User blog:ARTaylor/Disney Demands End to SMLI Litigation

The Walt Disney Company has asked a Pennsylvania judge to put an end once and for all to Stan Lee Media Inc.'s claim to ownership to certain rights including Spider-Man, X-Men, and the Fantastic Four. Despite numerous losses, SLMI continues taking Marvel Entertainment and now Disney to court. Last September, Disney filed a lawsuit in Pennsylvania after a musical production contained references to Mary Poppins, The Lion King, and Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark. The defendant in that case then made a deal with SLMI for the rights to Spider-Man. SLMI filed an intervenor complaint against Disney to defend the validity of its license. Last week, Disney gave two arguments to the Pennsylvania judge as to why SLMI's claims should be terminated for good. First that the claims are time-barred, that SLMI should have dealt with this in 1998 when they first made a deal with Stan Lee. They pointed out a similar ruling with the rights to Jack Kirby's characters. The second is that SLMI is a dissolved corporation lacking the capacity to license, basically only function to litigate.