RIP Roger Corman, “King of the B Movies”

May 12

A look at the filmmaker’s career—including conflicts with Marvel Comics and MST3K.

We note the passing of Roger Corman (1926-2024), trailblazer for indie movies. He passed away on May 9. He was 98 years old.

His reputation as a filmmaker led to being known by a few different nicknames, including “King of the B Movies” and “The King of Cult.” Corman was a movie director, producer, and actor. His resume includes directing more than 50 movies and producing nearly 400 movies. For many movies, he was an uncredited producer or executive producer (as head of New World Pictures 1970-1983).

His giant list of movies includes Battle Beyond the Stars (1980), The Little Shop of Horrors (1960), The Wasp Woman (1959), It Conquered the World (1956), A Bucket of Blood (1959), X: The Man with the X-ray Eyes (1963), and Attack of the Crab Monsters (1957). He also made several movies inspired by the writings of Edgar Allan Poe, many of which starred Vincent Price.

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Roger Corman vs MST3K

As a low-budget indie filmmaker, Roger Corman’s output has been heckled many times by folks like Mystery Science Theater 3000, RiffTrax, Cinematic Titanic, and the like. Of course, he wasn’t thrilled at this kind of attention.

As Corman remarked in 2014:

“If you don’t have any ability yourself, maybe you can make money by making fun of those who do.”

Corman even threatened legal action against Cinematic Titanic for heckling his 1959 movie The Wasp Woman. A compromise was eventually reached.

Find a list of Roger Corman movies riffed by MST3K and more here

Find MST3K versions of Roger Corman movies on Amazon

That Roger Corman movie that is NOT part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe

One key movie in Corman’s list is the 1994 movie The Fantastic Four—which was never officially released. It is probably one of the most famous movies that never came out. And if you have even seen this movie, you saw a bootleg copy that sneaked out. (In fact, this is the only Fantastic Four movie I have ever watched.)

Roger Corman was one of the producers for the low-budget movie The Fantastic Four, based on the Marvel Comics series created in 1961 by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby. Another producer, Bernd Eichinger, was the one who had gotten the movie rights—and the reason they jumped into making a low budget movie was the retain the rights before they lapsed.

Reportedly, there were planned release dates. Apparently, there were even Fantastic Four movie trailers running in movie theaters. Cast members were planning to promote the movie.

But it was all stopped by Marvel. They claimed that Eichinger never actually wanted the movie to go out. He had possibly just made this movie to keep the rights so they could go back and make a real movie later.

At least, that’s how Marvel Studios interpreted what was happening. Marvel Studios’ Avi Arad, worried that the low-budget film might ruin the brand, bought back this Fantastic Four movie and ordered all prints destroyed. As far as Marvel was concerned, the movie would never come out.

(Of course, bootleg copies are available. You can find the movie online.)

There was even a documentary about the experience: Doomed: The Untold Story of Roger Corman's The Fantastic Four

Famous filmmakers that Roger Corman worked with

Roger Corman’s catalog of low-budget movies found him working with a number of filmmakers—often early in their careers. This included directors like James Cameron, Martin Scorsese, John Sayles, Joe Dante, Francis Ford Coppola, Ron Howard, and Jonathan Demme. He also worked with a number of recognizable actors, including Vincent Price, Robert Vaughn, Charles Bronson, William Shatner, Diane Ladd, Jack Nicholson, Peter Fonda, Dennis Hopper, and Bruce Dern.

Corman also sometimes acted onscreen, including movies like 2004’s The Manchurian Candidate, 1991’s The Silence of the Lambs, 1974’s The Godfather Part II, 1993’s Philadelphia, and 1995’s Apollo 13.

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Chris Well

Chris Well been a writer pretty much his entire life. (Well, since his childhood.) Over the years, he has worked in newspapers, magazines, radio, and books. He now is the chief of the website Monster Complex, celebrating monster stories in lit and pop culture. He also writes horror comedy fiction that embraces Universal Monsters, 1960s sitcoms, 1980s action movies, and the X-Files.

https://chriswell.substack.com/