If FOX continues to hassle the Watchmen movie...



I'll boycott X-Men Origins: Wolverine.



I'll boycott everything FOX has to do with in the future.



I probably won't do anything.





View results Free online poll

All of this would seem to suggest that Warner Bros. either massively screwed up or is pretty darn certain that Fox is grossly mistaken. In a statement issued to the press on Tuesday, a Warner Bros. spokesman said: “We respectfully disagree with Fox's position and do not believe they have any rights in and to this project." But the studio also made the claim that the judge in the case, Judge Gary Allen Fees, "did not opine at all on the merits, other than to conclude that Fox satisfied the pleading requirements.” This is technically true. But the tenor of Fees’ edict does sound rather leading. For example: "It is particularly noteworthy that nothing on the face of the complaint or the documents supplied to the Court establishes that [Watchmen producer Larry] Gordon, the claimed source of Warner Brothers' interest in Watchmen, ever acquired any rights in Watchmen."



At the very least, the judge’s order seems to put Warner Bros. and Gordon in the position of producing proof that clearly shows that Fox is wrong, or confuses the situation so much that the judge will have no choice but to throw them into a slime pit and let them slug this thing out. (If you want to examine the legalese yourself, check it out here.) Regardless, the two most likely outcomes are: 1. Warner Bros. wins. 2. Warner Bros. offers Fox a big fat settlement and Fox takes it. They could certainly use the bump after a weak summer season in which none of its films crossed the $100 million threshold.