Neil Gaiman and Todd McFarlane settle...

Above: The cover to SPAWN #9 which introduced Angela, Cagliostro, and Medieval Spawn.

Several news outlets are reporting that Neil Gaiman and Todd McFarlane have finally settled their dispute over Gaiman’s contributions to SPAWN.

The NY Daily News reports:

Fantasy industry giants Neil Gaiman and Todd McFarlane finally called a truce in their long-running legal feud over who owns which characters in the Spawn universe, according to court documents.

Gaiman and McFarlane have been sparring for a little more than a decade over royalties from a handful of characters from the Spawn comic book series. Their attorneys filed a joint notice Friday in federal court in Madison saying they’ve reached a deal.

Jeffrey Simmons, one of Gaiman’s attorneys, said terms of the agreement were confidential. A jury had already found Gaiman a 50 percent owner of content in two Spawn issues and the first three issues of a Spawn spin-off. Simmons said reiterating that declaration would block any appeal.

"This is intended to put an end to the whole thing. It’s fair to say both parties are pleased to have this resolved," Simmons said.

For all of the hub-bub, check out "Neil Gaiman versus Todd McFarlane feud".

Bleeding Cool reporting no Neal Gaiman credit in SPAWN ORIGINS...

Looks like the Neil Gaiman and Todd McFarlane squabbles will continue. Bleeding Cool is reporting that McFarlane is reprinting Gaiman’s story and not giving the writer credit.

I still side with Neil Gaiman on this one. And the courts do, as well. As I’ve said before, it was ruled that both Neil Gaiman and Todd McFarlane share ownership to the characters that were first introduced in SPAWN #9. They include Angela, Cagliostro, and Medieval Spawn.

Marvel’s Marvelman...?

Above: Marvel’s Marvelman by Joe Quesada.

Marvel has swooped in and bought the rights to Marvelman? They own the property? This is a sudden shock. What rights does Marvel think it has to the character? I’m sure we’ll be hearing from Neil Gaiman and Todd McFarlane to see how they fit into all of this. I’m not sure I like the idea (if this ends up being the case) that Marvelman becomes part of the work-made-for-hire monster of Marvel Entertainment.

Marvel reports:

The biggest news of Comic Con International in San Diego was revealed moments ago and jaws are still on the floor-the world-renowned super hero MARVELMAN is now part of the Marvel Comics family! Marvel Comics has purchased the rights to MARVELMAN from creator Mick Anglo and his representatives, finding a home for one of the most sought after heroes in graphic fiction!

More on the Neil Gaiman versus Todd McFarlane feud.

Update: The InterWeb is all-abuzz about this topic.

Mr. Steve Bissette shares his insights, and gives an excellent history on the Marvelman/Miracleman ownership and feud with his "Thoughts on Marvelman: Making Sense of Marvel, Emotiv, Mick Anglo and Marvelman/Miracleman":

Freelancer and Creator Rights activist Al Nickerson has expressed his own misgivings, given Marvel’s poor track record with creator rights — but again, I note that Neil and Bucky have been quietly working with Marvel Comics since the founding of Marvels and Miracles LLC, which was announced six years ago.

Neil Gaiman does some Twitting on the matter:

they bought them from Mick Anglo's representatives. Todd mcfarlane could still sue everyone but I hope he won't.

Bleeding Cool has a bunch of insights and info, as well, with "Marvel To Publish Mick Anglo’s Marvelman - And They Own It":

But recently Emotiv Records in Glasgow, headed by Jon Campbell, claimed that they were now representing Mick Anglo’s interests in the character and some big people got involved. This is worthy of a piece in itself but figures started to include budgets for a movie, as well as all sorts of accoutrements. And then nothing. Silence. Until yesterday afternoon when I started to hear that Marvel had been contacting everyone assosciated with Marvelman. The deal has been done. Marvel have paid a considerable sum to the agents of Mick Anglo to secure the property once and for all. They are ready and confident to beat off any legal challenge from another party.

John Byrne vs. Erik Larsen vs. Neil Gaiman vs. Todd McFarlane...

Above: The cover to SPAWN #9 which introduced Angela, Cagliostro, and Medieval Spawn.

Full disclosure: I am a fan of the works of both John Byrne and Erik Larsen. At least twice, I interviewed John for BACK ISSUE. I met Erik twice.

Initially, I wasn’t going to blog again about the whole Neil Gaiman versus Todd McFarlane feud, but things just became very interesting when Erik Larsen started posting on John Byrne’s message board…

Erik Larsen: "Neil got a far better deal than he would have elsewhere (as promised) and Neil decided that wasn’t enough and the issue has still not been resolved. The other three writers all took the same deal and were perfectly happy with it. You don’t hear people talking about how Dave Sim was ‘screwed’ because Todd McFarlane ‘only’ paid him $100,000 to write a single comic book… Todd has spent millions defending himself against a guy who, at best, co-created a couple characters."

John Byrne: "Imagine how much he would have had to spend if he weren’t a champion of ‘creator’s rights’!!!"

Mr. Steve Bissette clarifies the whole mess and, also, contributes his own insights on the latest rumblings…

Steve Bissette: "The Kings of their respective and venerable fiefdoms have no idea what it’s like for those less fortunate and well-heeled than they (including those freelancers who make every one of their deadlines without fail), but it’s sure bleakly entertaining to hear them talk it up."

Steve Bissette is correct. The difference between Neil Gaiman and the other creators who wrote for SPAWN is that Gaiman created new characters in his story for SPAWN #9. And, I’m sure that Dave Sim would certainly have a problem if Todd McFarlane started saying he owned a piece of Cerebus because the character appeared in SPAWN #10.

As I’ve said before, I don’t think money is the issue here. Unless agreed upon, being given a very large amount of money doesn’t mean that you automatically loss any ownership of your intellectual property.

I did, finally, read through the thread on John Byrne’s message board. It’s mostly a bunch of nonsense. Erik Larsen is defending his defenseless friend. Byrne is being King of his message board, as usual (which is fine, really). But, the main problem with Byrne and Larsen is that they are the type(s) of comic book professionals who have been treated quite nicely by comic book publishers. Yeah, Larsen left Marvel to work on his own creator-owned comic (which was/is great). Byrne was one of (if not "the") hottest creators in the 1980’s. However, until creators, especially those of privilege (as much as that is), talk amongst each other and band together, I don’t see much more improvement for Creator’s Rights in comics. If the big name creators feel like they are treated well by publishers, they aren’t going to be too concerned about anyone else. There’s not going to be much motivation for them to commit to change.

Anyway, as it stands now, the courts have ruled that both Neil Gaiman and Todd McFarlane share equal ownership to the characters that were first introduced in SPAWN #9 which include Angela, Cagliostro, and Medieval Spawn.

PRINCE OF STORIES...

In the mail today, I received my copy of PRINCE OF STORIES: THE MANY WORLDS OF NEIL GAIMAN. Mr. Steve Bissette had the authors sign the book for me (which was awesome). I also have a nice mention in the book for my very small contribution in helping Steve locate some legal documentation between Neil Gaiman and Todd McFarlane (thanks, Steve).

The chapters of the book describing Gaiman’s feud with McFarlane over the rights to Medieval Spawn, Angela, and Cogliostro, as well as the Marvelman/Miracleman mess is very detailed and quite interesting (and frustrating). Some of us debated all of this over at the Creator’s Rights forum…

"Sim, Larsen, and the Neil Gaiman vs. Todd McFarlane feud"

"Sim on Todd's ‘Man of Miracles’"

Erik Larsen: "The whole Neil Gaiman situation I found to be particularly annoying, mostly because the characters Neil "created" were variations on Spawn himself. A female "angel" instead of a male "devil," medieval versions of existing characters, etc. It bothered me that Todd was stupid enough to let somebody "create" these characters and it bothered me that Neil would insist on owning something that he didn’t legitimately create."

Dave Sim: "The Neil Gaiman situation isn’t as cut-and-dried as you’re making it out to be. Neil knew what he was getting into at DC. Sandman is their character and Neil, as a novice scripter, decided he was going to do some interesting things with it and see what happened. Well, what happened turned out to be huge and, from what I understand, DC did the noblesse oblige "right thing" and magnanimously granted Neil greater—and entirely unprecedented—participation in Sandman and other ‘considerations’ in acknowledgement of what had happened. Whatever he got—and, again, none of us knows because it all took place behind closed doors—all he could do was to count himself lucky because he didn’t have a legal leg to stand on and, presumably, he knew it."

Steve Bissette: "That Todd presumed he could retroactively, claim every conceptual property in the respective issue as his and his alone "boggles my mind," Erik. That you and so many others, including Dave, continue to make insinuations about Neil's character and integrity while defending Todd's "boggles my mind." Neil wasn't short-changed -- the deal, as it was represented to Neil, was broken as soon as characters and concepts Neil introduced in his work for Todd began to surface in other comics and media (of course, once Todd dragged Miracleman into the fray as some aspect of the proposed legal settlement, he only further complicated matters, using a character that was never his, that he never had any claim to or creatively contributed a damned thing to, as a bargaining chip). That was NOT the deal, apparently, was it?"



Above: Todd McFarlane’s "Man of Miracles" statue.

Old news: Neil Gaiman versus Todd McFarlane...

My buddy, Steve Bissette, is co-writing a companion book on writer Neil Gaiman. Steve asked me to search for material on the Neil Gaiman versus Todd McFarlane lawsuit. Specifically, Steve was looking for the court’s verdict in the case. I found the court’s decision here. I also came across this interesting article on the Gaiman versus McFarlane battle over the rights to Mircleman titled "WHATEVER HAPPENED TO MIRACLEMAN?".

This whole feud between Neil Gaiman and Todd McFarlane concerning Medieval Spawn, Angela, and Miracleman is such a mess. Although, I am quite interested in how this will affect the comic book community in regards to (comic book) Creator’s Rights.

We have a couple of threads on all of this at the Creator’s Rights forum:

"Sim, Larsen, and the Neil Gaiman vs. Todd McFarlane feud"

"Sim on Todd's ‘Man of Miracles’"


Erik Larsen: "The whole Neil Gaiman situation I found to be particularly annoying, mostly because the characters Neil "created" were variations on Spawn himself. A female "angel" instead of a male "devil," medieval versions of existing characters, etc. It bothered me that Todd was stupid enough to let somebody "create" these characters and it bothered me that Neil would insist on owning something that he didn’t legitimately create."

Dave Sim: "The Neil Gaiman situation isn’t as cut-and-dried as you’re making it out to be. Neil knew what he was getting into at DC. Sandman is their character and Neil, as a novice scripter, decided he was going to do some interesting things with it and see what happened. Well, what happened turned out to be huge and, from what I understand, DC did the noblesse oblige "right thing" and magnanimously granted Neil greater—and entirely unprecedented—participation in Sandman and other ‘considerations’ in acknowledgement of what had happened. Whatever he got—and, again, none of us knows because it all took place behind closed doors—all he could do was to count himself lucky because he didn’t have a legal leg to stand on and, presumably, he knew it."

Steve Bissette: "That Todd presumed he could retroactively, claim every conceptual property in the respective issue as his and his alone "boggles my mind," Erik. That you and so many others, including Dave, continue to make insinuations about Neil's character and integrity while defending Todd's "boggles my mind." Neil wasn't short-changed -- the deal, as it was represented to Neil, was broken as soon as characters and concepts Neil introduced in his work for Todd began to surface in other comics and media (of course, once Todd dragged Miracleman into the fray as some aspect of the proposed legal settlement, he only further complicated matters, using a character that was never his, that he never had any claim to or creatively contributed a damned thing to, as a bargaining chip). That was NOT the deal, apparently, was it?"



Above: Todd McFarlane’s "Man of Miracles" statue.