Speed Racer and Turner

[Atoon]

Have Turner some rights over Speed Racer characters? I ask because:

The CN commercials that include various characters generally uses only the ones owned by Time Warner—mainly because these commercials can be used for other countries where all other shows that they don't own may be different. And they used Speed Racer many times when the series still aired there (like the commercial when Fred Flinstone, Thunddar and Chicken are looking for parking).
Speed Racer appeared in generic Boomerang ads, and in those they only uses the ones owned by Turner, like the Hanna-Barbera and MGM ones.
Speed Races appears in a Harvey Birdman episode.

[Blackstar]

Speed Races appears in a Harvey Birdman episode.

'Scue me, but that never happened. Cartoon Network studios (formerly Hanna Barbera studios) doesn't own Speed Racer, and Speed never appeared on Harvey Birdman. You may be confusing him with Ernie Devlin, from the old H-B animated series, Devlin.

[Atoon]

'Scue me, but that never happened. Cartoon Network studios (formerly Hanna Barbera studios) doesn't own Speed Racer, and Speed never appeared on Harvey Birdman. You may be confusing him with Ernie Devlin, from the old H-B animated series, Devlin.

I'm not confusing it. He (and the Chim-Chim monkey) made a cameo in Harvey's Civvy (briefly and with not speaking parts, but still).

[Dr.Pepper]

I think that they use to but not no more.

[Antiyonder]

He also appeared in that one commerical where Fred was trying to get a parking space. He and Judy Jetson crash into each other due to racing into the available parking space.

[Napoleon Solo]

I'm not confusing it. He (and the Chim-Chim monkey) made a cameo in Harvey's Civvy (briefly and with not speaking parts, but still).

I believe Speed was also in Harvey's office to have Harvey get him out of a speeding ticket.

[John Dorian]

Speed Racer was in a commercial with some HB characters in a CN commercial about parking space.

[Jeff Harris]

Have Turner some rights over Speed Racer characters? No.

As strange as it seems, the rights to Speed Racer is kind of in flux.


The rights to the property (in the US) is owned by Speed Racer Productions. They manage every aspect of the property, but the ownership of THAT entity is in question.
DiC owns distribution rights to all three series (the original, the 90s version, and the Speed Racer X episodes). Or, at least, they owned shared rights with Speed Racer Productions. Then again, DiC may actually OWN Speed Racer Productions.
Warner Bros. owns the film rights (including merchandising rights) to the franchise in North America, Europe, and all of the markets not covered by Village Roadshow, who own all other international rights to the film.
Wildstorm, a DC Comics imprint, own comic rights to the property, including reprint rights to the titles they originally published.
The new series, created by, ugh, Animation Collective, is co-produced by Speed Racer Productions, and the current distribution rights to the new show will be owned by Nickelodeon. Viacom, Nick's parent company, might have a stake in Speed Racer Productions since the original and 90s version were distributed by Group W Productions. Or maybe those rights were transferred to CBS Productions when they split from the original Viacom and now a part of the CBS Paramount Television Distribution unit. Dunno how that all added up, but Viacom somehow has a stake in the new Speed Racer series coming in 2008.Got it? Turner doesn't own any rights to the Speed Racer franchise. They just had limited rights to use the property in interstitials and ads for the duration of the period they had rights to broadcast the series.

[Atoon]

No.

As strange as it seems, the rights to Speed Racer is kind of in flux.

The rights to the property (in the US) is owned by Speed Racer Productions. They manage every aspect of the property, but the ownership of THAT entity is in question.
DiC owns distribution rights to all three series (the original, the 90s version, and the Speed Racer X episodes). Or, at least, they owned shared rights with Speed Racer Productions. Then again, DiC may actually OWN Speed Racer Productions.
Warner Bros. owns the film rights (including merchandising rights) to the franchise in North America, Europe, and all of the markets not covered by Village Roadshow, who own all other international rights to the film.
Wildstorm, a DC Comics imprint, own comic rights to the property, including reprint rights to the titles they originally published.
The new series, created by, ugh, Animation Collective, is co-produced by Speed Racer Productions, and the current distribution rights to the new show will be owned by Nickelodeon. Viacom, Nick's parent company, might have a stake in Speed Racer Productions since the original and 90s version were distributed by Group W Productions. Or maybe those rights were transferred to CBS Productions when they split from the original Viacom and now a part of the CBS Paramount Television Distribution unit. Dunno how that all added up, but Viacom somehow has a stake in the new Speed Racer series coming in 2008.Got it? Turner doesn't own any rights to the Speed Racer franchise. They just had limited rights to use the property in interstitials and ads for the duration of the period they had rights to broadcast the series.

Thanks for the info. But still, he appeared in a Harvey Birdman episode. And in these shows they only used Hanna-Barbera, Ruby-Spears and MGM characters that are owned by turner (they don't used characters from HB shows owned by different entities, even DC comics, that is from Time Warner). Or it was Fair Use, a la Robot Chicken?

[The Wolverine]

Harvey Birdman is a parody show. In parody, you generally don't need permission to use existing work.

[Blackstar]

Harvey Birdman is a parody show. In parody, you generally don't need permission to use existing work.

Exactly. Like how Race Bannon from Jonny Quest appeared (and died!) in an episode of The Venture Brothers.