http://insidemovies.ew.com/2011/08/22/stan-lee-media-inc-files-suit-a...
Thoughts?
Okay, not in the know and not a lawyer, but Stan Lee Media is no
longer actually connected to Stan Lee apparently... and I'll be
somewhat surprised if perpetual rights to Conan as movie or other were
provided from whoever owned them, to another company. It's more
likely to have been a limited-time loan after which they'd lapse, and
SLM being bankrupt or.frozen or anything wouldn't stop that. Like, if
you die, the books you borrowed from the library still belong to the
library, and still are due back there - although I expect they'll be
sympathetic. They'll also want to know if you died of something that
people can catch from other people's library books, I expect. I
should stop confusing the example, I think.
According to <http://www.conan.com/ip.shtml>
"CONAN (R) and/or CONAN THE BARBARIAN (R) and related logos,
characters, names, and distinctive likenesses thereof are trademarks
of Conan Properties International LLC unless otherwise noted. All
Rights Reserved."
This is not about existing stories, particularly, but about the
trademark design and identity of Conan, when used in new stories -
which you can't rip off from the original owner.
Conan comics currently are published by Dark Horse Comics, including a
version of the latest movie story. Previously, indeed, they were
published by Marvel Comics for a long while. Presumably by permission
of "Conan Properties International" or some predecessor throughout, in
exchange for money.