User blog comment:ProfessorKilroy/Fantastic Four film thoughts/@comment-1895174-20130129135135

Fox is indeed wishing to create their own cinematic universe including the X-Men and the Fantastic Four. Source?

Anyway, I don't at all want them to build a shared world around the X-Men and the Fantastic Four. Sounds like a terrible idea. There's very few major characters shared between them, so it's best to leave the two franchises separate. After all, the current X-Men franchise's days are numbered, so it makes little sense to put together an aging franchise together with a brand new one.

As for what way the reboot should go, FOX would be keen to recognize that the Fantastic Four are going to be competing with the other superhero teams out there - X-Men, Avengers, and (by then) the Justice League. Rather than basing their direction for the Fantastic Four reboot around the idea of "Let's make our own Avengers", which to be fair is exactly what WB's doing with the Justice League, they should be asking themselves "How do we make our team different from the Avengers?"

The answer is going to be a very different type of superhero movie. But then again, the Fantastic Four are very different superheroes. Whereas characters like Spider-Man and Batman are - to use a cheesy phrase - guardians, defenders of a particular city, the Fantastic Four are explorers. Many of their stories involve them in some fantastical or alien location - Atlantis, Attilan, Wakanda, or even the Negative Zone. Each of these locations makes for a different sequel.

By making their franchise less of an Avengers copy and more of "Indiana Jones with Superheroes", FOX has the opportunity to make the Fantastic Four stand out in a market dangerously close to overstaturation with superhero movies.