Grown Men Fight Over Comic Books--Again

Remember when life was simple and comic book heros were free to save the city without prohibitive legal restraint? Yeah, well, me neither, and the same probably goes for the clowns running the show at 20th Century Fox, who are worried that Sony's sure-to-be-Earth-shattering new Tim Allen project will threaten their $700 miilion X-Men franchise.

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Sony is poop! Fox lawyers, litigating their little hearts out

Fox is so terrified that Zoom--based on a graphic novel in which an out-of-shape superhero returns from retirement to train would-be teenage-mutant crimefighters--is going to undercut next summer's X3 that the studio is suing Sony not only for copyright infringement, but also to prevent Sony from releasing Zoom two weeks before X3's May 26 opening.

These brats have squabbled about this crap in the past with both X-Men and Spider-Man. In this instance, Variety's Ben Fritz and Nicole Laporte have the specifics:

"Zoom's release in May 2006 immediately before the release of X3 (or any release in proximity to the release of X3) is an unfair attempt by Sony and Revolution to manipulate the market and trade off the time, energy, resources and effort Marvel have invested in X-Men," the lawsuit states.

In other words, Fox is planning a huge marketing campaign for X3 and doesn't want Sony and Revolution sharing in the results.

Look, I know Marvel is bent on selling out every character it has ever contrived (even Captain America will soon belong to Merrill Fucking Lynch), but please. Come. On. We are talking about Tim Allen versus Hugh Jackman. Chevy Chase versus Ian McKellen. Courtney Cox versus Halle Berry. Pete Hewitt versus Brett Ratner (OK, it's a push). Trust The Reeler: The lawyers aren't worth it. And neither is the movie.



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