Ghost Rider goes to court
Long-time comics writer Gary Friedrich has sued Marvel Comics, Sony Pictures and their Columbia TriStar Motion Picture Group, Relativity Media, Crystal Sky Pictures, Michael De Luca Productions, Hasbro Inc. and Take-Two Interactive for copyright infringement over his version of Ghost Rider.
Filed last week in Illinois, Friedrich claims 21 separate copyright and trademark violations based upon the “production and marketing” of the recent blockbuster motion picture. He claims the copyrights used by the defendants reverted from Marvel to him in 2001.
According to Reuters, Friedrich alleges copyright infringement and accuses Marvel of waste for failing “to properly utilize and capitalize” on his character. Marvel’s attempts to do so, Friedrich claims, have only damaged the value of his work by failing to properly promote and protect the characters and by accepting inadequate royalties from co-defendants. Friedrich also claims that toymaker Hasbro and videogame firm Take-Two have improperly created merchandise based on the characters.
Even though Marvel has published this version of Ghost Rider off-and-on since 1971, it’s predecessor company, Magazine Management, failed to register the work with the Copyright Office, according to Friedrich’s complaint. He states that, following federal law, he regained the copyrights to Ghost Rider in 2001.
As of this writing, neither Marvel nor Sony has responded to the suit. It is expected they will adopt the initial position that the complaint “bares no merit,” as if it did, the crack of the whip could severely undermine the profitability of both Marvel and DC Comics and their parent companies.
Grindhouse executive producer Harvey Weinstein has been on a spree explaining why the movie tanked last weekend. Without revealing the fact that the reviews and word-of-mouth generally noted people’s tastes running towards one of the two movies on the double bill and against the other – with little consensus on which is better – Weinstein said the three hour running time was a major deterrent to sales. Certainly, film exhibitors agree.
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Forget that god awful looking CGI pup we’ve seen in the movie trailers. The one, true Underdog will be collected on a three volume DVD box set this summer. Released by Genius Products, under license from Classic Media, the $29.98 collection will feature digitally re-mastered episodes with Wally Cox (the voice of Underdog) sounding better than ever. Not only that, the DVDs will collect the 1960s television series as originally broadcast so fans can delight in the additional escapades of Hunter, Go Go Gophers, Klondike Kat, Tennessee Tuxedo, King and Odie, Tootie Turtle and Commander McBragg. The release date has been listed as both July 24 and August 6 while the god awful-looking CGI movie opens on August 4.
Okay, okay, I’m sorry. I know I promised, at least implicitly, to deliver Who Knows What Evil Lurks – Part 2 this week. But that will take some time and maybe digging, to write and, honestly, I have the luxury of neither. By the time you read this, I’ll either be at or returning from Juaniata, Pennsylvania, where I’ve been invited to be the guest of Jay Hosler and maybe shoot off my mouth in public a bit. I’ve been busy doodling notes for said mouth-shooting; hence no dissertation on lurking evil.
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