Approximately two years after the release of Men In Black 3 (which made $624 million at the global box office), the franchise was still looking at how to continue its cinematic future, particularly because there was an awareness that the Will Smith/Tommy Lee Jones era had come to an end with the Barry Sonnenfeld-directed trilogy. Work was being done behind the scenes on another kind of spin-off idea, but the concept wasn’t fleshing itself out property. It was at that point that the idea of a radical crossover came into the picture, and it was essentially viewed as an approach that had a “crazy enough to work” type vibe.