Singling Out Marvel's Film Rights Head Scratchers

[t hedge coke]

Anyone can make John Carter movies. If this was the '90s another studio would have likely put out their own big John Carter movie around the same time. But it's not the '90s, so we only got one from The Asylum. If this was the '80s and the movie had done well we would have gotten a bunch of crazy Italian John Carter movies.

Yes and no. Because of the way licensing and trademark laws work, particularly with film, while the novels are public domain, the characters and world are licensed, still, for film and other media. This is why we saw ERB Inc try to take action against Dynamite, a couple years back.

It's silly - from my perspective - and probably suspect in some ways, but it is within their legal range. The mockbuster wth Tracy Lords is about as close as you can get in movies, without the license, because they aggressively defend themselves as custodians and all unlicensed usage as an unauthorized trading on their name, that they're misidentified with these versions.

[SuperCooper]

The day Puck gets namedropped in a Marvel movie is the day I cry and praise a higher power in the middle of a movie theater.

[kalorama]

Why would a company waste time on something they can only ever get part of the money, when they can easily replace it with something that they can get all of the money of. If I can get all my money promoting Guardians of the Galaxy why would I invest into X-Men when I am only getting part of the full pie. X-Men can never get Marvel the same amount of money as a Iron Man or GotG or even now a joint effort Spider-Man can unless they A) get the rights back or B) Disney and Fox makes a deal. Some people are worry about the Inhumans replacing the X-Men, there wrong, they got replace the moment Marvel didn't need A-List characters too make there movies. Fox has nothing too worry about on there investments, Disney/Marvel has nothing to worry about not promoting characters they don't have full control of.

To the extent that any of that is true, it really has nothing to do with my question, as I wasn't asking why Marvel would make the decision. I was asking why, given that it was Marvel's decision to make and Marvel's alone, why would people who were upset with the decision choose to voice their displeasure by boycotting Fox, which had no say or influence in the decision that Marvel chose to make?

[Kencana]

I want Marvel to get the rights back so that everyone can complain when they start making a bunch of Spider-Man, X-Men, Iron Man, and Avengers movies and ignoring everything else because they have all the top characters and would rather milk them.

Wow. I am so confused. I can only imagine how many lawyers this crap employs. Then again, DC has all its characters under one wing and they can't find a way to make a decent comic book movie that doesn't star Batman or Superman. Go figure.

I agree with them. I hate to be the one that compare DC and Marvel, but just like MarvelMaster616 said, DC has all the character, but fans must wait for a long time to see Justice League movie. If Marvel has Spider-Man / Fantastic Four / X-Men from the start, we will see 12 Spider-Man movie and no Ant-Man or Guardians of the Galaxy.

[[Grum]]

The day Puck gets namedropped in a Marvel movie is the day I cry and praise a higher power in the middle of a movie theater.

If Alpha Flight were to make even a token appearance in the movies (maybe as part of a larger group for Infinity Wars), I suspect that Puck would be played for laughs ("Look at the short man bounce around!"), Guardian/Vindicator would be written off as an Iron Man wannabe, Sasquatch would be "the hairy Hulk", and Marina would simply be "the female Namor". The characters that could provide some value (for being different) would be Northstar/Aurora (the flying speed and light powers are interesting, plus twins, plus potential gay superhero character), Shaman (though Doctor Strange's mysticism might make him redundant), and Snowbird (who's shapeshifting would make for an interesting visual effect for the movie).

I'd love to see them used properly, but I think they have a better chance as a Netflix mini-series.

[Stringfellow]

I don't know if this has already been discussed yet. But Fox can't make an Alpha Flight movie due to Disney trademarking the name back in 2013. I would expect they did so to avoid Fox making a film with that group since their first appearance was in X-Men. I believe Disney wouldn't had trademarked Alpha Flight unless there were some characters in limbo and not yet claimed by Fox. Also, out of the original 8 members -Puck and Marrina were introduced first in Alpha Flight #1 so Marvel probably has their rights already. Out of the other characters I believe only Northstar and Aurora might be an issue since they are mutants. But so was Daisy Johnson (Quake) and Marvel Television has made her an Inhuman. So since there is precedent there -they could go the inhuman route with those characters in the films.

http://www.slashfilm.com/marvel-trad...-future-films/

The question I have is did Disney run interference with the rights for Northstar and Aurora by trademarking Alpha Flight? Because its possible they legally placed the sibling duo into a shared property.

On another note, Longshot should still be with Marvel. His character was among the ones Marvel gave to Artisan in a deal in 2000 to make films. This was after Fox had filmed the first X-Men movie. So Longshot shouldn't be under the X-Men license if Marvel still had access to the character in 2000. That also goes for Morbius, the Living Vampire since most people associate him in the Spider-Man universe. Of course, I believe Marvel has a good relationship with Sony -then they have with Fox -and could negotiate for Morbius if Sony owned him, and if they really wanted to use that character.

http://variety.com/2000/film/news/ar...l-1117781709/#

[simbob4000]

Yes and no. Because of the way licensing and trademark laws work, particularly with film, while the novels are public domain, the characters and world are licensed, still, for film and other media. This is why we saw ERB Inc try to take action against Dynamite, a couple years back.

It's silly - from my perspective - and probably suspect in some ways, but it is within their legal range. The mockbuster wth Tracy Lords is about as close as you can get in movies, without the license, because they aggressively defend themselves as custodians and all unlicensed usage as an unauthorized trading on their name, that they're misidentified with these versions.

They aren't licensed for film, and most of all the books are in the public domain. What ERB Inc is doing is using they're trademark to go after public domain works. Which is really something they shouldn't be able to do. I mean it sounds pretty fishy, to the point that I'm guessing a studio could just do John Carter stuff if they wanted to...but likely wouldn't because they're all so freaked out about lawsuits. Dynamite is still using those characters, rights? If so then I'm guessing ERB Inc wasn't able to stop them. I'm guessing as long as a studio doesn't call their John Carter movie John Carter they would be A-ok. ERB Inc could try and go after them on trademark grounds, but they would likely loss. I wonder if any studio that wanted to make John Carter movies could use Dastar Corp. v. Twentieth Century Fox Film Corp. to back them up?

Although there could maybe be places where ERB Inc still holds copyright, I don't know. It's not in the US anyways. If they still hold copyrights in other huge markets then that could be a problem.

[Mike Steele]

youv seen suicide squad?

Which includes Batman.

[Mike Steele]

I actually understand what Marvel/Disney is doing.

I don't agree with it but from a business perspective it makes sense.

Marvel have produced movies that have largely been as successful as anything other studios are putting out (they've made 3 movies that have grossed over a billion) and are making more money off these than the other licensed properties (it also helps that domestically where the bulk of the money is made, Marvel's movies on average are more successful than Fox's, discussions about quality are separate). It actually makes sense to push their own successful properties where they make more money than the others where they share revenue.

Now, as a fan of FF and X-men, it's pretty irritating that Marvel pull some of the merchandising licenses of these characters. I won't pretend to understand the agreement Marvel signed with these companies but it's grating to fans of these franchises to see them pushed aside like that.

I also agree that what Marvel is doing makes sense, regardless of whether or not it results in them getting some or all of the X-Men and Fantastic Four rights back. Marvel has a ton of properties, and it only makes sense to put all of their focus on the properties from which they will get 100% of the profits.

[Christian]

Marvel can release merchandise based on those 2 properties, they choose not too because Disney wrongly thinks that having merchandise based on the comics of those 2 properties will make more people go see the movies.

The only merchandise that Marvel can't release is that based on the movies.

Which is interesting you say that in another thread I was told I was bonkers for thinking that lmfao

[Christian]

youv seen suicide squad?

Um he is in it lmfao

[ChasingSuns]

I never saw it as a first appearance thing. To me it's all about which titles the characters are most associated with. I'ave always associated Kang with FF, and even though Kingpin is a prominent Spidey villain, I have always associated him with Daredevil more. The reason why Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver are able to be used is because they have spent a lot of time as Avengers. That being said, they aren't called mutants in the Marvel films because that term is Fox's territory as far as the films are concerned. Idk, I never really thought that the film rights were all that confusing. Maybe it's just me though.

[Hypestyle]

Sub-Mariner is the biggest priority for me now. I'd almost rather see him end up at Fox, where he can have some co-features with the Fantastic Four before being spun into his own features. But I don't see Universal genuinely developing any kind of "Namor-verse" based on his comics. Who, if anyone, would be the spinoffs? Namora? Namorita? Stingray? An Atlantis/Lemuria-based "Game of Thrones" on cable or Netflix? I guess Marvel corporate wants to avoid an outright war/lawsuit, since several Marvel characters have high profile rides at Universal Studios Orlando (another mess that has yet to be addressed in the long term.)

(side note: I presume Agents of Atlas is Marvel owned.)

[codystarbuck]

While it is technically true that DC has been part of what is now Time-Warner, since the late 60s, it's not quite the way things existed. National Periodical Publications was sold to the Kinney National Company, in 1967. That company, headed by Steve Ross, built an empire on cleaning and parking services, in major metropolitan areas (NYC). In 1968, they bought the financially troubled Warner-Seven Arts studio and renamed it Warner Bros., in 1969. In 1972, they spun off their non-entertainment companies, renaming the entertainment side Warner Communications. That was the reason why the Superman movie was done through Warner Bros. The Salkinds were still independent producers; but, Warner had the film distribution rights. Time, Inc and Warner merged in 1987, creating the current form of the company (which also merged with Turner Broadcasting Systems, Inc. and AOL; before spinning off some of the division in the past decade). Warner's approach to DC film rights has been to allow independent production companies to produce the films; but, with Warner maintaining distribution rights. Thus, you had Joel Silvers' company controlling the rights to several characters, while others were optioned through different companies.

Marvel had a long history of selling their media options on the cheap, in hopes of getting something on the movie and tv screen. That is why there were so many sub-standard productions between the mid-70s and mid-90s. It was even worse when Marvel was owned by New World Pictures, and things didn't improve under the McAndrews group. Some of those options, like the FF and Namor, had been out there for years, before we ever got a film. When Marvel decided to go it alone, they were stuck in a pretty complicated mess. It looks like Marvel's legal teams were greatly outclassed by Hollywood's. The most likely scenario was the powers that be didn't care, as long as they got the cash up front (certainly true under McAndrews and it sounds like under New World) They've been trying to sort things out, ever since.

It seems pretty clear that Stan's work in Hollywood was in schmoozing producers and executives, not negotiating. If he was involved in negotiations, he was pretty bad at it. Obviously, these days, he is pretty much a Marvel mascot, to be included in cameos.

[simbob4000]

Sub-Mariner is the biggest priority for me now. I'd almost rather see him end up at Fox, where he can have some co-features with the Fantastic Four before being spun into his own features. But I don't see Universal genuinely developing any kind of "Namor-verse" based on his comics. Who, if anyone, would be the spinoffs? Namora? Namorita? Stingray? An Atlantis/Lemuria-based "Game of Thrones" on cable or Netflix? I guess Marvel corporate wants to avoid an outright war/lawsuit, since several Marvel characters have high profile rides at Universal Studios Orlando (another mess that has yet to be addressed in the long term.)

(side note: I presume Agents of Atlas is Marvel owned.)

I can't really imagine anyone else having the rights to those Agents of Atlas characters. Really wish they would get Dario Russo and David Ashby to do something with them.