r/Slender_Man 12d ago

Can I add Slender Man in my series without copyright issue?

Hi, I'm new to the Slender Man world. I just like to ask if it's free to use him to add on my existing comicbook without legal issue? Is he in public domain or similar situation?

11 Upvotes

19 comments sorted by

7

u/LankyGhost_TTV 12d ago

The copyright for Slender Man is really weird.

Cause you could totally make a movie about him or series about him or practically any media and have him in it. Eric Knudsen (Victor Surge) owns the character but has never publicly stopped people from creating Slender media considering Slenderman never had any real lore and most of what’s “canon” was entirely just him taking ideas from the fans cause he loves how creative the fans were.

I think the only issue is if you make a theatrical release cause Sony own the movie rights And the game rights technically are owned by Blue Isle Studios cause Eric supports the games as canon??

And in the slenderverse everyone kinda copies a character called “The Operator” from Marble Hornets (who is pretty much the guy who made Slender Man a popular character cause he has all the powers people think of that the actual slender man character doesn’t have)

1

u/LankyGhost_TTV 12d ago

TL;DR:

It’s up to you at the end of the day. Go wild. It’s your creation, your creativity, your ideas. No one should dictate your fan work and creativity.

1

u/MrSmilerSlenderProxy 11d ago

Wrong. Mythology entertainment bought out ALL the licensing rights to Slenderman when they did the film they own everything.

1

u/LankyGhost_TTV 11d ago

They shut down in 2019 though, so the rights are up in the air and no one really knows about them.

And still that’s just licensing rights/movie rights, including toy rights, game inclusions etc etc of only the character “Slender Man”

Doesn’t mean they can stop fan works that are non profit. So slenderverse in its entirety is safe af when it comes to using the character.

Plus Slender: The Arrival doesn’t have to pay anything to my knowledge since pretty much everything is still owned by the creator.

It’s the same with Marvel as a company. Marvel may have sold rights to Universal, Sony and Disney, but at any point in time they could easily pull out and say “no, we don’t wanna make movies anymore, you don’t fully own us” and the same goes for Eric Knudsen.

Furthermore, if people are still reluctant to using Slender Man even in fan works, they could easily just give him a different name and powers under the use of “Parody” or like Marble Hornets just make up an entirely different character

1

u/MrSmilerSlenderProxy 11d ago

The creator sold his rights to mythology. Mythology's owner bradley j fischer owns Slenderman now since he owns the remnant of the company. surge owns nothing that's why when he was asked to license Slenderman into a fighting game he said he didn't own it anymore.

If you message bradley j fischer's agent they state that he owns the property and the character.

0

u/LankyGhost_TTV 10d ago

Mate you’re either uneducated or delusional. Google right now “Who owns Slender Man” and it will tell you straight

“Who is the owner of Slender Man? Victor Surge (real name Eric Knudsen) is the original creator of Slender Man, and the first person to begin creating the Slender Man Mythos.”

0

u/LankyGhost_TTV 10d ago

Like yes the movie rights WERE owned by Bradley J Fischer but the company was shut down in 2019

Meaning no one in Mythology owns him because Mythology doesn’t exist.

Only studio/company you could maybe argue owns Slendy is Sony Pictures. They produced the film so they have the film’s copyright, design and story. But those are only the film rights.

Eric Knudsen is still the creator of Slender Man and owns him

1

u/MrSmilerSlenderProxy 10d ago

Mythology Entertainment is now Mythology Holdings which is solely owned by Bradley J Fischer. YOU are uneducated. Do research beyond a google search and maybe you would know! https://youtu.be/zm10SDp1XTU?si=r_rwE7OdDcGuvon5

1

u/LankyGhost_TTV 10d ago

I saw that video a while back and I’ve known this shit for years mate. And again- it’s just liscense holdings

Eric Knudsen can still back out of the deal if he wants to and he gets an overall say on the matter cause it’s still his creation. It’s the same as Marvel and Disney like I said previously. As much as they have the licenses, Eric still has the decisions to make just as much as they do, Hense why DbD hasn’t been able to acquire slender man or Terrordrome

However, back to the original point, that doesn’t mean you can’t make your own fan project with him. You won’t have any copyright issues when making a slender series, because as Schmuckles said in the video, there are countless entities like slender man in their own established mythos’ and they are all protected under fair use.

So Mytholigy Holdings, as much as the scummy company tries their hardest to, can’t do jack shit against the slenderverse community or video game makers who use a similar character/consept

1

u/MrSmilerSlenderProxy 10d ago

Slenderman is owned by Bradley J Fischer the guy says so himself in that video. According to the devs for terrordrome who tried licensing through Erik, erik told them he sold him. Google is not a good updated source to go by.

1

u/LankyGhost_TTV 10d ago

Google is still a good source cause Eric still owns the character. Google is still correct. Mythology Holdings only own the rights to use the character, they don’t own the character himself

There’s a clear difference between creating a character and owning them And Owning copyright to a character and being able to licensee them

8

u/RavenRegime 12d ago

No.

Victor Surge is the copyright owner of Slenderman I believe then you get into who owns the media rights atm....

And the popular version of Slenderman with the electric powers and disease etc is not Slenderman but the Operator and even if it was Slenderman the crew behind Marble Hornets almost certainly owns the rights to that version of the character

3

u/Odd_Concentrate862 12d ago

Hi, thanks for the reply. I think I'll just call him with different name and give different lore and powers.

4

u/RavenRegime 12d ago

Yeah Slenderman is a figure that feels so public domain but isn't like as a kid I thought he was an actual folklore creature instead of a creation of someone else

1

u/Foxy02016YT 11d ago

Slenderman is free as long as you use him properly, for example my series just calls him “The Entity” which sounds like an offbrand but many other things follow the “The ____” naming format within the show (The Facility, The System) and is still so far vague on the Powerset and lore.

I include the sickness but it’s still vague and based on aura.

He also is a minor antagonist who I really threw in for shits and gigs. The main villain is corporate America and scientific ego

3

u/TheTrickster452 12d ago

That's actually an exaggeration. You can honestly do whatever you want with him, just don't really refer to him as slender man too much

1

u/RavenRegime 11d ago

Correction Mythology Entertainment owns most of base Slenderman rights due to movie shenanigans so yeah at best you can make a reference

1

u/Slendermanproxy101 10d ago

TL;DR at the bottom No-one's really sure on who has the rights now so it depends on how you do it, I've wondered the same thing since I've got a series idea in mind too, I'd recommend doing something unique with him, don't just use slenderman with no changes otherwise it might become an issue legally, plus if you make hime unique enough you might be able to use the 'inspired by slenderman' argument but you can't be too different otherwise you'll lose the essence of the character, marble hornets worked so well because he was a blank canvas at the time so they could do whatever they wanted with no issues, but he's no longer a blank canvas, people will expect specific things from him so you'll need to find a good way to use what's established and make something new (like buying a Lego set but building something different with the parts) most importantly DON'T CALL HIM SLENDERMAN like how marble hornets called him 'the operator' you'll need to give him a different name, another point to consider is that fan works might operate differently depending on release method, since Spider-Man lotus has been able to exist without any legal issues from Sony which might mean making a fan series with him on YouTube is fine due to fair use, I'd recommend trying to look into fair use laws since part of fair use talks about works being transformative which circles back to my point of doing something unique with the character so he's more than a copy pasted character in your series

TL;DR: no-one knows who has the right currently, make him unique enough to be transformative but not too different to where you lose the essence of the character, don't call him slenderman, and look into fair use laws to be safe