Wolverine vs. Mickey Mouse: Disney to buy Marvel
 

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090831/..._entertainment

LOS ANGELES – The Walt Disney Co. said Monday it is buying Marvel Entertainment Inc. for $4 billion in cash and stock, bringing such characters as Iron Man and Spider-Man into the family of Mickey Mouse and WALL-E.

Under the deal, Disney will acquire ownership of 5,000 Marvel characters. Many of them, including the Fantastic Four and the X-Men, were co-created by the comic book legend Stan Lee.

Analyst David Joyce of Miller Tabak & Co. said the acquisition will help Disney appeal to young men who have flocked to theaters to see Marvel's superhero fare in recent years. That contrasts with Disney's recent successes among young women with such fare as "Hannah Montana" and the Jonas Brothers.

"It helps Disney add exposure to a young male demographic it had sort of lost some balance with," Joyce said, noting the $4 billion offer was at "full price."

Disney said Marvel shareholders will receive $30 per share in cash, plus 0.745 Disney shares for every Marvel share they own. That values each Marvel share at $50 based on Friday's closing stock prices.

Marvel shares jumped $10.17, or 26 percent, to $48.82 shortly after the market opened. Disney shares fell 47 cents, or 1.8 percent, to $26.37.

Disney said the boards of both companies have approved the transaction, but it will require an antitrust review and the approval of Marvel shareholders.

Disney last made a big purchase in 2006 when it acquired Pixar Animation Studios Inc., the creator of the "Toy Story" franchise, for $7.4 billion in stock.

Disney CEO Robert Iger said the latest acquisition combines Marvel's "strong global brand and world-renowned library of characters" with Disney's "unparalleled global portfolio of entertainment properties" and ability to maximize value across multiple platforms and territories.

Marvel earned a net profit of $206 million last fiscal year, up 47 percent from a year earlier, on revenue of $676 million, as it took movie production in house instead of just cutting licensing deals.

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What could happen to Marvel as a result of this?

Donald Duck and the X-men

dude..what the fuck is this/? I thought it was a joke.

Disney vs Capcom

Could be a good thing for Marvel to have that kind of money behind them.

Just have to hope that Disney don't interfere in things too much.

lol

whoa, fuck

also I would pay limitless amount of money to see Dr. Doom Ice Skating

Awesome, now there will be Marvel rides at Disney World! :love:

Well, putting some thought into it..I doubt Marvel will change much as far as story telling goes. Like it was mentioned by the Disney CEO, the purchase is being done to get a profit out of young adults who Disney lost touch with. If they are smart, they probably won't change the formula. I guess it is nice to see a bigger budget for Marvel and more chances for movies.

Some young males are ogling the Disney girls though so they haven't lost touch with all of them.

Holy shit.

It will allow them to sell figurines of Disney characters dressed as Marvel superheroes. That, and there will be Marvel rides at disney world.

That's really about it. Everything else will probably be conducted exactly the same, only now the money will be going in Disneys pocket.

Maybe they'll make another Kingdom Hearts with Marvel characters

Well, it definitely seemed like Disney had been interested in Marvel for awhile. They do air just about most of the Marvel animated series on the Disney XD channel.

Still, this is big.

NO NO NO NO NO FUCK FUCK NO NO NO NO NO GOD DAMN IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

As you can tell, I am not thrilled with this news.

I will be merging the Marvel Movie News Thread with the Disney Movies News Thread. Effective immediately.

I don't think its such a big thing to worry about though. Time Warner owns DC and that doesn't seem to be a problem.

AOL V. DC, AMIRITE!?


No but seriously, folks, when I first looked at JURA's Custom User TItle, I was all "Holy SHit, their is a Pog Forum?". Then I realized what it actually said.

Did you realize that it was Jeritron and not Jura while you were at it?

Literally my first thought and absolutely fantastic if they do. Cloud and Wolvie? Sick

IGN all over it already.

http://ds.ign.com/articles/101/1019844p1.html

What about characters like The Punisher? And Deadpool? Will they be watered down? What about Wolverine?

Will they still be labeled as 'Marvel Comics', but under the umbrella of Disney? Or will Marvel just be dead now and it'll be seen as 'Disney Comics presents Spider-Man' or summit?

Personally this worries me now. Let's hope Disney doesn't change anything. Also, what's with all the bigger budget stuff? Marvel seemed to be doing alright for themselves? And what does a bigger budget mean for comics exactly? More pages?

Yeah a more "Child Friendly" Punisher would not be very good.

Disney Zombies

Not much for comics maybe but don't forget Marvel have started making films themselves with their own in house studio. For their film franchises it could be an incredible deal.

I'm not getting too worked up over this deal to be honest, I imagine Disney will keep their nose out of Marvels business and let them be their own seperate entity. I don't really see why they'd get rid of the Marvel tag as it is a powerful name.

Well lets think of all the marvel movies that have been rated R...
Blade Trilogy which is done..Punisher and Punisher: warzone(I don't remember the first one being R but maybe.) With the "great" success of Warzone I doubt we were going to see more R rated movies coming from Marvel.
I don't think it will be a big deal at all. I think the Marvel main continuity will be left alone.

Wonder what may happen to the Hulk and spider man rides at universal and islands of adventure...That's about all I care for, anyway.

Apparently nothing - Marvel's existing agreement seemingly gives Universal exclusive rights to use the characters in theme parks "east of the Mississippi" in perpetuity.

So either Disney will have to make do with doing stuff in Disneyland and non-US parks, or they'll have to buy Universal out of the deal.

Howard the Duck/Donald Duck Team-Up. Make it happen.

Disney already releases plenty of R-rated films under Miramax. Don't be concerned about them meddling in Marvel's affairs.

Nothing will happen creatively to any of the Marvel characters.

And I thought Logan was overexposed BEFORE...

Well, it'll be fun to listen to the religious right froth at Daken, considering he's pretty much a queer...

I thought about that after I read the news...

I was joking with my cousin that the trailer would just show Wolverine getting angry...then his claws come out but instead of his normal claws they are all in the shape of keyblades.

Juratron.

How are they only buying 5000 characters? There's well over 400,000 in the Marvel Universe.

They aren't buying coloured characters, so the Mexicans are out.

The first thing that came to mind when I heard about this was all the older-oriented heroes getting fucked over this. Games like Wolverine Origins will never happen again, and movies like Punisher Warzone are extinct as of now.

I just don't see Disney letting Marvel run the same.

Oh yeah, when Disney got Power Rangers they did shit all to it. Basically let it bleed out after they scrapped whatever they could off it's pre-set popularity. I don't like Disney.

And Marvel fucking Studios was only $4bil? These companies aren't nearly as much as I imagined them to be.

You want more films like Warzone? One was quite enough.

Plus you seem to be working off the faulty premise that everything Disney owns is for kids. You do realise the extent of what Disney actually owns, don't you?