New Friday The 13th & South Park Movies Likely In the Next 5 Years

Hollywood can be a very complex place, with multiple studios owning different bits of the rights to major franchises, which often holds up production on sequels and remake (just look at The Hobbit, which was delayed by a year because MGM help co-production rights but ran out of cash).

However new instalments of Friday The 13th and South Park have become far more likely now, as it’s been revealed that Warner gave up its part of the rights to films based on the franchises for a period on five years. The reason it did so was so that it could co-produce Chris Nolans’ Interstellar with Paramount.

Many had wondered why two major studios had cosied up for the movie, but it seems it was because Warner was very keen to stay in business with Nolan and Paramount agreed because they got some juicy bonuses on top of the financing.

The fact Paramount and Warner both had stakes in the rights to Friday The 13th and South Park has proved a problem with getting sequels made. Both Paramount and Warner Bros. had to be 50-50 partners on the 2009 Friday the 13th reboot, and the reason that a sequel has not been made yet is largely due to the complicated rights issues. The studios were also partners on 1999’s South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut, since Warner Bros. still retained some film rights to the property from its previous ownership of Comedy Central.

Warner has now given up its rights, but there’s a ticking clock, as they’ve only done so for the next five years, giving Paramount that window to get new movies into production without having to worry about complex negotiations over sharing things with Warner.