Superheros Sony has the rights to?

I know their trying to create their own Cinematic universe so I was wondering if they have the right to any other superheroes besides Spider-Man.

@dagmar_merrill: How does Universal have Namor ?

@kgb725: They bought the rights to him? I mean how else?

Wait if Lionsgate entertainment bought Man-Thing why was he name dropped towards the end of the S.H.I.E.L.D show.

@dagmar_merrill said:

Wait if Lions-gate has Man-Thing why was he mentioned towards the end of the S.H.I.E.L.D.

@acer51: Not a clue.

@dagmar_merrill: That's pretty accurate I'd say. . .though Man-Thing is an actual surprise to me.

@dagmar_merrill: is that really accurate? I heard they have the rights to cloak and dagger, so I assumed they also had rights to some lesser know superheroes

I haven't watched AoS, but I do know that there are some loopholes with Marvel being able to use certain characters on TV, but not in the movies. Like I believe Marvel currently has the TV rights to Spider-Man, while Sony has the movie rights. Meaning that, from my understanding...though I could be wrong, Marvel could do a TV show staring Spider-Man, they just can't have him appear in the movies with The Avengers.

If my understanding of this is correct, though I'm not 100% sure it is, the same thing could be applied to Man-Thing. Even if his movie rights are owned by another studio, if Marvel has the TV rights to the character then they should be able use him AoS all they want...but if they want to mention his name in say, Avengers 2, then they are unable to because they don't have the movie rights for him.

Not sure if all of that is correct, but that's one way I saw how it was explained. Movie rights by themselves can get a bit messy in terms of who can and can't use certain characters, so when you throw TV rights into the mix, then everything gets even more confusing.

@dynamo8: haha I just looked at the pic better and realized Cloak and dagger are at Marvel Studios, I wonder why Power Pack was in the pic, seems like a pretty obscure team to me.

Poor lionsgate

@matthewparker: Yeah Power Pack do seem kinda odd but based on their demographic I can see it being episodic series on a Diseny Channel 'n all lol.

Apparently Marvel got Namor's rights back very recently... and nobody gave a shit.

@smashbrawler: whaaa?? Really?

@matthewparker: There's nothing official yet but The Hollywood Reporter's Borys Kit recently stated that Namor's film rights are back to Marvel. Of course, it could all be hogwash.

Not that I care, to be honest.

@acer51: that picture is a few years old. Its possible that Man-Thing has reverted back to Marvel recently.

actually the graphic is new look at the dates on it.

That would be right because they run a cartoon series with Spider-man albeit not a fan but it stars the character and run on T.V there can't be a difference between cartoon rights and t.v rights.

If this is true it means they could use Spider-man, the daily bugle and all those guys to help support the t.v shows.

@smashbrawler: I hope it's true, the more Marvel characters back at Marvel the better.

The problem with that though is, even if they have Spider-Man appear in say, Agent's of S.H.I.E.L.D., because Marvel doesn't have the movie rights to Spider-Man, even if they establish him in the MCU through AoS, he still wouldn't be able to appear in Avengers alongside Captain America, Iron Man, and Thor. Some might not think that a big deal, but with Spider-Man being one of Marvel's biggest characters, having him appear alongside their other big characters would be more beneficial for them.

Not to mention that say, if Marvel did have Spider-Man appear in a TV show set in the MCU, and if they then got the movie rights back, they would have to continue using the same Spider-Man that appeared in the TV show. They could get a new actor, but because it's still all one universe and Marvel isn't planning on rebooting it, they would still have to use whatever version of Spider-Man they used in the show. They can't have one Spider-Man appear in a TV show, yet have a completely different Spider-Man appear in a movie, not when both are suppose to be in the same universe.

So even though Marvel does have the TV rights to Spider-Man, until they get the movie rights back they're limited on what they can really do with the Web-Head. And with him being one of this biggest characters, the last thing they would want is to screw up any chance of introducing him into their ever expanding movieverse.

Sony has too many. As do 20th Century Fox, Universal, and Lionsgate

@matthewparker: The graphic isnt really new though. Its originally from 2012. They just switched over Daredevil and Blade back to the Marvel circle. I'm sure they didnt even think to re-check on Man-Thing since its not a huge property.

@war_killer: @acer51: Actually there IS a difference between cartoon rights and TV show rights. Marvel is not allowed to use characters such as Spider Man or X-Men in any live action TV show. Look up "Mutant X" which was a TV show in like 2003 about unique (as in new) characters with the X-gene that Marvel produced with some other company. Fox ended up suing them because it broke their deal with the X Men rights.

@feartheliving: Ummm its not because their making a Namor movie for 2016

@feartheliving said:

Can't say I agree with this.

What you did there, see it I did!

Um that has never actually been confirmed to be Namor. (Unless Universal has come out and said it and I missed it entirely)

He doesn't need to take off his mask at any point, if he's just making appearances on the Daredevil show there's no reason for it and if they get a good actor and he gets popular they'll want to use the same guy anyway. There's no way they'd be able to get away with this without declaring legal war on Sony though.

@smashbrawler: I never asked you to.

Oh well that ship is sailed then.

Maybe they could make cartoons that somehow fit into the MCU?

@feartheliving said:

Alright, be like that. But it's pretty damn obvious that if Marvel had the rights to characters like Spider-Man and the X-Men there would be no Guardians of the Galaxy, Ant-Man or Dr. Strange movies.

Be like what? Marvel has some time before they can even think about getting Spider-man and X-Men back, so they can most definitely have those characters have their movies and more. Down the line I would like those characters to be back at Marvel; if you look at some of my other posts on the subject I'm a firm believer that if Marvel got those characters back they'd expand their studio and produce more films a year or bi yearly. Look at the cluster of CBMs this summer and they're still making bank. If they get those major franchises back they can more than afford to put out a lesser known title and put out an X-Men or a Spider-man here and there to get some money even if the lesser known titles perform less then they'd hoped.

Also I'd like to point out how much the GA likes Iron Man, you don't see them making tons of Iron Man movies every year, so just because they have those titles doesn't exactly mean they'd be chosen over other ips. If people disagree with me that's find I'm not trying to change anyone's mind :P