FANTASTIC FOUR Concept Designs Reveal HERBIE The Robot
It looks like at one point during development, HERBIE the robot from the Fantastic Four could have made it into Josh Trank's feature film adaption. Let's be honest, though, anything that didn't make into this movie is much better off. As great as HERBIE is, its inclusion in the film would not have made it any better.
HERBIE stands for Humanoid Experimental Robot, B-type, Integrated Electronics, and he was first introduced in the '70s as part of the animated Fantastic Four TV series. The reason he was included in the series is because they needed something to fill the shoes of the Human Torch, who had been licensed out separately and he couldn’t be used in the show.
Thanks to concept artist Fausto De Martini (RoboCop, Transformers: Age of Extinction) we have some concept designs showing us what HERBIE would have looked like. And well, he looks like a robot sitting on top of a soccer ball. That little soccer ball look is reminiscent of BB-8 from Star Wars: The Force Awakens, but this has a completely different look.
I'm not exactly sure how HERBIE would have fit into the story, but it looks like something that maybe Reed Richards would've built when he was a kid. What do you think of the concept designs, and would you have liked to see HERBIE in the film?
Via: Birth.Movies.Death