“Unearthed Secrets: The Shocking Truth Behind the Unreleased ‘Fantastic Four’ Movie That Could Have Changed Superhero History”
In more recent years, Disney acquired 20th Century Fox Studios, which included rights to the X-Men and, yes, the Fantastic Four.
Back to 1986. Eichinger’s company tried to attach major studios like Warner Brothers and Columbia (eventually owned by Sony) to cover what would be a high budget for the production of the comic book adaptation. However, nothing came about.
By 1992, the rights he had optioned from Stan Lee were about to expire, meaning that all rights would revert back to Stan Lee if a film was not produced, as stated in the contract. Eichinger had asked for an extension from Marvel, to no avail. So, he figured out that all he had to do to retain the rights to the franchise was produce a film. There was no stipulation that the eventual film had to be a big studio movie.