Marvel & Jack Kirby Family Settle Long-Running Legal Dispute

[ExcelsiorPrime]

Thanks for the clarification, Mr. Busiek. The way you put it in layman's terms is appreciated.

Please Post mo' often.

The Fantastic Four, and other golden age characters in the public domain without the copyright law amended= Mind Blown.

[Kurt Busiek]

The Fantastic Four, and other golden age characters in the public domain without the copyright law amended= Mind Blown.

Keep in mind that if copyright hadn't been extended, the FF would still be owned by Marvel until 2017. But yeah, the Marvel Silver Age characters would have gone PD starting in the next few years.

And Cap, the Sub-Mariner, the original Torch and others would be public domain already. So would Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, the Fawcett Captain Marvel, Plastic Man...

kdb

[Darrell D.]

Jack Kirby made his own choices, like cashing in his checks and leaving Marvel to work for DC. Stan stayed at Marvel and helped the company flourish. If Jack had stayed at Marvel he may gotten a better deal overtime but he didn't stay.

How was Marvel/Goodman screwing Kirby and Ditko out of promised royalties 'their' choice?
I guess you could argue that Kirby stayed while Ditko left (the whole 'Goblin was Osborn' story is a convenient fiction, but, no, Ditko left Marvel due to promised royalties), but Kirby had a family. He produced 15+ pages a week to provide for them, and leave them something substantial after he was gone.
So, 20 years after his death, the promised royalties will finally be realized for the creator that nearly single-handedly created the revenue stream for the company.
Justice delayed is still justice served.

[friendly-fire-press]

Does Jack Kirby even get a 'Created by ...' byline for Captain America and Thor? I don't remember seeing any. He definitely should at any rate.

[Coal Tiger]

Does Jack Kirby even get a 'Created by ...' byline for Captain America and Thor? I don't remember seeing any. He definitely should at any rate.

From what I remember, "Captain America created by Joe Simon and Jack Kirby" appears on every Captain America comic.

No one can really claim that they "created" Thor.

[friendly-fire-press]

So my prediction is: All the public changes you see coming out of this are going to be favorable to the Kirbys. Probably the first thing you see will be creator credits. And the family's going to suddenly be financially secure, like their father/grandfather wanted them to be.

kdb

Thank goodness. I certainly hope so.

BTW Thanks for your entire post(s), Kurt. It was very enlightening.

[friendly-fire-press]

From what I remember, "Captain America created by Joe Simon and Jack Kirby" appears on every Captain America comic.

No one can really claim that they "created" Thor.

Okay. Cool. My bad.

[Darrell D.]

From what I remember, "Captain America created by Joe Simon and Jack Kirby" appears on every Captain America comic.

No one can really claim that they "created" Thor.

They created A version of Thor. The design of the costumes, the design of their version of Asgard..all Kirby.
Thor is a public domain character, but their version is trademarked.

[Ya1000]

Thanks to Kurt Busiek for the post. It really clarified everything to me.

[neohuey89]

yeah Kurt Busiek shut it down in my opinion. A lot of misinformation was occurring around here.

[CliffHanger2]

Thanks for the very informative post Kurt Busiek.

[Marvell2100]

Glad to see the Kirby Estate and Marvel come to an agreement that was beneficial to both.

[Sighphi]

Hardly. Big business likes the "lather, rinse, & repeat" MO. Find something that worked once & repeat it ad infinitum. Hollywood does it as easily as you breathe. Comics are no different. Forcing Marvel to do something 100% new would accomplish nothing. They'd just beat that new horse dead instead.

That's the point.
Make something new, by the time the repeat that new dead horse to death i will probably be dead so i wouldn't care.

HAHAHA! Screw the future.

It would be awesome if Marvel and DC allowed creators to own the stories they create. Then you would see some innovation, perhaps.

That makes some sense.
Just grab a standard story and switch some stuff around, you get paid and you get to keep all your ideas.

[Mikekerr3]

Comics should be more like publishing..the writer owns the story and characters, the publisher publishes.

If so major character would be dying off in drove and the last Superman book would have been written decades ago,

[Mikekerr3]

I'm just glad it's finally settled so that tax payers don't have to pay for any more of this nonsense in court.

I am kind of sad it did not go to Couret, since it would have ended many controversies at once, like the definition of different kinds of character rights in different mediums

And What makes a valid court case over real legal principles nonsense?