I really hate to push the wedding analogy too far,

but I think it explains heaps about the current Narnia situation. In reference to the questions you ask:
1: @ Anhun: a.)
They didn't even hold the rights.
Does it really matter who held the rights? In the case of PC, Walden and the CS Lewis estate were prepared to go ahead with VDT, then Disney pulled out, leaving them to scrabble around for another firm to officiate at the wedding party.
2. @ Anhun: b.)
Walden and Fox were collaborating on VDT a mere month later?This is where the wedding analogy comes into its own. OK, Disney ran off and Fox, like a sympathetic best man, stepped in to rescue the jilted bride. And so we got a VDT movie, like it or not.
A lot depends on which firm does what in a movie production. For the purposes of MN, I see Walden, in particular, as the blushing bride,

with the C.S.Lewis as a kind of nagging prospective father-in-law.

The real trouble I have is this question: How does the likes of Fox, Warner Brothers, Walt Disney and Paramount get such prominence, not by holding the rights to a movie, but by handling the distribution? You were talking about Walden and
Journey to the Centre of the Earth. Yes, when it was pointed out to me, Walden did have something to do with the production of this movie, but it is Warner/New Line which gets all the credit, not Walden.
I know that Fox did the marketing for VDT and it was Fox who supplied the $100,000,000 for that purpose. When the 3D DVD edition is released in America on August 30th, the logo of Fox will be on the marketed product, not Disney. Walden will be mentioned, but as an aside, not in first place.
I keep wondeing about the production costs. How much input did Fox have in those arrangements?