Biff! Pow! Comic Artists Clash Over Copyrights
Biff! Zap! Pow! Comic book heavyweights clash again over Spawn copyrights in federal court
By TODD RICHMOND
The Associated Press

MADISON, Wis.

Bam! Zap! Whammo! It’s a battle royale between two of the toughest heavyweights in the superhero business. The fate of the world doesn’t hang in the balance, but a lot of money probably does.

Sci-fi writer Neil Gaiman and former Spider-Man artist Todd McFarlane’s attorneys have been sparring for years over Gaiman’s claims to a handful of characters created for McFarlane’s classic Spawn series, which features a murdered CIA agent who becomes a demon.

Now Gaiman insists McFarlane owes him for three more characters — a demon named Dark Ages Spawn and two avenging angels in thong bikinis. A federal judge in Madison has scheduled a Monday hearing to listen to both sides’ arguments.

The long-running case underscores the tension among comic artists as they vie for rights to even minor characters in an industry that has grown more lucrative over the past 20 years through movies, graphic novels and international distribution.

Comic book sales totaled about $429 million last year, up from $360 million to $400 million in 1996, according to estimates by The Comics Chronicles, which compiles comic sales data. The Batman movie sequel “The Dark Knight” has grossed over $1 billion worldwide since it was released in 2008, according to Box Office Mojo.

Spawn isn’t nearly as popular as Batman or Spider-Man, but the series has been fairly successful with action figures, an Emmy-winning HBO series and a 1997 movie that grossed $87 million worldwide. A sequel is in development, according to Image Comics’ Web site.

Gaiman’s attorneys said Gaiman plans to donate any money that comes out of the case to charity. The lawsuit for him is more about establishing clear guidelines for other comic book creators about their rights to characters, they said.

“Our view is McFarlane just took some of the characters Neil was a co-creator of and just gave them different names,” said Gaiman’s attorney, Allen Arntsen. “It’s a matter of principle.”

McFarlane’s lead attorney, James Alex Grimsley, didn’t return several messages seeking comment. In court filings, though, McFarlane’s legal team denied Gaiman has any right to the three additional characters, arguing they’re based on ideas from the Spawn universe, not other characters.

McFarlane created Spawn in 1992 for a startup comic book company, Image Comics. Gaiman and McFarlane collaborated on early Spawn stories. In 2002, Gaiman sued McFarlane in federal court, arguing he was a co-copyright owner of supporting characters Medieval Spawn, a demon similar to Spawn; Angela, a red-haired angel; and Cogliostro, a one-time Spawn ally.

A jury found in Gaiman’s favor later that year. He and McFarlane have spent the past eight years figuring out how much money the three characters have generated and how much Gaiman deserves. A number has yet to emerge.

Gaiman filed a motion in March claiming the demon Dark Ages Spawn and two more angels, Tiffany and Domina, were derived from Medieval Spawn and Angela. They should be figured into the accounting, too, he argued.

Gaiman contends Medieval Spawn and Dark Ages Spawn both wear metal helmets, carry shields and help the defenseless. Tiffany, Domina and Angela, meanwhile, all have long hair and wear armored bras and thong bikinis.

“There’s certainly historical examples of minor characters becoming major breadwinners,” said Mark Zaid, founder and marketing director of the Comic Book Collecting Association. “Characters start off in a cameo and, to put a pun on it, spawn into something bigger. … When you succeed, you can hit the lotto.”

McFarlane’s attorneys counter that while Dark Ages Spawn, Tiffany and Domina have “superficial qualities” similar to other characters, but they have unique personalities and express broad concepts in the Spawn story, including the ideas that demons walked the earth throughout time and God created an angel army to battle them.

Gaiman, who lives in northwestern Wisconsin near the Twin Cities, worked on the “Sandman” comic book series. His novels include “American Gods,” “Coraline” and “The Graveyard Book,” which won the John Newberry Medal.

McFarlane illustrated a number of big-time superheroes, including Batman and Spider-Man, before co-founding Image Comics. He also manufactures action figures and made headlines in 1999 when he paid $3 million for the baseball Mark McGuire hit for his then-record 70th home run in a season.

McFarlane told The Associated Press in a phone interview he thinks Gaiman is a “good man.”

“We just sort of hit a crossroads in the piece of the puzzle in our relationship,” he said, choosing his words carefully. “I don’t begrudge anybody from taking a strong position if they think something isn’t quite right. I try not to get overly worked up about it. Somebody smarter than all of us will tell us where this all will land.”

Copyright 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

Copyright © 2010 ABC News Internet Ventures

Original article: http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/Media/wireStory?id=10902790

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Unfortunately, the famous Megan Fox Supergirl poster is just another Photoshop fake that makes us wish our girlfriends would wear a Supergirl costume for us.

Megan Fox has also been rumored to play Wonder Woman, complete with a set of photoshopped photos and even a  website.

Even though it’s fake, who couldn’t appreciate this piece of art?

See link below this image for a 2500 x 3500 poster size digital image

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Disney To Purchase Marvel

Disney has agreed to acquire Marvel and it’s extensive portfolio of over 5,000 characters.

Under the terms of the agreement and based on the closing price of Disney on August 28, 2009, Marvel shareholders would receive a total of $30 per share in cash plus approximately 0.745 Disney shares for each Marvel share they own. At closing, the amount of cash and stock will be adjusted if necessary so that the total value of the Disney stock issued as merger consideration based on its trading value at that time is not less than 40% of the total merger consideration.

Based on the closing price of Disney stock on Friday, August 28, the transaction value is $50 per Marvel share or approximately $4 billion.

Click here to see the Marvel press release.

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Back by popular demand, the Supergirl Kotobukiya Statue has been re-released.

Manufactured again to meet popular demand, this is one super girl! Sure, your cousin may be hot, but can she fly or stop a speeding bullet? From the hyper-creative minds at Kotobukiya, comes this dazzling, exquisitely crafted Supergirl Vinyl Statue. This sexy superheroine stands approximately 10-inches tall and is packaged in a 4-color window box. But she won’t be cooped up in there for long. You’ll want her out where she can drive you to leap tall buildings in a single bound!

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Superman Comic #1 Sells For $24,950 with Buy It Now on eBay

From the eBay auction:

One of the biggest and brightest of all comics collectibles, a holy grail for most.  This is an original copy of Superman Comics #1 from 1939.  Actually, there is no number on the indicia, as DC comics was reportedly not certain the book would sell enough to make a series.  But sales exceeded their expectations.  The series went on to a second issue and continues to this day.  It’s one of the very, very few comics titles that has continued from the golden age to today.   Only Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman stayed in publication from the golden age to the present day, and, of course, Superman was the first.

This is a very attractive lower-grade issue that has had minimal professional work:  to clean it, removing tape from the spine, and to seal tears with archival tape.  As you can see, there has been no attempt to mask the tears, only to seal them.  We’ve had quotes from restorers that this copy could be made to appear extremely nice with relatively little work or expense (just under a thousand dollars).   We decided to leave that to the next one who can decide on their own.

The interior pages of this iconic and world-famous comic book are very solid, with supple and off-white paper.  The stories include the origin of Superman:  how, as an infant, he was sent from the planet Krypton by his parents, to live on Earth, where his powers would be far beyond that of ordinary people.   That story, of course, is almost as well known as Superman himself.

Superman was an instant sensation, read the world over, and quickly transformed into a multi-media star, appearing not only in comics, but also toys and novels, radio and movies (in cartoons as well as live action).   His success sparked a flood of costumed superheroes who dominated culture during the “Golden Age” of comics and beyond.   When almost all other comic heroes disappeared in the 1950s, Superman not only survived but thrived as the star of an immensely popular film and television series.  His success continued strong through the “silver age” of comics with reruns of the TV show, more comics and toys, and even a Broadway play.   A new film series was a massive hit in the 1970s and 80s with several more blockbuster films.   The story of his “death” and resurrection made headlines for months in the 1990s, and in the new century he’s come back to the big screen yet again, with “Superman Returns” and another film in development.

Comics superheroes dominate the cultural landscape today as much as, if not more than, they did during World War II.  Superman is easily among the most beloved, as well as being the first, and the most enduring, of all.

There have never been enough copies of Superman #1 to feed the demand of collectors who would like to have, and to invest in, an incredible piece of cultural history.  That has never been more clear than in recent years, when the supply has dwindled to the point where even mid-grade copies in very good condition have sold for more than a hundred thousand.

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