Netflix has surprisingly settled the trademark lawsuit that ChooseCo, the children's book publisher that owns the "Choose Your Own Adventure" trademark, filed against the streaming service over the Black Mirror film, Bandersnatch. This comes as a surprise because Netflix had given off every indication that the company was planning on doing everything it could to win this suit, even going so far as to try to invalidate ChooseCo's trademark.

Black Mirrow: Bandersnatch is about a video game developer who loses touch with reality as he works on a new game. The film is an interactive experience, with readers able to choose what happens next in the story, making each viewing a theoretically distinctive story.

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"Choose Your Own Adventure," of course, is the famous children's book series where the story is told in the second person, with the reader as the main character and they have to choose different options in the story and turn to different pages in the book to see what happens next.

ChooseCo argued that Netflix was using the brand awareness of "Choose Your Own Adventure" to promote the film and that Netflix had actually negotiated with ChooseCo to make an interactive film before Bandersnitch. ChooseCo instead cut a deal with 20th Century Fox for a future "Choose Your Own Adventure" film. The video game developer character in Bandersnatch even specifically references "Choose Your Own Adventure" in the film when he discusses the book that he is basing his game on. His father mentions that his son must really love that book because he always sees him flipping back and forth in it and the son explains, "No, it's a 'Choose Your Own Adventure' book."

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Netflix defended its use on First Amendment grounds, arguing that the description was merely an accurate description of the book in the film and thus its usage in the movie (and in descriptions of the film) was "artistically relevant" and therefore protected by the First Amendment.

Netflix lost its motion to dismiss back in February when the judge felt that there was a need for discovery first. The reason the settlement is surprising is because Netflix appeared to be playing hard ball earlier in the suit, by actually trying to get the "Choose Your Own Adventure" trademark canceled. However, presumably something came up in the discovery that led to a change in Netflix's stance as the company has now settled the suit with ChooseCo. Terms of the settlement were not disclosed. ChooseCo's trademark has not only not been canceled, but the company has even filed new trademarks on the "Choose Your Own Adventure" name, including downloadable animated videos.

Via Hollywood Reporter