The studio added frosting to its New Year's celebration cake by announcing that it had also acquired a 10-percent stake in POW! Entertainment for $2.5 million. POW! is headed by former Marvel president Stan Lee, who created or co-created many of Marvel's iconic superheroes, including Spider-Man, the Fantastic Four, the X-Men, Iron Man, and the Hulk.

Disney, which already had a first-look deal with POW!, acknowledged that it wanted to extend the relationship in order to take advantage of Lee's "knowledge and familiarity of the Marvel universe." The deal was announced on Thursday, three days after Lee's 87th birthday.


/Studio Briefing/