Ultraverse Characters Question

[Kaine322]

I'm a bit surprised that Disney lawyers have not sorted out this whole "contract problem" issue by now, but the question occurs to me (and hopefully some experienced legal mind can explain it to me):

Isn't there some finite period of time by which Marvel must use the characters in print or they lose the copyrights, something like 17 years?

Thanks in advance for your reply.

PAC

[Hypestyle]

I asked Kurt Busiek recently about the Malibu situation—he responded that he wasn’t in the loop, but knew that there was a non-disclosure agreement, and nobody’s talking. Beyond that, it is known that the original creators of those books are reportedly guaranteed a certain amount of royalties if/when the characters are used. If there’s some kind of “deeper” issue at hand that prevents editorial from using them, again, “those who know don’t tell, and those who tell don’t know..”
Some people have concluded that it’s a simple matter of Disney/Marvel corporate not wanting to pay added royalties for these “fringe” characters. Whatever the reason is, it’s unfortunate that these characters are apparently not even being used for TPB reprints.

[MyriVerse]

I'm a bit surprised that Disney lawyers have not sorted out this whole "contract problem" issue by now, but the question occurs to me (and hopefully some experienced legal mind can explain it to me):

Isn't there some finite period of time by which Marvel must use the characters in print or they lose the copyrights, something like 17 years?

Thanks in advance for your reply.

PAC

Copyrights are not lost for 100 years. Trademarks are what you lose for non-use.

[PaxHouse]

I asked Kurt Busiek recently about the Malibu situation—he responded that he wasn’t in the loop, but knew that there was a non-disclosure agreement, and nobody’s talking. Beyond that, it is known that the original creators of those books are reportedly guaranteed a certain amount of royalties if/when the characters are used. If there’s some kind of “deeper” issue at hand that prevents editorial from using them, again, “those who know don’t tell, and those who tell don’t know..”
Some people have concluded that it’s a simple matter of Disney/Marvel corporate not wanting to pay added royalties for these “fringe” characters. Whatever the reason is, it’s unfortunate that these characters are apparently not even being used for TPB reprints.

That's a shame........especially since these characters could have been utilized within the SECRET WARS Event for Next Summer if at all.

[Kaine322]

Copyrights are not lost for 100 years. Trademarks are what you lose for non-use.

Thanks for clarifying that. So, how long does Marvel have of non-use before they would lose the trademarks to Prime, Night Man, et al?

Thanks in advance.

[Kaine322]

I became curious after the use of the Marvel UK characters earlier this year, with all of them (save for Dark Angel) immediately being shunted back into non-use. As this struck me as an effort by Marvel to protect trademarks and Marvel UK was originally published around the same time as the Ultraverse characters, I wondered if Marvel will take some similar action in the (near) future to protect the Ultraverse copyrights.

Otherwise, Wouldn't these trademarks revert to their respective Ultraverse creators? Or am I totally off-base with such a supposition?

[Tiamatty]

My guess is Marvel simply made the decision, years ago, to not give a shit about the Ultraverse, and Disney has decided to continue that policy of non-shit-giving.

[Michael P]

Losing the trademarks doesn't really mean much, since that just means someone could publish a comic book named Prime, not that they could use Malibu's Prime. (This is like how Marvel can publish its own Captain Marvel comic, but not the original "Shazam" Captain Marvel character.)

The specifics of the Malibu deal and the status of the Ultraverse copyrights are under non-disclosure agreements, so anyone who does know the full skinny isn't going to say. But it's very unlikely the characters will see the light of day anytime soon.