Sadly, the state of the Friday The 13th film franchise has been up in the air for years now. With a heated legal battle, everything related to Jason Voorhees has been put on hold, and even the hit video game took a hit over this.
However, it seems like things are settling down, and there’s a winner in the battle between Victor Miller and Sean S. Cunningham as reports say Miller has won the copyright termination appeal.
Starting back in 2018, a judge ruled that Friday the 13th screenwriter Victor Miller is the sole owner of the original screenplay in the United States. Since then, director Sean Cunningham has fought to reverse this decision, bringing the case to the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in hopes of overturning the ruling.
Now, the courts have sided with Miller, rejecting Cunningham’s argument, and declaring “Miller was an independent contractor when he wrote the screenplay and is therefore entitled to authorship rights.”
The Hollywood Reporter’s Eriq Gardner broke it down wonderfully and let fans of Friday The 13th fans know what’s happening: “Barring any reversal before a fuller panel at the 2nd Circuit or Supreme Court, Victor Miller will reclaim the domestic rights to the franchise. A big win for attorney Marc Toberoff as he heads into an even bigger fight against Disney over Marvel characters.”
While this doesn’t mean a new film is on the way (it’s been over a decade since the last entry), this is a step in the right direction to getting Friday The 13th back to slashing the cinemas. Miller’s win doesn’t make everything clear though, as there’s still the matter that owning the original screenplay doesn’t mean you own the rights to the adult Jason Voorhees. So, deals will be worked out in the process and could take a while… but there’s finally movement on this front.
SEE ALSO: The Top 13 Kills from the Friday the 13th Franchise
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