check the website address out:

http://www.portfolio.com/culture-li...7/Time-Warner-Superman-Suit/?TID=drudge#

Even though DC are no longer using Superboy...now the S family is adding Superman to the list - *groan* who'll be next? Supergirl? Batman?

I am surprised that Capt America, Fantastic Four, Spider Man, Hulk all are untouchables.

I fear the DC company if they lose Superman and maybe next one - Batman. :worried:

Looks like we could blame it all on Sonny Bono.

I want DC to publish Superboy stories too, but I can't help but feel a tremendous amount of empathy to the Siegel family.

But FC, I think any amount of blame we put on poor Sonny needs to be shared with Cher. Once she put her little hand in his, ain't no mountain they couldn't climb.

Honestly, if it weren't for the fact that ownership of Superman wouldn't come with ownership of all of the trademarks, supporting cast, etc., of Superman, I would actually prefer to see DC lose control of Superman.

How did all this start? It's not a new thing. I remember talks about "DC losing Superman" etc since the 90s. It even made the news here in Greece back then, along with the "Death" of Superman thing.

while the creatr-rights advocate in me sees the logic of the Siegel suit, at the same time I can see this snowballing to the point where comics universes as we have known them could be completely unwoven.

I have mixed feelings, but not mixed enough to side with a corporate goliath over a creator.

These things always cause mixed emotions for me, too... I'm FOR the creators getting a share of what they created, really. But... well, she IS already getting paid $135,000 a year plus insurance.

How many years would a regular person have to work to equal that? A lot. I know I could darn sure live very nicely on $135,000 a year.

When does this cross the line from what's fair to plain old greed?

Believing this to be a good thing, I have no problem siding with the creators...

IIRC, a few the family of Joe Simon was considering legal action to get the rights to Captain America.

If this was a matter of Siegel and Shuster never having gotten compensation for their creation of Superman, that would be one thing. But they did get compensation and recognition, finally, even if the amount wasn't that great at first.

From what I read of this article, this isn't about creators' compensation. This is a lawyer setting up a lawsuit against a company, getting settlement money from them, and then going back to the company and demanding more money atop the settlement money if the company still wishes to publish that character/series.

I know that "double jeopardy" keeps a person from being put on trial twice for the same crime. But isn't this an attempt to do the same thing by making the company pay twice to keep publishing a character?

While I do feel some concern for the comics creators, I cannot support Marc Toberoff's tactics -- or truly respect those who would resort to them.

Good point. The more I think on it, maybe it is time to shake things up in a mjaor way. I've long been tired of mega-x-overs and ridiculous amounts of continuity (i.e. the Hulk farts in his series; the FF hear it in theirs, and it stops traffic in Amazing Spider-Man). But I would miss some of the inter-linkages; things like a 40s-era JSA could become impossible if all the characters of that age reverted to creators.

"When does this cross the line from what's fair to plain old greed? "

When corporate huckster lawyers get involved.

Don't get me wrong, Siegal and Shuster should have been treated much, much better. And i have absolutely no problem with them being treated better now, but the lawyer doesn't give a rats patootie about the clients he hunts up. And he doesn't give a tinkers damn about what fans will lose out on as long as his slimy lawyer hands get money.

Don't kid yourselfs. Its all about money for him. He, and the article, even says so.

Like some of you, I can see both sides. Having designed stuff myself, and been paid copyright for that product, I do empathise with the creators.
But the FAMILIES of the creator? That's taking it a bit far, especially if a settlement has already been reached.
This case suggests nothing but greed and getting money any way you can. For something like Superman, the original intent has developed into something so much more. I'm not a huge Superman fan myself, but I can see how important he is, and a cas/argument like this belittles everything that has been achieved. Doomsday 'killing' Superman is one thing, but would you like to be the person responsible for ACTUALLY killing Superman and getting him pulled from publishing? I certainly wouldn't. But id that because I'm a comic book fan and value him and don't see him as a commodity?

I'd like to think that if I designed something that came to be THAT big and have that big an impact, that would be all the satisfaction I'd need. How COOL would it be able to say that you were a part of all that? So much better than simply being able to say that you have a bucket load of cash because you have a mean spirit.

Well, there's no question that Seigal and Schuster were shafted back in the day. And that was wrong. But Seigel is now dead. He co-created Superman, not his wife and daughter.

So this might be a simplistic view on my part but-why on earth should his widow and daughter get money for something they didn't create? Seigel was entitled to that money *not* them. Yeah, yeah, I know that's not how it works, legally.

But still, this would have much more moral authority (not that that means much legally!)if Seigel were still alive.

At this point, it looks like the widow has dollar signs in her eyes and is out to get as much money as she can get. Plain old human greed. It's ironic that she accuses DC of greed. Looks like she's trying to use the injustice her husband suffered for her own benefit.

Sorry if that offends anyone but that's how it looks to me.

There's probably some big article somewhere, detailing why Siegal and Shuster or any of the old time writers and artist should retain rights to a product created in the employ of another. Did DC "rent" Superman, the renege?

I don't know, which professions, where people employed for another retain rights to their creations as employees of that company. As an engineer, I know I certainly didn't.

If not for DC, would anyone have ever heard of Superman or would he have just been a sketch rotting in a closet somewhere?

What exactly is the line that was crossed by the "corporate huckster lawyers" and why would we presume that the lawyers representing the Siegals are anymore or less in this for less than honorable reasons?

I don't have any problem with the spouse of a creator being compensated for a creation. They must certainly have suffered as well during the many years the company profited off of the creation while the creator didn't.

In the case of DC and Superman, Mrs. Siegel should be compensated for the rest of her life. I also think $135G per year and insurance coverage is fair. Descendants of the Siegel's and greedy lawyers should be removed from the equation.

If Superman was created for the company, and the company did pay for it, the company should have the rights to it, and in return the company is responsible to make fair compensation for this creation, now and forever the creation is in use.

point.

but since the industry relied on a lot of arm-twisting in those days, I cannot say that revisiting the issue using modern creator-eights persepctives is unwarranted - especially since (to the best of my knowledge) DC/National did seem to play some dirty pool to get S&S to sign their rights away.