As the superhero franchise boom shows no signs of slowing down, 20th Century Fox is looking to get moving on their Fantastic Four reboot. We knew the reboot was coming, as Fox is in danger of losing the property if they don’t produce a Fantastic Four film every few years. Now the studio has apparently honed in on their choice for the film’s director: Josh Trank. The director is set to make his feature debut with the found footage superhero movie Chronicle, which has been generating a good deal of buzz ever since the first trailer debuted online. The studio won’t make a final decision on Trank until after seeing how Chronicle fares once it hits theaters, but Variety says insiders at Fox are very keen on the young director. Hit the jump for more.

Ever since 2008′s Iron Man, Marvel Studios has carved out a profitable niche in Hollywood independently financing the film adaptations of the Marvel comics.  However, because of the nature of film rights, a few of Marvel’s most popular properties are housed at other studios.  Fox has three: X-Men, Daredevil, and Fantastic Four.  In a recent interview, Fox executive Tom Rothman stressed the studio is eager to continue development on the next chapter in those respective stories—a sequel to X-Men: First Class and reboots for Daredevil and Fantastic Four.

Hit the jump for the interview clip (plus quotes) to see what Rothman had to say.

With a mere ten days to go until Matthew Vaughn’s X-Men: First Class hits theaters, t-shirt designers are getting creative and drawing inspiration from great artists such as the legendary graphic designer Saul Bass and pop artist Nagel.

While the Bass-inspired designs have a more retro feel, the Nagel series draws its influence from the Duran Duran era of the 80’s. Check them out after the jump!

One man’s trash is another man’s treasure, especially if the first man is a finished movie or TV production and the other man is an eBay memorabilia business.  Fans of Battlestar Galactica, Iron Man, Fantastic Four, The Incredible Hulk, Stargate SG-1, and other geek properties may want to get their wallets out to buy some movie memorabilia.  Sure, an Iron Man poster is nice, but wouldn’t you rather have a fake newspaper with the headline, “Who Is The Ironman?”  And while real books are all well and good, you could fill your shelves with the corner-less books from the Battlestar Pegasus.  And fellas, if you want to impress that certain special someone, you might want to pick up fake blood samples from BSG and Incredible Hulk.  She’ll be like putty in your hand when you say, “Hey, baby.  Check out all this blood I bought off eBay.”

Hit the jump to check out some of the memorabilia that’s currently up for sale.

Artist Justin Van Genderen, who did the wonderful travel agency-style posters for various Star Wars locales, is back.  This time, he’s turned his attentions to the exotic locales of Gotham City, Metropolis, Neo Tokyo, as well as a Fantastic Four and Spider-Man-inhabited New York City.  These posters are really stunning so hit the jump to check them out.   Also, after the jump I’ve included details on where you can purchase these lovely posters.

No one debates that the Fantastic Four movies need a reboot.  Spider-Man may not, but Sue Storm and Mr. Fantastic did.  With X-Men: First Class approaching its start date, Fox’s next Marvel film will be a new Fantastic Four movie.  We’ve previously reported that The Thing is going to be entirely CGI.  Now ScreenRant reports on a pair of interesting names being thrown around for the role of Mr. Fantastic: Oscar-winner Adrien Brody and Jonathan Rhys Meyers.

Both actors have recently taken part in more action-oriented roles — Brody with the recent release of Predators, and Meyers with the flop From Paris With Love.  Both would be logical choices for the elastic genius Mr. Fantastic, and someone was going to offer one of them a superhero role eventually anyways.  After the last efforts on this franchise, it’s good to see the movie taken in a more serious direction.  With either of these actors, it’ll have to.  In other news, the reboot of the new Fantastic Four movie was allegedly dubbed “Fantastic Four Reborn”; this title has reportedly been stricken from the record.  Although any official title hasn’t been released, hopefully they go with one less tacky.

While I’m not sure that many would argue the previous Fantastic Four films were anything but disappointing from a sheer cinematic perspective (on the bright side, I’m sure they sold tons of merch to my nephews), 20^th Century Fox still has future plans for the franchise with Fantastic Four Reborn. That said, Screen Rant is reporting today that the studio has made two announcements regarding the film’s status:

- The Thing will be 100% CGI rather than using a practical effect suit like the one worn by Michael Chiklis in the previous installments.

- The reboot itself is on hold pending the completion of X-Men: First Class.

For more info on the announcements and why neither sounds like a terrible idea, hit the jump.

Comic book legend Stan Lee – creator of Spider-Man, the Fantastic Four, The Avengers, and, like, the whole Marvel Universe – says his cameo career in the Marvel movies will continue, and he hoping he won’t miss out on an appearance in Captain America: The First Avenger.

“I’ve already done my Thor cameo,” Lee told Collider at Comic-Con. “Captain America, I think, will be filmed in England. I don’t have time to go there but I’m hoping that they’ll film some scenes here so that I can do that.”

More after the jump:

While many might have thought we’d seen the last of John McClane on a movie screen, 20th Century Fox is currently developing a 5th installment of the Die Hard franchise after the last film, Live Free or Die Hard, made $383 million at the worldwide box office.  When a film is that profitable, it’s no surprise the studio wants another.  And thanks to Harry at AICN, we’ve got what the film might be called: Die Hard 24/7.

The other bit of news in the same article is an update on the next Fantastic Four movie.  As we reported last year, Akiva Goldsman is producing the project and it’s a complete reboot of the franchise.  So it shouldn’t come as any surprise that the tentative title is Fantastic Four Reborn.

Of course titles change all the time, so until Fox sends out a press release, I’d not get too worked up over either one.  More as we hear it.

You want to know why Chris Evans is always going to be cool in my book? Because when I was on the set of The Losers in Puerto Rico last June, when it was incredibly hot and humid, Evans had the five online journalists in attendance come into his trailer to do his interview, as he had air conditioning and was willing to share it.  Trust me, I’ve done a lot of on set interviews in some sketchy areas, and no other actor has ever opened his door like Chris Evans.

Anyway, during our extended interview with Evans, he talked about how he plays a computer expert named Jensen and if he’s anything like him, did he debate playing another comic book based character, 80′s movies, Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, his career, Fantastic Four, and so much more.  It’s a great interview so take a look:

Last week I was with a small group of people and we were able to speak with Chris Evans for an extended amount of time. While most of what we talked about is under embargo, I’m able to post part of our conversation and it covers what Chris said about Edgar Wright’s “Scott Pilgrim vs. the World” and what he think about 20^th Century Fox rebooting “Fantastic Four”. As you might imagine, he was incredibly excited to talk about “Scott Pilgrim” and he was raving about working for Edgar Wright. And regarding the “Fantastic Four” reboot, I asked him if he would be willing to go back and play Johnny Storm again and he said it all depends on the director. Of course, it’s more than likely Fox is going to hire an all new cast and creative team when they reboot the property, but you never know. Exactly what Chris said is after the jump:

In the wake of Disney’s purchase of Marvel this morning, Fox is hurrying to reboot a Marvel property is still owns: “Fantastic Four”. The franchise is one of four Fox owns in perpetuity, irrespective of Disney’s $4 billion deal, including “X-Men,” “Daredevil,” and “Silver Surfer.” Thought details are scant on the new project, a few names have been dropped. Those, and why this could be a good thing after the jump.

The deal isn’t done but it’s too sensational a story to get bogged down in the corporate legalese and business intricacies when it comes to discussing one of 2009′s biggest entertainment deals of the year.  The $4 billion Disney-Marvel merger could have huge ramifications and while this is all speculation that is subject to further (and further, and further) reporting and interviews, I wanted to give my thoughts on this news because my thoughts are better than everyone else’s thoughts.  My thoughts are magic.

Hit the jump to read about my magic thoughts on the Disney and Marvel’s potential long-term relationship.

In a shocking announcement, The Walt Disney Company has agreed to purchase Marvel Entertainment for $4 Billion in cash and stock. Under the deal, Disney will acquire ownership of Marvel including more than 5,000 Marvel characters including “Iron Man”, “Spider-Man”, “X-Men”, “Captain America”, “Fantastic Four” and “Thor”. So what does that mean for your favorite characters and their upcoming films? It’s after the jump: