A Partnership Built Around One Superhero Universe
Lee Baker and Marco Derhy have spent years working together to develop and advance Stan Lee’s LEGION OF 5, strengthening the franchise creatively, strategically, technologically, and commercially. Their partnership reaches across feature film, video games, interactive entertainment, and AI-assisted filmmaking through PARALIGHT Studios and Legion Digital Studios.
Both serve as the project’s main producers and partners across the franchise’s broader development, each bringing distinct and complementary strengths. Baker is the screenwriter and director of the film, Founder and CEO of PARALIGHT, and Co-Founder of Legion Digital Studios. Derhy is a producer and partner on the project and Co-Founder of Legion Digital Studios alongside Baker.
Baker leads on screenwriting, direction, visual development, and filmmaking technology. Derhy contributes hands-on production, production packaging, financing relationships, distribution strategy, strategic partnerships, casting relationships, business development, and international outreach. Their combined work has moved the property toward the next phase of the LEGION OF 5 universe.
Preserving Stan Lee’s Creative Legacy
LEGION OF 5 originated with Stan Lee, who created the intellectual property and characters during the property’s early development with POW! Entertainment. His original creative attribution remains central to the project’s identity.
The property was publicly announced in April 2008, when Stan Lee and POW! Entertainment, together with Brighton Partners, joined Rainmaker Entertainment to develop LEGION OF 5 as a CG-animated superhero property. The vision was cross-platform from the start, reaching into film, comics, games, merchandising, and digital releases. In the original announcement, Stan Lee described the group as his newest set of superheroes and said he was excited to bring them to audiences.
Baker became involved after Brighton Partners approached his former company, Sandman Studios Entertainment, to contribute artwork and visual effects. He and his team kept working on the property as it evolved, and he later wrote the screenplay and became attached as director.
According to the franchise’s published rights history and legal disclosure, Baker’s Stormlight Entertainment, LLC assumed Brighton Partners’ contractual position in 2015. That disclosure states the property is currently owned 50 percent by Stormlight Entertainment, LLC and 50 percent by Stan Lee’s POW! Entertainment, Inc., with the two companies jointly determining the timing for moving the project forward. The transaction transferred responsibility, not authorship. Stan Lee remains credited as the creator of the characters and story, and Baker as the screenwriter and director.
A Universe Larger Than One Film
Stan Lee’s LEGION OF 5 follows five young heroes who unexpectedly receive extraordinary abilities and must learn to work together against a super-powered threat while facing personal challenges of their own.
The broader strategy envisions a connected entertainment universe spanning feature films, potential sequels and episodic content, animation, video games, licensing, merchandising, digital storytelling, and immersive experiences. Among these initiatives is LEGION CHAMPIONS, a video game concept set within the same universe and designed to extend the property beyond the feature film.
Legion Digital Studios, LLC, co-founded by Lee Baker and Marco Derhy, gives the franchise a dedicated production and business structure for developing film and television projects while exploring gaming and other areas of entertainment, supported by PARALIGHT AI technology.
This multi-format approach reflects how Baker has worked throughout his career. A story, in his view, is not confined to one screen or one medium. It can begin in prose, become concept art, move into film, continue through a game, and grow through the participation of a global audience.
PARALIGHT and Human-Centered AI Filmmaking
Baker is the Founder and CEO of PARALIGHT, a patent-pending, AI-powered filmmaking platform built to help creators move from written concepts toward visual production inside one connected creative environment. The platform supports screenwriting, character development, scene development, shot planning, storyboarding, visual generation, dialogue, and other production functions.
The idea grew out of a problem Baker had watched storytellers face for years. Writing an idea is one challenge. Producing it at a cinematic level is another, and traditional production can require heavy financing, specialized teams, complex scheduling, physical locations, and long development periods before audiences see a finished frame.
At the center of the platform’s philosophy sits a human-centered approach. PARALIGHT is designed to support actors, writers, directors, producers, and visual effects professionals rather than replace human creativity, artistic judgment, or performance. A tool can generate an environment, organize a sequence, or visualize a character, but a human still decides what a story means and what an audience should feel. In March 2026, Baker described PARALIGHT as “a fundamental shift in how stories are brought to life.”
A concept trailer for Stan Lee’s LEGION OF 5 was produced using the platform, showing how AI-assisted tools can support visualization and development while human creators remain responsible for story, performance, direction, and tone.
What Comes Next for the LEGION
The road for LEGION OF 5 has not run straight from announcement to production. Its financing structure changed, and the project passed through a long stretch in which ownership and the path forward had to be resolved. Through those years, Baker kept developing concept art with artists working under his direction, invested additional time and resources, and wrote the screenplay that would carry Stan Lee’s characters into a live-action story.
For Derhy, that persistence is part of what made the partnership work. Baker continued the work when the path was anything but clear, and both partners now see the universe taking shape rather than waiting as an idea. Stan Lee imagined the heroes. Baker and Derhy are working to bring their world to audiences across film, games, and new production technology.
About Lee Baker
Lee Baker is a filmmaker, screenwriter, author, visual effects executive, and technology entrepreneur whose career spans filmmaking, visual effects, animation, interactive media, video games, education, and technology development. He earned a degree in English from the University of Utah and taught writing, educational technology, and digital video editing through institutions including UCLA Extension, Loyola Marymount University, the University of Utah, and the Utah Education Network.
He previously owned and led Sandman Studios Entertainment, a visual effects, animation, and interactive media company. The studio contributed to Disney’s 2009 feature Race to Witch Mountain and worked on television productions and interactive games connected to a range of well-known properties. Baker is also an author, with credits including the science-fiction novel Speed of Light, the illustrated family book Humbug: A Christmas Carol, and Beau and the Beanstalk, a retelling of the fairy tale from the giant’s perspective. In a 2011 interview, Larry King called Speed of Light “a terrific read” and described Baker as a “master storyteller.”
About Marco Derhy
Marco Derhy is a Beverly Hills-based entrepreneur, film producer, author, philanthropist, and Founder and CEO of Derhy Enterprises, Inc. He brings decades of entrepreneurial leadership, film production, business development, financing, marketing, and international experience to the partnership.
After his military service, Derhy moved to Los Angeles and launched a private-label fashion company in his early twenties, growing the business into one of the industry leaders and later reported that the business generated more than $50 million in annual sales. He later expanded into film production and distribution, real estate development, emerging technologies, international business development, and humanitarian work. Over his career, he has worked and negotiated with influential figures across entertainment and business, including producer Robert Evans and former Viacom chairman Sumner Redstone. He now brings that experience to the continuing development and global expansion of the LEGION OF 5 universe.
Creative Credit and Rights Disclosure
Stan Lee is credited as creator of the LEGION OF 5 intellectual property and characters.
To read the full interview: visit the source of this article.
STAN LEE’S LEGION OF 5
Paralight Studios | Legion Digital Studios
