Hey! It's been a while, and as I've been away, there was some HUGE news in regards to this blog's main mandate.
DreamWorks SKG, the mega huge animation studio behind hits like "Shrek," "Madagascar" and "How To Train Your Dragon" recently
purchased Lone Ranger rights holder Classic Media. The deal went down to the tune of $155 million dollars, which considering Disney paid over $4 billion each for Marvel Comics and LucasFilm in recent years could be considered a steal.
Sure, Classic Media characters like Casper and Doctor Solar might not have quite the cachet that Spider-Man and Darth Vadar have these days, but looking over the assortment of kids properties represented, there are a lot of opportunities for a company like DreamWorks to make cool new stuff. In the meantime, the immediate plans for the characters involved
getting classic TV series up online, and that's not a bad idea at all.
As far as the Ranger is concerned, it does add an interesting wrinkle to the new film considering the fact that LR is now owned by one of the chief competitors to Disney – the studio producing the new film. Still, I think both sides will see the value of this movie being a big hit.
Overall, I'm rather pleased by this. As long as corporate copyright continues to be near indefinite for 20th Century properties like this, the ones that survive the longest will be owned and operated by big media companies that have the ability to exploit them across many platforms. Ultimately, DreamWorks owning these characters will likely mean that we see a lot more of them, not less.
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