About the comic book spinoff

[danielma]

As much as I despise the idea of this happening, I really do hate the idea. I don't think John has much of a leg to stand on as far as stopping it outright, sadly to say.

Comes with the territory of the rights being sold. Its a property and clearly its well within Hammer's rights to legally to do this...Don't get me wrong infected, I'm against this as much as anyone else, I don't want to see it happen. But I don't think there is much of a chance in stopping it. Its clearly something that Hammer obtained the rights to do when they bought the property.

I think the best that could be done in this situation would have been to show respect to John and actually approach him about it before hand. It would have been nice of them to actually approach him before doing this deal. I think that's a kick in the pants that they didn't have the common courtesy to do that though. Legally, I don't know how this will be stopped or if it even can be stopped. Now that the deal is inked I don't see it being stopped. This obviously came with the territory of Hammer buying the rights to the property in the first place.

So yes, once again don't get me wrong fellow infected, I don't want to see this happen. But I don't see much of a chance in stopping it from happening.

[Wolfchild]

As much as I despise the idea of this happening, I really do hate the idea. I don't think John has much of a leg to stand on as far as stopping it outright, sadly to say.

Comes with the territory of the rights being sold. Its a property and clearly its well within Hammer's rights to legally to do this...Don't get me wrong infected, I'm against this as much as anyone else, I don't want to see it happen. But I don't think there is much of a chance in stopping it. Its clearly something that Hammer obtained the rights to do when they bought the property.

I think the best that could be done in this situation would have been to show respect to John and actually approach him about it before hand. It would have been nice of them to actually approach him before doing this deal. I think that's a kick in the pants that they didn't have the common courtesy to do that though. Legally, I don't know how this will be stopped or if it even can be stopped. Now that the deal is inked I don't see it being stopped. This obviously came with the territory of Hammer buying the rights to the property in the first place.

So yes, once again don't get me wrong fellow infected, I don't want to see this happen. But I don't see much of a chance in stopping it from happening.

It is impossible to speak authoritatively on this topic without knowing the original terms under which the rights to the novel and/or the film were sold. It seems likely that a novelization of the Let Me In screenplay is covered under one or more of those agreements. I have suspected that there were plans to make a novel from the LMI screenplay from the start. (Remember those promotional posters that were used to get backing for the film? At leastone of them looked to me very much like a book cover.) However I would bet that a novelization of neither the original film, and almost certainly not the novel, were covered. It is pure a supposition, but I will wager that JAL/Ordfront will find they have leverage on the topic of using the Oskar & Eli characters. It may even be that the speaker from Dark Horse was overstating their latitude when he mention using the original characters in a bid to generate excitement among fans of LTROI.

At least I hope so.

[danielma]

It is impossible to speak authoritatively on this topic without knowing the original terms under which the rights to the novel and/or the film were sold. It seems likely that a novelization of the Let Me In screenplay is covered under one or more of those agreements. I have suspected that there were plans to make a novel from the LMI screenplay from the start. (Remember those promotional posters that were used to get backing for the film? At leastone of them looked to me very much like a book cover.) However I would bet that a novelization of neither the original film, and almost certainly not the novel, were covered. It is pure a supposition, but I will wager that JAL/Ordfront will find they have leverage on the topic of using the Oskar & Eli characters. It may even be that the speaker from Dark Horse was overstating their latitude when he mention using the original characters in a bid to generate excitement among fans of LTROI.

At least I hope so.

True...actually come to think of it there was a similar situation that recently happened with another remake that's been in development hell. The Oldboy remake. I remember when there were talks about Spielberg and Will Smith doing a re adaption from the Oldboy Manga, I remember there was a bit of a legal issue there over the fact that Universal had only bought the remake rights to the actual movie. The fact that they were trying to re adapt from the Manga was from memory a breach of their legal contract.

It depends on what was written into that contract. When Hammer bought the remake rights, it depends on what was stipulated in that contract as to whether there is any legal grounds to stop it. But like you said, we don't know. No one here (besides John) would know what was written in that contract.

Anyways I don't know, you're right Wolfchild no one knows the full deal. But I can't imagine that this is out of their reaches legally. I'd have to imagine that if Hammer are doing this then its well within their rights to do. There is a whole bunch of sticky points that we of course don't know about the deal but I can't imagine it being stopped. This is all just personal opinions and such, I don't have a background in law or anything, this is just a random opinion. As you said Wolf we don't know the specifics behind any of this, nor should we really.

However It is a complete shame though that they couldn't actually approach the author himself about it though. If there going to do this then surely they could of shown some respect and actually contacted John about it.

Like I said before, I'm not defending it either. I hate the idea of what they're doing...I truly hate the idea of this whole deal. I hated it when I first heard about it over on IMDB.

[gary13136]

I have heard of cases where authors have filed lawsuits clamiing that someone later used their ideas. And while I'm not sure, I think some of them were successful. I'm assuming of course that JAL did use legal counsel who "covered all of the bases."

[StefL]

I actually hadn't heard about the comic book spinoff until this morning when I discovered this on the webpage of Dagens Nyheter, one of Sweden's major newspapers: http://www.dn.se/dnbok/lat-den-ratte-bl ... -1.1080237
In translation it reads:

"'Let the right one' becomes American comic book
John Ajvide Lindqvist’s book “Let the right one in”, which director Tomas Alfredson made into an acclaimed film, will become an American comic book.
Hammer films, who right now take part in producing the American remake of the film, have made a deal with comics publisher Dark Horse to produce a comic book, writes Filmnyheterna.
The album is to be ready on October 1, when the American film, which is to be named “Let me in”, premieres.
It is still not clear whether the story about Oskar and Eli, or Owen and Abby as they are called in the American film, will be a recurring comics magazine."

Read the last line again: Recurring comics magazine - WTF! (shudder!!!)

[drakkar]

This seems so weirdly stupid. The essence of these actions are as far from the essence of LdRKI as you can get. I cannot see that people of this level of desperation or narrowmindedness could be capable of extracting anything useful from the story. Especially after this:

And...

Though Allie was reluctant to discuss story points at this early date, he did say that, "We're in a very different kind of location from the film, meeting the vampire at an earlier age, in a rural setting. We similarly use themes of cultural change to contrast the vampirism. More screwed up, psychotic characters, more twists."

And to think we were all worried about what Matt Reeves might do to this story. What sort of violence do you suppose a bunch of comic authors might do to Eli's backstory? Ugh.

If this can't be stopped, one can only hope the result will turn out to be so ridiculously beyond recognition that all it will receive is *shrugs*:

[jun2k]

who is responsible for the LTROI comic book idea? molinder? nordling?

[nithr]

wrong on so many levels.
not asking you.
based on the american movie.
adding new stuff.

i hope it can be stopped.

[TheVoxHumanus]

I'm honestly not sure why you're all so against the concept of this. I wouldn't mind seeing the original story in comic book form. Comics are a perfectly valid form of storytelling. I also wouldn't mind a continuation of the story in comic book form, or a "prequel" of sorts. I want to see these characters live and grow and have adventures and do things I haven't seen before. I don't mind other writers taking up the reigns. That can be (and has been) done with great success, it can be fun.

I am very upset though that JAL is not involved, and whomever is doing this without his consent. They are his characters and his creations, "Americanized" or not, and he needs to have final control over their use. He also needs to be financially compensated for their for-profit use.

I'm sure this is probably all legal, it doesn't make it right.

I will not be giving my money to anyone who doesn't obtain permission or endorsement from JAL to use his characters. I will not be purchasing this unless JAL gets a cut of the wealth.

[lombano]

I am very upset though that JAL is not involved, and whomever is doing this without his consent.

That's the point, if JAL were re-writing the story into another form, or were creating prequels or sequels, I'd be interested, but I wouldn't contribute to the profits of someone doing it not just without his consent, but without even having informed him it was going to happen.