Fox has finally made it official: Chronicle director Josh Trank will helm the reboot of its Fantastic Four franchise. According to Deadline, production will begin sometime following Matthew Vaughn's X-Men: First Class, which goes in front of the cameras in January.

The studio began circling the 28-year-old Trank in January, shortly before the release of his feature debut Chronicle, the $15 million found-footage superpower movie that went on to gross more than $126 million worldwide. Fox, which distributed Chronicle, was said to be confident from the start that Trank was the right director to tackle Fantastic Four. He's expected to put the film ahead of his other projects: Sony's Venom spinoff and Shadow of the Colossus adaptation, and Warner Bros.' The Red Star adaptation.

Word of the Fantastic Four reboot surfaced in August 2009, with Michael Green (Green Lantern, Heroes) writing the script and Akiva Goldsman producing. At one point at least, it was rumored to be called Fantastic Four Reborn.

Fox, which released Fantastic Four in 2005 and the sequel Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer in 2008, holds the movie rights to the Marvel property (as well as X-Men and Daredevil) in perpetuity — as long as the studio keeps making the films within a contractually prescribed time frame. The previous franchise installments grossed nearly $620 million combined worldwide.