Tag: lawsuits

Marvel responds to Jack Kirby heirs copyright claims

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Q: What do Superman and Spider-Man have in common?

A: The heirs to the comics creators’ estates are suing to regain control of the copyright, which may put the production of any movies into doubt.

Similar to how earlier in 2009, the heirs to the estates of Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster sued to regain some part of the millions that were earned from Superman Returns‘s worldwide box office receipts, the heirs to Jack Kirby’s estate are seeking to terminate the hold that several companies have on the copyright to Spider-Man, the X-Men, and several other character that were created by Kirby during the Silver Age of comics.

Among the companies that were told that the rights would soon be reverting to the estate are Walt Disney Pictures, 20th Century Fox, Universal Pictures, Paramount Pictures, and Sony Pictures, each of whom have a great interest in making sure that they only have to pay Marvel Comics for the use of the characters in their big screen adventures.

Marvel responded last Friday by filing a lawsuit against the Kirby heirs stating that because Kirby’s work on the characters was under a “for hire” contract, his claim to the characters is invalid, according to many sources (but I’m using Digital Spy.com and Newser.com‘s accounts).

Marvel attorney John Turitzin commented on the Kirby heirs actions, stating that the heirs were trying “to rewrite the history of Kirby’s relationship with Marvel” and that “Everything about Kirby’s relationship with Marvel shows that his contributions were works made for hire and that all the copyright interests in them belong to Marvel.”

Marc Toberoff, also the attorney for the Siegel and Shuster heirs, responded:

The truth is that Jack Kirby was his own man. Like so many artists in the fledgling comic book industry of the late 1950s/early 1960s, Kirby worked with Marvel out of his own house as a freelancer with no employment contract, no financial or other security, nor any other indicia of employment.

Kirby’s wonderful creations, which leapt from the page, were not Marvel’s ‘assignments’, but were instead authored by Kirby under his own steam and then published by Marvel. It was not until 1972 that Kirby by contract granted Marvel the copyrights to his works. It is to this grant that the Kirby family’s statutory notices of termination apply.

What some are saying prompted the Kirby heirs to action was a recent change to the copyright laws which allows more avenues towards people regaining the rights to their work, but I have not been successful in seeking out the exact verbiage of the changes. If that’s true, then I really hope that they are able to get some control back.

However, unlike Siegel and Shuster’s situation, Stan Lee was also very much a part of the Silver Age character creation due to his employ of what became known as “the Marvel method” and since Lee has yet to make an official statement about the events, fan perception of how this all goes down could be split.

We’ll be bringing more news to you, as it happens.

Superman heirs have their day in court… and lose

Posted on by admin 9 Comments on Superman heirs have their day in court… and lose

supermanreturnsYesterday, Variety reported on the outcome of the ongoing legal troubles between Warner Bros., DC Comics, and the heirs of Superman creators Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster and it doesn’t look good for them.

U.S. District Court judge Stephen G. Larson found that the licensing fees paid by the studio to the comics company for the rights in order to make Superman Returns were indeed of a fair market value and not indicative of a “sweetheart” deal. As thus, Joanne Siegel and Laura Siegel Larson are only entitled to their share of the $13.6 million that DC earned from the sale of the rights rather than any portion of the $391 million that the studio grossed worldwide for the film.

The companies released a joint statement, quoted in the article:

“DC Comics and Warner Bros. Entertainment are very gratified by the court’s thorough and well-reasoned decision in this matter,” the companies said in a joint statement. “The decision validates what DC and Warner Bros. have maintained from the beginning, which is that when they do business with each other, they always strive for—and achieve—fair market value in their transactions. We are very pleased that the court found there was no merit to plaintiffs’ position that the Superman deals were unfair to DC Comics and, by extension, the plaintiffs.”

However, there’s a second component to the case which will take place on December 1, when Larson will take a stab at figuring out exactly how much in profits the women will get from an earlier ruling which gave them half the copyright to the character, as well as an additional part will actually have an impact on when another Superman movie will be made.

According to Marc Toberoff, the attorney for Siegel and Siegel Larson, by 2013 they and the heirs of Joe Shuster will own the entire copyright to the character, which means that if a movie doesn’t get made or start production before then, Warner Bros. will have to deal with them in order to do it and not their sister company DC Comics.

Toberoff also asserted the the court

found that Warner Bros. should have paid three to four times the amount actually paid for the Superman film rights and that [it] had found it ‘inequitable’ that DC transferred the Superman film rights to Warner Bros. without the standard term providing for reversion for lack of ongoing exploitation.

As a result, the court ruled that (according to Toberoff) “if Warner Bros. does not start production on another Superman film by 2011, the Siegels will be able to sue to recover their damages.” Warner Bros. chairman Alan Horn testified during the trial that the property wasn’t currently under development and that the earliest another picture could possibly be released would be 2012.