An X-Men and Fantastic Four crossover seems like a matter of “When”, not “If”. Never mind that producer Simon Kinberg thinks joining the two is ill advised since the Fantastic Four’s superpowers would be rendered less important in a world where superpowers occur naturally in the human population. But that doesn’t register with executives at 20th Century Fox, and so it’s up to a brain trust to bring together the new Fantastic Four reboot with the X-Men, something I’m sure will be an even bigger priority if Fantastic Four doesn’t hit at the box office.

X-Men: Apocalypse director Byran Singer isn’t tasked with bridging the two franchises, but he’s been privy to discussions about how they might come together. “Those ideas are in play,” Singer confirmed to Yahoo!. “That would be a natural match-up because they’re both ensemble films and there is a natural mechanism by which to do it.”

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Image via Marvel Comics

And the “natural mechanism” he’s talking about? “It deals with time,” says Singer, but wouldn’t divulge any more than that. The X-Men franchise has been no stranger to time travel after Days of Future Past, but judging by the trailers for Fantastic Four, Josh Trank’s superhero movie deals with traveling between dimensions. So where do the two franchises meet? Do they team up in an alternate universe?

It’s also important to remember that Trank’s movie is apparently set in the present while X-Men: Apocalypse is set in 1983. Singer’s film has brought on a lot of new, young talent like Tye Sheridan and Sophie Turner to presumably carry the franchise after Jennifer Lawrence and Michael Fassbender leave, and they don’t want to age them out of it. So perhaps the time travel mechanism could be used to bring the 1983 cast into the present day and keep them there.

But right now the biggest question is whether or not Fantastic Four will be any good. The lead actors are great, but do they inhabit the characters, and will the tone of Trank’s film fit with what Singer has done with the X-Men franchise? That matters far more than just having the “natural mechanism” in place for Cyclops to shake hands with Mr. Fantastic.

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