“Unearthed Secrets: The Shocking Truth Behind the Unreleased ‘Fantastic Four’ Movie That Could Have Changed Superhero History”
Why do they do this? Because they don’t want to outright sell their rights to someone who is never going to produce something from it.
The prime example occurred with some Marvel properties in the 1990s, well before superhero movies were WIDELY accepted—beyond the two titans of Superman and Batman.
In 1986, German producer Bernd Eichinger optioned the rights to make a Fantastic Four movie from Stan Lee for an estimated $250,000.
At the time, Marvel wasn’t doing so well. The company would sell film rights to their properties to the highest bidder, which is why, for many years, Sony had the rights to Spider-Man while Marvel Studios couldn’t use the character (and the many supporting heroes and villains within the Spider-Man comics) in their MCU universe. It wasn’t until 2016 that Sony partnered with them to include the character within a joint profit share.