On this week’s episode, Sonny Bunch (The Bulwark), Alyssa Rosenberg (The Washington Post), and Peter Suderman (Reason) discuss the legal back and forth between Disney and the estates of Marvel’s most famous creators, including those of Steve Ditko and Stan Lee, as well as fan reactions to the (very slight!) possibility that copyright termination notices will be the death of the MCU as we know it. Is legal wrangling the kryptonite (sorry, mixing universes) that will slay the biggest film franchise in movie history? The gang also reviews The Eyes of Tammy Faye, asking why it feels so slight given the overtly theatrical nature of the subject in question. And make sure to check out our members-only bonus episode on musical biopics and why the genre feels fairly moribund; if you aren’t a member yet, you have five days left to take advantage of our 30-day free trial offer.
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First, full disclosure, I've been a Marvel fan since the 80s, and for me the MCU has been a dream come true, and I'm looking forward to many more years of it. With all that said, I gotta say I'm not too concerned about suits and countersuits. I agree that Disney is in a pretty strong position to get hold onto the rights, and I also don't have a problem with the creators' heirs getting a payout: I view it as a form of inheritance. So Disney keeping the rights while the creators' heirs get a (relatively) little something seems like a reasonable solution to me. Oh! And I wish you brought up the fact that, according to my calculations, Golden Age characters such as Superman and Captain America, and Namor, who will be appearing in next year's Black Panther movie, will start going into the public domain in just a little over a decade.
Yeah, it's going to be very interesting to see what happens when a bunch of those classic golden age figures hit public domain age. My theory: a series of very expensive lawsuits aimed at shutting down anything that uses lore for the character that came later on in his run, combined with a series of trademark suits designed to stop infringement on the character's actual logos, etc.
It should definitely be interesting. And it'll be more of a problem for the owners of DC than for Disney, since Cap and Namor are the only Golden Agers they're using these days