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Suit Claims 'Voltron' Film Thwarted By Potential Rights Dispute Date: 11/21/2008 |
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After the tremendous success of the Transformers movie the process of turning 1980s cartoons into big budget live action films got into full swing as audiences will see this coming summer with the debut of a G.I. Joe film along with a second Transformers movie, but some other properties such as Voltron are yet to make the transition to the big screen in spite of intense interest, and, in the case of Voltron, a highly-regarded script by Justin Marks. As the Anime News Network has reported World Event Productions, the company that owns the rights to Voltron, which was cobbled together out of two anime series, GoLion and Dairugger XV, is attempting to sue Toei, the Japanese animation studio that created GoLion and Dairugger XV, charging that the prospect of a lawsuit from Toei over rights to the Voltron property had caused Fox New Regency to pass on creating a live action Voltron film just as the final studio hurdles appeared to have been cleared (see ?Voltron Movie Close?). According to ANN after learning of a potential Voltron film Toei contacted World Event Productions indicating that Toei didn?t believe WEP had the ?exclusive right? to license a live action movie. According to WEP?s lawsuit, New Regency then investigated the potential of third party claims to GoLion or Voltron and identified Kazuo Nakamura, the character designer of GoLion, as someone who might possess rights that would encumber the GoLion/Voltron property. In its suit against Toei WEP is claiming that the rights dispute has ?lost one developmental deal that would have resulted in a live-action motion picture.? As part of its lawsuit WEP is hoping to determine legally which rights to the Voltron property it controls and which might belong to Toei or Nakamura. |
| Source: ICv2 |
