibetan temple whose monks help him further his occult knowledge, and to forge himself a new armored identity. Like Tony Stark, he builds an incredibly advanced battle armor, though he takes it a step further, pressing the hot forged face-plate to his own own flesh, scarring it far beyond anything done by the accident.
Now armed like a combined Iron Man/Doctor Strange, he returns to his native country to depose the corrupt regime that destroyed his family. After a brief but devastating war with the rulers & their armies, Doom installs himself as the new government. As our movie ends, we see that he is bringing a never before known prosperity to his country, advancing the science, health and lifestyle of the common peoples. And the dark edge of power that enforces his view of how things should be...

Now you're set up for an epic confrontation when he appears in the 2nd or 3rd Fantastic Four film - a hero every bit as much as villain for a pure distilled awesome clash of comic goodness on the screen.

Of course, this assumes that they're doing the classic Lee & Kirby character. I don't believe the Fox execs have ever seen him - just the pitiful creature that exists in more recent times.The one who's a villain because Daddy was a Satanist who beat him, and that's bad, so he is, too.
Somehow, they thought this was improving the character.

Man, that's pathetic.

We'll get back to how they can make a good FF film later. I jumped the gun on this one point because of today's news.