White Wolf Sues Sony

etherlad writes "White Wolf, makers of pen-and-paper RPGs such as Vampire: The Masquerade and Werewolf: The Apocalypse, and author Nancy A. Collins, are suing Sony Pictures, Screen Gems and Lakeshore Entertainment for copyright infringement in the upcoming Underworld movie, which they claim not only is blatantly the World of Darkness with the serial numbers (partially) filed off, but that the movie is obviously ripped off Nancy Collins' novel Love of Monsters, also set in the World of Darkness. There's a PDF of the legal brief floating around, and to me (IANAL) it really looks like WW has a case."

Comments

Big Companies Suck on Copyrights

[Goo.cc]

I hope that WW wins this case, as it is not the first time that a large company has ripped someone off.

What's ironic to me is that Sony, like Disney, really wants to prevent works from entering the public domain and will vigorously defend their copyrights but seem to have no problem with stealing copyright material or using material in the public domain. It is just sad.

Anecdotally speaking

[Jahf]

I didn't know a thing about the lawsuit, who made the movie, or anything else about it when I saw the trailer.

Both times I saw the trailer this weekend I thought to myself "interesting, maybe someone finally made a Storyteller movie".

It most definitely has a strong resemblance in the trailer. Enough that WW fans will immediately associate the two. If the trailer is an accurate portrayal of the movie, then I can see a lawsuit having teeth.

While the Storyteller stuff is "just" an interpretation of myths and legends that have been around for centuries (or more), it is a very specific interpretation of them.