On Friday, January 10th, Buck Woodall an animator sued Disney for copyright infringement over Moana 2. This is the second time Woodall has sued Disney over copyright infringement, he did so in 2016 over the first Moana with the court ruling eventually that “too much time had passed” with the release of Moana for Disney to be held accountable for the copyright. Even with Disney not paying damages for Moana, a jury found it was possible that there was someone at Disney who could have seen the development materials.
Jenny Marchick, the former Mandeville Films director of development, stated that she had asked Woodall to share his work on “Bucky”, the unfinished film Woodall claims was copied by Disney in 2003. The courts found no proof of this conversation or event due to the aforementioned passing time, but the jury considered the fact that Mandeville Films had a first-look deal with Disney then and it was possible a Disney staff member could have seen the screenplay, concept artwork, and trailer that Marchick claims to have been presented to her by Woodall. Marchick is now DreamWorks Animation’s head of development for features and has not made any more comments regarding the case. The original ruling was commented on by U.S. District Judge Consuelo Marshall “There is a disputed issue of genuine fact regarding substantial similarity and striking similarity between the parties’ works.”
The similarities Woodall says that his work “Bucky” has with Moana and Moana 2 are mainly centered on the story, with the plots and major characters of both being extremely close in description. The plot of “Bucky” centered on a Polynesian hero journeying to an ancient island to break a curse with a symbolic necklace and encountering a tattooed demigod armed with a hook and a monster in a mountain. The new lawsuit directly references specific scenes and imagery in the “Bucky” project with the whirlpool portal seen in Moana 2 being a near-direct copy as Woodall claims.
With the release of Moana 2‘s box office gross currently sitting at 687 million and climbing the copyright case, if Disney loses, would directly impact the profits the studio would be collecting. Woodall is seeking 10 billion in damages or a 2.5 percent portion of gross revenue from the films for the infringement.
Disney’s response to both cases has been to present the development material for Moana and Moana 2, including concept art, and screenplays, and issuing statements that the developers of Moana had no idea Woodall’s work existed. During the original lawsuit, Ron Clements one of the co-directors of the first film stated in the court regarding the lawsuit, “Moana was not inspired by or based in any way on (Woodall) or his ‘Bucky’ project, which I learned of for the first time after this lawsuit was filed.”
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