Batman vs Superman, Seriously Guys, It's Not That Bad

By CaulynDarr

I mean, yeah, it's kind of a mess.  But is is it Green Lantern levels of awfulness?  Despite what the meta scores are saying; it's more solid than the critics would have you think.

Is Trek a Dying Enterprise? (UPDATED)

by SandWyrm

With the recent brouhaha over Axanar, I got to wondering how the Trek franchise is actually doing from a financial standpoint. I mean... The 2009 reboot supposedly revitalized the franchise in a big way, right? Or is the truth, after looking at the historical budgets and gross returns, more disturbing?

Axanar: Round 2, FIGHT! (UPDATED)

by SandWyrm

Anyone remember this classic 1992 3DO/PC game? Clearly infringing!

In our last episode, CBS/Paramount had decided to sue Axanar Productions over their clearly infringing (to some extent) fan-kickstarted movie project to tell a story about a Trek-Universe battle that was mentioned once in passing by Captain Kirk during TOS. Even though there are over a dozen OTHER fan projects out there, from movies to episodic series, that infringe on Trek copyrights and trademarks at least as much, if not more than Axanar does.

But then Axanar countered with the assertions that CBS/Paramount's lawsuit wasn't specific enough in its claims (which it wasn't), that the ownership of certain IP elements is uncertain due to the split of CBS from Viacom (which owns Paramount), and that they can't be sued for an infringing work that they haven't even completed, much less published yet. Fair Enough.

Well, CBS/Paramount has pressed on, and has filed an amended lawsuit (thanks to David Heagney Jr. for the link) that includes much more specific copyright claims. While at least a third of them seem reasonable enough, most wander into GW vs. Chapterhouse territory by ridiculously claiming ownership of ideas, instead of specific expressions of those ideas.

Let's take a look at a selection of CBS/Paramount claims, and talk about what is, and is not defensible under copyright.