Facts

Plaintiff Joan Celia Lee (JC Lee), as the only child of the late comic book author Stan Lee and trustee of the Lee Family Survivor's Trust, filed a lawsuit against Defendant POW! Entertainment, Inc. seeking declaratory relief as to the ownership of Stan Lee's name, likeness, and certain literary properties.

PLAINTIFF'S CONTENTIONS: Plaintiff contended she sought to perform the contractual covenant Stan Lee made with the company he founded in 1998 named Stan Lee Entertainment, Inc. and thereby restore the rights her father purportedly assigned to Stan Lee Entertainment at that time. Plaintiff further contended defendant POW! Entertainment Inc. deceived and manipulated Stan Lee into believing that he had retained his creator rights and rights to his name and likeness while those rights remained assigned to and the property of Stan Lee Entertainment Inc. Plaintiff argued that POW! Entertainment misled Stan Lee in convincing him to reassign those rights to POW! Entertainment.

DEFENDANT'S CONTENTIONS: Defendant denied Plaintiff's contentions, pointing out that Plaintiff's entire case turned upon a two decade's old employment agreement that had already been the subject of no fewer than six federal lawsuits, all of which had found that agreement to be unenforceable. Defendant moved to dismiss Plaintiff's case based upon the grounds that: (i) Plaintiff's claims were barred under the doctrine of res judicata; (ii) Plaintiff lacked standing to assert the purported contractual rights of third party Stan Lee Entertainment, Inc.; and (iii) all of Plaintiff's claims were barred as untimely, having arisen from publicly known facts dating as back more than two decades.

Result

The court granted Defendant POW! Entertainment's motion to dismiss the case with prejudice, finding that Plaintiff's claims were barred by res judicata.