I'm pretty sure they can't even adapt ideas and theories from fanfics, let alone the fanfics themselves, because that would be classed as being derivative. To the point where some series' writers are forbidden from reading that stuff. I know that was at least the case for the Friendship is Magic writers. So if there was an official Sonichu movie, Pokemon and Sega would need permission from Chris Chan. That's probably one reason why so much big budget fan content gets DMCA'd
Yeah, I meant to mention something about that. It's the reason (aside from the obvious) that Greer's songs which he sent to Taylor Swift
could not be received by her, even if he sent them as gifts. Any
appearance that a future work may have been influenced by the work of a third party, be it a derivative fanwork or not, opens artists and companies up for a plagiarism lawsuit.
Which is why it's always funny to me when someone puts out some kind of "how I would do it" fanwork on YouTube or something. Like these recreations of Mario or Zelda levels on some realistic engine, well done guy, not only Nintendo Will Not Hire This Man, they won't be able to do something similar to what he did (not that they wanted to).
Or, a particular example I remember, some movie critic YouTuber wanker made a video years ago about what he'd pitch for Ant-Man 3, essentially an idea about how they could incorporate Eric O'Grady (the third, most unethical, and most FUN of the Ant-Men) into the setting by tying him to some past events, etc etc.
Congrats, NandoVsMovies, you've made sure any possible plans they may have had to bring O'Grady up for Ants3 got yeeted and instead we got Quantumania.
Don't worry, Sega doesn't want you to remember that ds game either
Remember when they used the crash woah meme in Crash 4? Chris had no idea they used it and I don't think the guy who made the meme animation had to say yes to it, so I think they would be fine making a sonichu movie without Chris chan's permission as he didn't get any legal procedures done to actually trademark it, right? I know he has A trademark but I doubt it has any legal power
I don't know about the Crash meme (beyond the bit where Tomar told Chris "You're more than a meme to me"), but small nods like that are usually too insignificant to cause them legal concerns, and are often considered endearing to the audience.
But while I think they could make a movie about a Sonic and Pikachu fusion if they wanted, I don't know if they could take the Sonichu name or design, and they most certainly couldn't take anything that happens in the comic and adapt it in any way.
Like I said before, if they wanted, they could have sued Chris, they could have taken any and all profits he made on Sonichu merchandise, but they couldn't simply take his work, derivative and copyright infringey as it is, and consider it their intellectual property.
