Intellectual Property
Jan. 9, 2026
9th Circuit's 'Top Gun' copyright ruling crashes and burns, costing heirs millions
Copyright law's reliance on judges to parse art yields predictably flawed results--evident in Yonay v. Paramount, where the court dismissed the original "Top Guns" article behind the Top Gun films.
Timothy D. Reuben
Reuben MediationEmail: treuben@rrbattorneys.com
Tim Reuben spent more than 40 years handling complex legal disputes in California's state and federal courts. As the founder and managing partner of Reuben Raucher & Blum in Los Angeles, he has worked on a wide range of matters through jury and bench trials, arbitration, mediation, judicial reference, and settlement conferences across multiple areas of civil law, including commercial, real estate, construction, employment, intellectual property, insurance, professional liability, and unfair competition.
Copyright law has long been a confusing and complex legal domain, which is continuously made more intricate by incomprehensible judicial opinions. Trusting bench officers to dissect artistic works and opine regarding what is protectable and what is not is simply folly--how can a legal career prepare one to competently decide what is highly debatable artistically? <...
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