moriarty@fluke.UUCP (The Napoleon of Crime) (01/23/86)
In article <11487@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU> cc-30@cory.UUCP (Kathy Li c/o Sean "Yoda" Rouse) writes: > > Heard an idea about why Marvel/Shooter is suddenly going to be pushing >out a whole new universe with lots of new characters--it seems Kirby has a good >chance of getting the rights to his characters, possibly leaving Marvel with >nothing but Spiderman (unless Ditko sues). > Any thoughts on this? I'd love to hear. I read this "New Universe" (a "seperate but equal" universe :-) ) in CBG, and this is truly one of the most interesting topics to come up in a while. No, not the universe itself; the causes for creating it. Kathy's suggestion is interesting; I don't know how legally sound Kirby's claims are to the characters (morally, I think he's what Mr. A would call "without a speck of black"), but it is an interesting proposition. However, if Kirby were to win, which characters would he take with him? First, CBG said that only Kirby was going after character rights (and that Marvel is saying that this voids his rights to the original artwork -- the shitheels!); Stan says he doesn't want to pursue it, and Ditko signed the rights away a couple of years ago. So basically this means FF, Silver Surfer, Inhumans, scads of villains, the Avengers(?), Thor(?), and many others would go. Still, not the entire Marvel Universe (I don't think the X-Men would leave -- that was Lee and someone else). Also, how many issues of a comic would Kirby have had to do to get rights? Does he have to be the "creator" (issue #1)? In that case, he really does have the majority of the old-liners, especially Captain America. I suspect that Marvel has more confidence in their lawyers than that; the New Universe is probably started up for an alternate reason (next paragraph). Ironically, if Kirby can't get the characters to leave Marvel, he may end up getting the big talent to do so. C'mon, Archie, Chris, Louise and Walt and Peter -- get outta there! What I suspect (and I'll need some confirmation from someone who understands the business theory of comics better) is this: Marvel is in a much better area to flood the market with a gross amount of Marvel titles. Since comic dealers can get just so many comics, and because of the preponderance of pre-teen and adolescent Marvel Zombies out there, who will buy anything with a Marvel label, they feel they might be able to capture a larger share of the market. Ethically, I can't see anything wrong with this (just enlarging your market); as a comics lover, the outflow of new material which will almost certainly be mostly crap (looking at Marvel's current crap/gold ratio for their titles), and probably almost all merchandising-supported... Hey, wait! Why don't they make the new Universe made up completely of MARKETING CHARACTERS!? G.I. Schmoe, The Care Bears, He-Man, etc. Get 'em outta here... > >p.s. Is it true that it's an official policy of Shooter's that NO negative > letters are to be printed in Marvel comics? I doubt it. It depends on the comic -- I've seen plenty of negative comments in some mags. The poorer ones, though, seem to get more of the "gee-whiz-gosh-wowee" letters with no critical content, i.e. they ain't much fun to read. But I suspect this is due to not many people writing about these comics (or the fact that many can't write :-) ). "When are you BUTTHEADS gonna learn that you can't oppose Gestapo tactics WITH Gestapo tactics?" -Reuben Flagg Moriarty, aka Jeff Meyer ARPA: fluke!moriarty@uw-beaver.ARPA UUCP: {uw-beaver, sun, allegra, sb6, lbl-csam}!fluke!moriarty <*> DISCLAIMER: Do what you want with me, but leave my employers alone! <*>