Marvel Finally One Big Happy Family

nweathington

The Kirby Estate and Marvel have finally come to a settlement. The war is over. Now people can either cheer for the Kirbys, or stop complaining about how greedy they are, depending on what camp they’re in.

Hex

I'de love to know the details of that settlement (not that it is any of my business).

mwhitt80

I'm just glad they were able to get something resolved. It was an ugly story for both parties.

David_D

Wow.

That is a hell of a thing.

And, nice for there to be closure on it, for those of us that might not fall easily into one camp or the other. I know I have never known the whole story, but the whole thing made me uneasy. Especially as mountain after mountain of money keeps being made on these creations.

I am also glad this happened in Lee's lifetime, so that when it is time to talk about his legacy, there is perhaps less of a tarnish then there would be if there was still an ongoing legal battle, you know what I mean?

Simply put-- glad to hear this.

David_D

(One Happy Family Camera now cuts to a not-so-happy-looking Weird Uncle Steve Ditko. . .)

CaptShazam

I am glad it is settled and hopefully done forever.

Hopefully this was a true "settlement" in which the family was paid extremely well and Disney/Marvel put in a "you cannot sue us ever again about this" clause.

David_D

I'm sure there is a lot of analysis and speculation breaking out all over. Kurt Busiek, who I always find to be very wise and articulate in his takes on, well, everything about comics, had this initial thought in a comment over at The Beat:

Considering that the Kirby Estate didn’t seem to have anything to lose by going to the Supreme Court, but Marvel/Disney had a lot on the line, I’m thinking (or hoping, at least) that this was a decent settlement for the Estate. Given the timing — if the Supreme Court had chosen to hear the case, no settlement would then be possible — it virtually has to be a deal spurred on by the side that doesn’t want the case to go to the Court.

However unlikely onlookers think it might be that the Court would take up the case, and however corporate-friendly the Court may seem to be, the stakes are very high, and a settlement may have seemed a better plan than rolling the dice.

In any case, I hope it’s a good and happy outcome for both sides. If the Kirby Estate gets a share of the wealth Kirby helped Marvel earn, and Marvel gets out from under the negative publicity of having one of the three major architects of the Marvel Universe cut out its success (the third, Ditko, still doesn’t get a share, but he’s aggressively quiet about it), then that would seem like a win-win.

pfinnegan

Thanks for the quote from Busiek. Seems to sum it up nicely.

nweathington

I think Kurt’s assessment is spot on, though I would add that part of Disney/Marvel’s motivation to settle was likely to avoid the type of attention a possible Supreme Court hearing would generate—win or lose. Let’s face it, for all the Marvel movie-goers who know who Stan Lee is, there probably is a large percentage who don’t know Jack. (See what I did there?) Now Disney can turn a potential negative reaction into a love-in for this other guy who helped create all these cool characters.

SolitaireRose

David_D said:

(One Happy Family Camera now cuts to a not-so-happy-looking Weird Uncle Steve Ditko. . .)

Ditko has been offered money more than once by Marvel, and he rejects it by saying that he was paid for the pages he produced. He’s VERY much into the “Objectivist” philosophy and lives his life by it. If you read his current self-published stuff he talks a lot about how he feels someone should get paid for what they agreed to and nothing more or less. This is a different stance from the reason he supposedly left Marvel, which was that Martin Goodman didn’t follow through on a promise to cut him in on merchandising rights.

random73

SolitaireRose said:

David_D said:

(One Happy Family Camera now cuts to a not-so-happy-looking Weird Uncle Steve Ditko. . .)

Ditko has been offered money more than once by Marvel, and he rejects it by saying that he was paid for the pages he produced. He’s VERY much into the “Objectivist” philosophy and lives his life by it. If you read his current self-published stuff he talks a lot about how he feels someone should get paid for what they agreed to and nothing more or less. This is a different stance from the reason he supposedly left Marvel, which was that Martin Goodman didn’t follow through on a promise to cut him in on merchandising rights.

nursing from the Ayn Rand teat, eh?

random73

well, gotta admire a man that takes philosophy seriously, even if it is to his detriment.

SolitaireRose

Yep. Not to get too far off topic, but Ditko was actually consulted at one point in doing comic book adaptations of her novels. If you read his late 60’s stuff like The Question, Mr. A and even Hawk and Dove, he railed against the idea that there were moral shades of gray, spoke about “makers and takers.”

He has refused to do some art jobs due to the characters not fitting with his philosophical beliefs (early in discussions, Ditko has always been good about doing what he is contracted to do). I couldn’t disagree with him more, but I admire that he lives his life by his beliefs.

Back ON topic: I’m very happy about this settlement, and I’m guessing Disney wanted it to go away, rather than have work-for-hire agreements up for grabs in front of the Supreme Court…but there was no indication if the court would take the case or not. Kirby’s fondest wish and greatest fear through his life were all about his family being taken care of, and hopefully, this means his wishes are being carried out. At the end of the day, without Kirby, I have no doubt there wouldn’t be comic books after the early 70’s…so we all owe him a debt. This is a nice down payment on that.

random73

SolitaireRose said:

Yep. Not to get too far off topic, but Ditko was actually consulted at one point in doing comic book adaptations of her novels. If you read his late 60’s stuff like The Question, Mr. A and even Hawk and Dove, he railed against the idea that there were moral shades of gray, spoke about “makers and takers.”

He has refused to do some art jobs due to the characters not fitting with his philosophical beliefs (early in discussions, Ditko has always been good about doing what he is contracted to do). I couldn’t disagree with him more, but I admire that he lives his life by his beliefs.

sticking to his guns.

AxelBrass

Hopefully all of this is finally put to rest. I love Marvel. I love Jack. I love Stan. Heck, I even like Disney. Hopefully everyone is satisfied and everyone can move on.

David_D

Kurt Busiek has continued to drop knowledge on the subject. Find more here.

WetRats

David_D said:

Kurt Busiek has continued to drop knowledge on the subject. Find more here.

Gotta love The Buze.

dubbat138

Glad to see this was settled. Now I hope they start giving Kirby and Ditko screen credit on the right films.

SolitaireRose

dubbat138 said:

Glad to see this was settled. Now I hope they start giving Kirby and Ditko screen credit on the right films.

Kirby gets a credit on SHIELD now…I wonder if Disney will do it with the other stuff retroactively. In a perfect world, anyone who contributed to the stuff on the screen would get a credit and a check. DC used to do that when Paul Levitz was in charge, but that practice left when he did, as has a lot of the humanity that the company showed in the 80’s and 90’s. More’s the pity.

Ditko doesn’t want it. He probably would like you to support his Kickstarter, however, which I find interesting that his publisher would turn to that knowing how he feels about people paying for things that aren’t completed yet.

nweathington

SolitaireRose said:

He probably would like you to support his Kickstarter, however, which I find interesting that his publisher would turn to that knowing how he feels about people paying for things that aren’t completed yet.

From what the Kickstarter says, the book's already finished with the exception of adding an “Honor Roll” page. They're just wanting to be able to pay the printing bill up front.

David_D

nweathington said:

SolitaireRose said:

He probably would like you to support his Kickstarter, however, which I find interesting that his publisher would turn to that knowing how he feels about people paying for things that aren’t completed yet.

From what the Kickstarter says, the book's already finished with the exception of adding an “Honor Roll” page. They're just wanting to be able to pay the printing bill up front.

I bet Ayn Rand would *love* Kickstarter.

SolitaireRose

David_D said:

nweathington said:

SolitaireRose said:

He probably would like you to support his Kickstarter, however, which I find interesting that his publisher would turn to that knowing how he feels about people paying for things that aren’t completed yet.

From what the Kickstarter says, the book's already finished with the exception of adding an “Honor Roll” page. They're just wanting to be able to pay the printing bill up front.

I bet Ayn Rand would *love* Kickstarter.

When you understand that “A is A”, you will then “B all you can B” and only then will you be able to “C".

TheOriginalGMan

A couple of interesting items on the settlement from Bleeding Cool:

http://www.bleedingcool.com/2014/10/30/what-a-difference-a-court-case-makes-to-marvel-comics-credits/

1) Bleeding Cool indicates the settlement was "a mid eight-figure sum, which we estimate from between $30 million and $50 million."

2) Several Marvel books are now being billed as "Created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby"