Two federal courts ruled against Stan Lee Media (which has nothing to do with Stan Lee) in the last few days, continuing an unrelenting string of losses for the shell company with a seemingly bottomless appetite for litigation, its only business.
A panel of the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that a Los Angeles judge ruled correctly by tossing Stan Lee Media’s case, which alleged that Lee assigned his rights to Marvel characters to the company in 1998, according to Courthouse Reporter. Stan Lee Media’s failure to behave as if it owned the rights for years made its claims "simply implausible," the court said.
And in Pennsylvania, a court ruled this week on Stan Lee Media’s effort to interject itself into a dispute between Marvel parent Disney and a theater producing a play that drew on Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark. Disney had argued that the issues were previously litigated (see "Disney Fights Back in Spider-Man Suit"), and the judge agreed. "These issues have previously been addressed in one form or another by multiple courts around the country," the judge wrote, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
There have been other losses for Stan Lee Media, including a New York case in which the ruling was upheld on appeal (see "Stan Lee Media Loses Another Round"), an appeals court ruling on rights to Conan, which Stan Lee Media was trying to control (see "Another Loss for Stan Lee Media"), and a Colorado case over Marvel rights which the judge ruled was “completely frivolous” (see "Judge Smacks Down Stan Lee Media").
The Colorado case is on appeal to the 10th Circuit, but is likely to go badly for Stan Lee Media as well.
In Endless Lawsuits Over Marvel Rights
Posted by ICv2 on October 30, 2014 @ 11:29 pm CT
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