“The rights between the two parties are complicated,” said Judge Dolly Gee on Tuesday after Hasbro and Sweetpea Entertainment lawyers gave closing arguments in the trial to decide ownership of movie rights to Dungeons & Dragons (see "'D&D' Trial Begins"). Gee then encouraged both sides to work out an agreement instead of waiting for her decision, Deadline reported.
"There are two possible outcomes for a trial," she said. "One side wins, one side loses, or both sides are unhappy."
"It should come as no surprise to Mr. Solomon that his campaign to hold on to the Dungeon & Dragons rights is over," Hasbro lawyer Jeremy Goldman said. "They should return home to Hasbro."
"Mr. Solomon has not built Dungeons & Dragons into a franchise, into a trilogy," Goldman also said in his closing, deriding the 2010 D&D: Book Of Vile Darkness that aired on cable TV network Syfy channel (see "'D&D' Feature for Syfy"), like 2005’s D&D: Wrath Of The Dragon God before it. "Besides having the name Dungeons & Dragons slapped on it, the third movie is in no way connected to the first D&D movie."
Sweetpea Entertainment’s attorney Patricia Glaser reiterated her client’s position that Hasbro’s claim is a "desperate attempt to recapture rights they’ve been trying to get for 15 years," and that "only Sweetpea, not Hasbro, has the right to make a movie with Dungeons & Dragons as its primary title."
It sounds like the judge in this non-jury trial plans to take a while to make a decision, giving plenty of time for the parties to come to an agreement, an effort that failed before the trial began.
As Trial Ends
Posted by ICv2 on September 24, 2014 @ 6:13 pm CT
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