Fox’s suit against Warner Bros over the rights to Watchmen (trailer here) was scheduled to go to trial in January.  Today, the judge who denied both sides’ original request for summary judgement (a decision without a trial) reversed himself, ruling that Fox owns partial rights to the film.

“Fox owns a copyright interest consisting of, at the very least, the right to distribute the ‘Watchmen’ motion picture,” the ruling said.
Fox acquired rights to the “Watchmen” graphic novel in the late 1980s for the producer Lawrence Gordon, but eventually dropped its own plan to make a movie.
Mr. Gordon later pursued the project with Universal Pictures, and then with Paramount Pictures, before shooting it with Warner and Legendary under an arrangement that allows Paramount to distribute the film abroad.
In ruling on Wednesday, Judge Feess advised both Fox and Warner to look toward a settlement or an appeal.
“The parties may wish to turn their efforts from preparing for trial to negotiating a resolution of this dispute or positioning the case for review,” he said. [NYTimes]

If all you care about is being able to see the film as scheduled in March, this may not be a bad thing.  Basically, the judge is telling WB that they have to negotiate with Fox, and to try to come to an agreement now rather than waiting for a trial next month.  If they can hammer something out before then, the release will probably go as planned.  And now that Fox officially owns a piece of it, both companies have a financial stake in getting it released on time.

But from a principle standpoint, this sucks.  Fox doesn’t deserve shit.  If you have the rights to a book and you don’t do a goddamned thing with it for 20 years, you don’t get to come in and demand a percentage only after someone else makes it into a hit.  If Fox had made Watchmen no one would be trying to take credit for it, I guarantee you.  It would look like Fantastic Four, or God forbid, Dragonball.  Fox deserves to get reimbursed for whatever they originally paid for the rights, and that’s it.  See? I should be the judge.  I’d wear a fez and a shiny vest and sit Indian-style on top of my desk, and after I made a ruling I’d nod my head up and down twice, and then my shirtless black bailiff would spit fire.  And you can appeal a ruling, but only if you wrestle the bear.  And the bear wears one of those wigs like they do in England.