5 Movie Crossovers That Could Be Ridiculous Fun

"Legendary Battle" by Sean Sumagaysay

Yesterday we learned that Sony was discussing a possible crossover movie between their successful 21 Jump Street franchise and their evergreen Men in Black series. This is obviously the next evolution of the Marvel-style universe trend that all of Hollywood is chasing. I know we're supposed to hate this sort of thing but I couldn't stop thinking about which modern movie properties could be combined into mega crossover movie events that (however ridiculous) I'd actually want to see. After the jump I list the best opportunities for big screen movie crossovers.

First of all, I decided to include only modern movie franchises and try to combine films from the same studio. While it would be possible for two studios to work together on a crossover, its a lot less likely. Its so much easier when one studio owns both of the rights, like with Fox and the Alien and Predator franchises before they decided to combine them, as Dark Horse did in comics, for an Alien Vs. Predator series of films.

Also the ideas below are not ranked.

Both GI Joe and Transformers are owned by Hasbro, with film franchises set up at Paramount. Since the first films of both franchises hit the big screen, fans have been hoping for a big screen crossover like the one which has happened in comics. And I agree. With the exception of Michael Bay's original Transformers, I have not really liked the human characters in any of the three films that have followed. I think involving Joe and Cobra could be a step in the right direction.

Transformers: Age of Extinction perfectly sets up this possibility, too. With Optimus Prime leaving Earth it wouldn't take too much for the rest of the remaining Autobots to follow. You could begin this crossover as a purely GI Joe story with the special ops force having to battle Cobra, which is working to use Transformium (ugh, yup) to create their own alien weapons. Joe would then be outmatched against a new generation of Decepticons — but if they can get the Transformers back to Earth it could be a more evenly-matched fight. That eventually happens, leading to a big hour-long third act with Autobots fighting Decepticons while Joe fights Cobra with cool tech and weaponry.

Unfortunately, Lorenzo di Bonaventura, who produces both film franchises, has publicly stated that it isn't likely to happen.

Fan art from manfpedia

How cool would it be to see a movie that combined the gigantic mech robots and post apoclyptic future of Pacific Rim with Godzilla? Would it make sense? Probably not, especially since the Gareth Edwards reboot establishes the monster as a good guy trying to protect earth... but I'm sure Guillermo del Toro could come up with some story to pull it together and make it awesome.

Godzilla and Pacific Rim were both produced by Legendary Pictures for Warner Bros, but those two companies had a divorce and now Legendary is at Universal Pictures. This complicates the possibility of this crossover movie because Warner Bros holds the rights to the Godzilla sequel while Legendary brought the rights to Pacific Rim over to Universal. And who knows how the Japanese-based Toho Company would feel about the crossover concept; they are very protective over the original kaiju.

Someone even created a movie trailer mash-up of the two films:

This famous four-issue mini-series was published in 1987. The original comic by writer Chris Claremont followed the quest to find an effective medical treatment for dying X-Men teammate Kitty Pryde.

But are they willing to strike a deal with Doctor Doom? Their search for a cure brings them into conflict with the Fantastic Four! Also, will the contents of a long lost diary from Reed Richards' past destroy the Fantastic Four?

Of course, the storyline could be modified like the inspiration for X-Men: Days of Future Past (a story which, in comics, also involved Reed Richards' son Franklin) or almost completely changed a la Avengers: Age of Ultron. Either way, 20th Century Fox owns the movie rights to both Marvel properties, but producer Simon Kinberg has publicly stated that the superhero teams live in their own "discrete universes." That strongly implies that they aren't planning to combine them into a shared universe — not to say it couldn't happen.

Okay so this one is super-ridiculous, but I think the glory years of all three franchises is long past. So couldn't it be fun to see retired cop John McClane (Bruce Willis) from Fox's Die Hard movie franchise team up with Counter Terrorist Unit agent Jack Bauer (Kiefer Sutherland) from Fox's TV series 24  against a swarm of xenomorphs from Alien? My problem with the last couple Die Hard films is the scale was not contained like the original films. I think John McClane works best when he's trapped in one single complex covertly trying to take down his adversaries.

Here's my pitch, John McClane is now working as head of security at a huge Casino resort, either in Vegas or Dubai. (Or heck, if they make it China they can get a co-production deal.) The story starts on Jack Bauer, who is being forced to help an elaborate heist at the Casino (his daughter Kim is being held hostage or something). The story starts as McClane vs. Bauer but all hell breaks loose when an alien ship crashes within the state of the art complex, which of course goes into lockdown for some reason, and a swarm of xenomorphs is on the lose. The two men must now work together against the bigger threat.

I'm actually surprised Dark Horse Comics or Boom Studios never released a John McClane vs. Aliens comic book miniseries. This may sound ridiculous but its only one step away from a real plan Fox was developing — a movie titled Die Hard 24/7, which would have teamed up McClane and Bauer. The project apparently didn't gain traction because of resistance from Kiefer Sutherland who was apparently more interested in his own movie franchise than a buddy cop crossover film.

Avengers: The Star Wars

After Phase 3 of the Marvel Cinematic Universe goes galactic, there is only one direction to take it (OBVIOUSLY) and that involves a mega-crossover with Disney's orther huge franchise Star Wars. I don't even need to come up with an concept pitch for this one as Patton Oswalt delivered an improv filibuster rant about this exact topic for a 2013 episode of Parks & Recreation. In the episode, the comedian-writer played a Pawnee citizen attempting to filibuster a city council vote. To fill the time, he improvises an epic eight-minute speech outlining exactly what he thinks Star Wars Episode VII should be. Oswalt's full eight-minute speech was sadly way too long fit into a 22-minute episode but they released the whole thing online, and it went viral. The rant tyes in Star Wars, Marvel, Clash of the Titans, and even Brian De Palma. Watch the rant below:

Or you can watch a version that someone animated: