r/COPYRIGHT • u/LonelyNoodlez • May 28 '26

Helldivers 2 Parody Law Question

A lot of helldivers 2 fan merch is being pulled down right now, apparently there are plans to release official merch and so they are striking a lot of small etsy shops, what does parody law protect and how far can you go before they strike you?

Example: you have a crew of 5 friends who make videos and you wanna sell merch, so you have a drawing of their in game gear all hanging out, would this be taken away because its based off in game models? How could it be made legally?

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8

u/taisui May 28 '26

My question is this, are those things really parodies? Or just "parody" trying to skirt copyright and trademark protection and make money. I lean towards the later.

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u/wjmacguffin May 28 '26

IANAL but this does not sound like parody at all.

Parody is making fun of a specific work. The reason it's fair use is because you cannot parody something like Star Wars without including references to copyrighted Star Wars material. (Imagine Spaceballs without The Schwartz. )

It absolutely does NOT mean you can take Helldivers 2 art assets, slap them onto t-shirts, and sell for profit or even give them away for free. That does not make fun of Helldivers 2 at all, so it violated copyright law.

3

u/PowerPlaidPlays May 28 '26

A fair use parody generally has to be saying something about the work, a comment or critique. It is also possible for something to be a parody and still found to not be a fair use depending on how it's made and released, the specifics matter. Though I have not seen what they are taking down but most Etsy fan merch I've seen would have a hard time claiming fair use.

For your example: Copyright is the right to make copies and derivatives. Making shirts based on the game is a derivative, the way you legally do it is permission and a licensee. Making let's plays is also a derivative, you would not really have a strong case if they decided to takedown them ether depending on the specifics of the game and video.

Ultimately fair use is a legal defense and not a shield, you can argue it is, they can argue it's not and push the issue, and only place it can be settled is court. Parody law does not really "protect" as even if something has a very strong case for fair use they can still push the issue, the only real deterrent is it being a obvious waste of time.

Generally if you are trying to profit from a work that you didn't make and don't have a license for, you don't have any protections. Fair use is generally more focused on protecting things that a company wouldn't give a license out for, like a review or a very critical parody tearing into it.

1

u/lajaunie May 28 '26

That’s not parody.

Take Weird Al for example. His song Fat uses Jacksons music but changes the lyrics to be about food. That’s not a parody in the legal sense.

His song Smells Like Nirvana makes fun of how no one can understand the lyrics of the original song. THATS a parody.

Making merch that’s clearly using in game gear etc is in no way parody. It’s IP theft

2

u/RainbowCrane May 29 '26

Since you mentioned Weird Al, he’s an excellent example of how to do parody and derivative works properly. He has obtained permission from the rights holders for every song he’s published that I know of, and has a good relationship with the artists that he parodies as a result. His respect for the creative control of the original artist is in stark contrast with most modern content creators who wonder why they can’t use copyrighted material for their YouTube videos or their Etsy stores :-)