Netflix and the company behind the Choose Your Own Adventure series has finally come to a settlement in an ongoing trademark lawsuit over the interactive nature of the Black Mirror film Bandersnatch.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, the settlement comes after a lengthy and aggressive fight between it and Chooseco LLC. To find out more, turn to the next paragraph.
The episode that started the lawsuit is the 2018 Black Mirror interactive movie Bandersnatch. The episode follows a game developer named Stefan Butler (Fionn Whitehead), who’s trying to turn a “choose your own adventure”-style book called Bandersnatch (complete with a cover by Chris Foss!) into a video game, and as the film progresses, viewers can choose the decisions that Stefan makes, thereby changing the outcome of the film. Ultimately, there are more than a trillion variations of the story.
After Netflix released the episode, Chooseco sued the streaming service, saying that the company had violated its trademark. Netflix tried to have the case dismissed and tried to get Chooseco’s trademark invalidated, but a federal judge allowed the case to proceed, citing the need for extra examination to see if Netflix explicitly misled its subscribers.
Now, it seems as though the two companies have come to a settlement. According to THR, the judge will throw out his opinion that cited further examination of the issue, and the terms between the two companies weren’t disclosed.
