As Age of Ultron rakes it in at the box office Disney has a major set back on the upcoming Star Wars spinoff, as it loses the film’s original director Josh Trank. Trank showed a solid spark of talent with Chronicle and recently finished wrapping the reboot (or whatever you want to call it) of the new Fantastic Four. The original report coming from the Hollywood Reporter stated that the director left due to creative differences, but some new information has come to light man. Apparently Trank and his fellow screenwriter had some serious issues getting along and it turns out that there were some major problems on the set of the Fox backed Fantastic Four film that caused Lucasfilms to lose faith in Trank’s ability to pull off the new Star Wars film. According to THR Lucasfilms got wind of problems on the set of his upcoming film and some fairly strange behavior by the director and no longer felt confident in his ability to helm the Star Wars spinoff.
Insiders at Fox described his behavior as “erratic” and “very isolated” giving little or no real creative direction. In the end producers had to step in to help lend direction and get the film finished. This led to some difficult reshoots as the films stars were already in production on other films, as well as producers Simon Kinberg and Hutch Parker having to leave the new Xmen production to do clean up on the Fantastic Four project.
It’s hard to say what exactly happened but this is definitely a bit of a set back for the 31 year old director. I’m sure he’ll resurface in the not too distant future. Sounds like he was a bit in over his head with Fantastic Four and needs a little more work before tackling something as big as Star Wars. I have a feeling he’s gonna suffer another set back when Fantastic Four’s reviews and sliding box office hit theaters, but maybe thats being a little cynical.