The Miracleman Copyright Saga (Updated And Complete)
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- Опубліковано 21 вер 2024
- An in-depth examination of the publishing history and convoluted copyright battle surrounding the British comic book character, Miracleman, previously known as Marvelman.
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SOURCES:
The Poisoned Chalice series of essays on The Beat.
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Kimota! The Miracleman Companion by George Khoury.
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I also remember hearing at one point somebody tried to sell rights to DC and they went "Lol no."
Which hilariously makes them the most sensible side in the whole mess.
And Dc are ussually the dumb ones lol.
This is a story I'll tell my hypothetical children.
I sit my nonexistent children down and tell them this story again and again.
Unless they’re claimed, due to copyright infringement.
All my children are transformative and used for review purposes. So, they don't infringe on anyone's copyright. :)
@@StrangeBrainParts tell that to their nonexistent mother
Also her nonexistent advocate said she will take the nonexistent dog too
Whenever this story comes up I always imagine a bunch of very serious minded lawyers and business professionals listening to artists talk about handshake deals they made about who really created Medieval Spawn and Zool the World Ender or whatever. It makes me happy.
I have a friend who spent almost five years of her life working on a legal dispute about who owned the rights to a specific design of sex toy. The two litigants eventually settled out of court, but they'd paid well into six digits worth of fees to the law firms involved by that point. Believe me, lawyers do not care how absurd or muddled an argument is as long as they're getting paid.
I wish someone would put together a documentary about Mick Anglo himself. It seems like the contributions made to Marvelman by Moore and Gaiman have over shadowed the original character's legacy and by extension Anglo's aswell. Anglo over the course of his career in UK comics and even Euro comics to a larger degree created an entire fleet of Superman/Captain Marvel composites and pastiches. It is evident that he was always very invested in Captain Marvel. As the further back into his library of work you go, many of his pre-Marvelman and post-Marvelman creations all reference or homage characters and concepts tangentially related to Captain Marvel and the Fawcett pantheon outright. He had one such copycat who went by the name "Master-Man", who aside from borrowing the name from an even earlier Fawcett Superman swipe, had an origin story which was pretty much ripped from the Captain Marvel serial outright. Captain Universe borrowed the entire gimmick outright but swapped sorcery for science. Captain Miracle's magic word was even "El Karim", which was also borrowed from a Fawcett character. Anglo made so many of these Marvel clones that many of them would go onto find new lives through foreign reprints. As far as Im aware Miracleman (the one who transformed by yelling "sun disc" aloud) would see great success in Spain, the Netherlands, and Brazil under new names in each country.
Jack Marvel in Brazil.
@@davideoliveirapinheiro1096 thank you friend, likewise much of brazil's comics history remains woefully underrepresented in comics discourse. the fact that brazillian captain marvel reprints saw release alongside namor and captain america stories is something which continues to fascinate me even now. Like Marvelman it seems only the infamous parts of Brazilian comics gets discussed.
My knowledge of Brazilian comics is woefully inadequate. It seems like an area of history that hasn't been documented to any noticeable degree. I'll try to see what I can see, but I can't promise a video on the topic. It may be my resources don't have that much information.
@@StrangeBrainParts theres a lot of UA-cam channels about brazilian comicbook history, but all of them are brazilians
@Strange Brain Parts I would love to know more about Deodato Sr. All I know is he was apparently quite influential in Brazil. The only bits of his work I have seen are collaboration with his son in a couple of the Mike Deodato Jr. comics Caliber put out in the mid 90s.
Hell yeah. Paid for membership and rewarded a-GAIN. Thanks for this
You're welcome! And thanks for being a member. :)
I think I need to stop watching these Miracleman videos for as good as they all are, I haven't finished reading it in full since I was only able to get my hands on "A Dream of Flying" and I don't want to risk spoiling the whole story because, fuck man "A dream of Flying" was like that good.
No worries. But, for the record, the story in the comics isn't mentioned whatsoever. It won't spoil anything for you.
I bought the Marvel omnibus earlier this year, and it is absolutely worth it! Especially since some of the individual TPBs are starting to fetch higher inflated prices. I think the omni winds up being cheaper, and it’s packed with all kinds of cool extra content.
@𝖔𝖜𝖊𝖓 Agreed. It's well worth owning as the omni features great extras and is able to showcase the art much better than a standard trade.
Alan Davis is the most underrated artist and writers of all time.
I initially believed that the creation of the Sentry was going to be Marvels reintroduction of the character with a changed historical narrative. I don't know like maybe miracleman exists in various iterations throughout the omniverse and Marvels Sentry was one of them.
Sentry has enough parallels to MM that it's pretty fair to call the character a loose knockoff conceptually - of a character that also started as a direct knockoff of Captain Marvel, but not Marvel's Captains Marvel.
Excellent video. One detail not mentioned tho. In Poisoned Chalice there's speculation on why Marvel stopped printing new material in 2015. According to the book, the silver age storyline would feature the Warpsmith characters, and I think the rights for them were not yet secured by Marvel.
In the new 2023 issues of MM Warpsmiths do feature so that might give some credence to that theory
Ah! Yes...very good point. I had forgotten all about the Warpsmiths.
Ive seen the unprinted Miracleman Issue written by Neil Gaiman and Mike Deodato Jr and it was incredible and its a real shame it will never see the light of day
Never say never!
Love what you do SBP, comic book history presented with class and dulcet tones
Thank you very much!
I remember McFarlane selling a Miracleman statue before the rights were settled. It was basically a 1/12 scale statue, the same size as his figures, stuck on top of a giant, cake-sized base to drive the price up.
Years ago, after the Miracleman debacle, and the documentary about McFarlane, I saw him in a new light. It was surreal seeing Angela appear on a Marvel comic.
When thr story goes from two of the most principled artists in Alan Moore and Neil Gaiman to one of the very least principles humans in McFarlane, you know how things will go
Yes,we do.
Dunno, Todd attempts to relate himself with published masterpieces is kinda of cute - that Toddy guy!
Well said!
@@luciferfernandez7094 Cute like Ted Bundy but with comics.
Both Poisoned Chalice and Kimota are amazing. I have Poisoned Chalice signed by Paidrag, and Kimota signed by Mark Buckingham. I've forwarded your video to Paidrag.
I fully agree about the investigative reporting done by Paidrag! I wish Poisoned Chalice was available to buy somewhere so I could link it and give it a plug. I couldn't find it listed anywhere.
Thanks for forwarding the video, Mikayla! You are always too kind. I know he's commenting before on other Moore related videos.
your last video on Miracle man made me go pick up the hardback trade. It was a really good read, so thank you for that!
You're welcome! I hope you found it enjoyable.
@@StrangeBrainParts I did! it was a great read.
Well, I can already see that random guy working in Disney’s legal office opening and envelope and wondering “WTF is this Miracleman thing? And who wants what of it?”
Lets goooo! New strange brain parts! And one of my favorite comics!
I hope you enjoy!
saga isn't over yet. still waiting for Silver Age to complete. was supposed to wrap in March but keeps getting delayed. issue 5 out next week and last issue not expected until August.
Is the Silver Age series worth reading?
I've not read it yet. I'm waiting for it to actually be complete for I dive in.
@@joedent3323 I would say so
@@joedent3323 I like it. Gaiman is a great writer and Buckingham is a great artist
@@StrangeBrainParts hopefully no more delays
Great summing up of the tortured history of the legal tangle that is Marvel/Miracleman... But wait! I think it's even more complicated than that. You mention the character of Big Ben in your documentary and that got me thinking. Mick Anglo may (or may not) have owned Marvelman, Young Marvelman, Kid Marvelman and everything that appeared in the 1953 - 1963 strips, but he didn't own characters like Big Ben, the Warpsmiths and Miraclewoman. Big Ben would almost certainly have belonged (at least partly) to Dez Skinn... The Warpsmiths were owned by Alan Moore and Garry Leach. Both these properties featured in strips of their own outside the Marvelman strips in Warrior Magazine and A1. Miraclewoman - who knows what the copyright situation was by the time she was created at Eclipse? All these things would have been needed to be settled by Marvel Comics' lawyers before the reprint of stories featuring those characters were reprinted... Or at least we might hope they were. Under UK and European copyright law any creator owns their work UNLESS they choose to sign it away. Garry Leach passed away not too long ago and his rights would have passed onto relatives.
I like to see a vid about what might happen when Superman and Batman enter the public domain? ✌️
That's not a bad idea. Although, I'm guessing that both Disney and Time Warner (or whatever they're called nowadays) are going to do their best to prevent any of their properties from becoming public domain. But...the clock is ticking.
@@StrangeBrainParts Other characters like Mickey Mouse and Popeye (who sadly seems to be all but abandoned these days) will enter the domain even sooner; so it will be interesting to see what happens with them first.
From my understanding, it's only the Steamboat Willy version of Mickey that will be public domain this year. So, it's going to be interesting to see what happens.
@@StrangeBrainParts I've been following it all very closely and it seems as though Disney's been using Oswald the Lucky rabbit as a measure for how these things will go for them. Oswald became free to use on January 1st 2023 and leading upto that point, after nearly a decade of next to no use of the character outside of 2 video games and a few cameos, they began cranking out a ton of Oswald merch, had a mascot of the character make appearances in Euro-Disney, released a few animated shorts, and announced plans for some kind of animated series to release at some point in the future. That said the character is still free to use but given that he's as obscure as he is there arent many rushing to make use of him.
With Mickey it seems that they've taken the approach of trademarking Mickey's Steamboat Willie appearance as a brand in of itself to prove that they still make use of it. Just like with Oswald, alot of Steamboat Willie merch has also released in the last year aswell. Whether or not it sticks will be another matter entirely. The interesting thing about all this copyright talk at large is that they cant change the laws any further without just abolishing the creative commons altogether. We're at a point where these characters and concepts are nearly a century old. Going any further to prevent the roughest, rawest, and earliest incarnations of them from being free to use just seems redundant as their use couldnt possibly be seen as posing a legitimate threat to either corporation since they've both made so many derivative incarnations of their respective characters in the time since they first debuted. Much like the Winnie the Pooh case, the public would only be allowed use of Batman, Superman, Mickey, etc as they appeared in their first year of publications. Ofcourse that library of appearances would grow overtime but regardless there would still be over 75 years worth of derivative reimaginings and reinventions of these characters they could still profit off.
@@lazer-apeyeah but tradmarks are nit the be all end to ut as you could do some stuff to avoid that.
I sure do appreciate these.
Thanks! I'm glad you enjoy them.
@@StrangeBrainParts I just finished it. Good stuff indeed! I was completely unaware of the outcome of the lawsuit. I had no idea things were so convoluted at the end there.
Thank you for your work!
You're welcome and thanks for watching! It did get pretty messy near the end. But it appears to be all cleared up now.
I am a HUGE Marvelman Fan sure was printed before my time but owning the Hardcovers of the older works of Mick Anglo's era and reading what interviews he did for them and him not knowing thie rights were in limbo was a fun time doing research and still to this day some New Marvelman/Miracleman stuff is beimng printed long after the Late Anglo's death. By the Atomic word that gives him his powers KIMOTA!!
I'll be here no matter what when it comes to Miracleman
It's odd that Marvel never mentioned who they bought the rights off, once they had them.
I always assumed they bought the rights off Mick Anglo himself as there are pictures of a 93 year old Anglo meeting with Joe Quesada as he signs official looking documentation
@@lazer-ape According to this video it's very unclear who actually owned the rights in the end, because previous claims were suspect or even false.
@@Cervando I acknowledge as much but I was merely chiming in with my own assumption. Given how much of the proceedings remain out of the public eye we'll presumably never know the truth.
I don't believe Marvel negotiated with Anglo. If I remember correctly, Anglo passed away before the rights issue was definitively cleared up (circa 2019) and Marvel was able to publish new material. Best speculation? Anglo's sold his rights to some company and it was that company Marvel negotiated with.
@@StrangeBrainParts It's a longshot, but maybe Marvel discovered that nobody had definitive proof of ownership and thought fuck it, and published it anyway 😜
Ijust popped up a batch of popcorn. now to sit back and watch the sparks!
Love hearing about the legal history of Miracleman.
Thanks for the update. As far as I'm concerned, the Miracle Man saga ended when Moore left the series. I never cared for the Neil Gaiman material. Despite the changes that Marvel made to the material I purchased the omnibus to go along with the Eclipse singles & Marvel hardbacks. Losing Warrior magazine in the 80's was sudden. Even without Marvel Man I enjoyed the other series in it.
Can someone tell me more about this Miracle man?
Eight minutes into the past....after that, my future will one day become better.
This lecture is physically PAINFUL...I have to experience memories long forgot and new flavors of info/history a first time.
Some of the paper trail of Miracleman had been purchased from Bud Plant, in Grass Valley, CA., some from a store named
Dolly's, in Chico, CA. The earlier, crumbling and torn mags from England, only a few were available.
Life has a way of making all that just disappear.
I reeely tried to watch without feeling the loss.
Playing Catch Up, with the half memories and truths, from decades past and the gossip paths of the last few years...
I DO KNOW, the experience and truth, the addition to my Miracleman experience, will (eventually) be found, here.
Todd McFarlane: I OWN ANGELA!
Neil Gaiman: OH REALLY? *YOINK* HERE YOU GO, MARVEL!
Todd McFarlance: I OWN MIRACLEMAN!
Neil Gaiman: OH REALLY? *YOINK* HERE YOU GO, MARVEL!
Time is a flat circle.
Great video. I always love to see videos on Miracle man. Especially from you since your first video on it is the reason why i got into miracle man in the first place. Thanks.
You're welcome! Thank you for watching.
Thanks a LOT for this video essay!!! 🙂👍💛
The behind the scenes shenanigans make for a story almost as engaging as the one on the comic's pages.
I wonder why DC never asserted any claim to the rights for Marvelman/Maracleman. I would think they could dig up the old Captain Marvel lawsuit victory and use that to battle Marvel for the rights.
Believe it or not Captain Marvel is public domain. Although DC have asserted trademark over his look and the title 'Shazam!' - anyone can do their own version of the basic character as long as they don't infringe the trademarks. There are plenty of other close copies of the Big Red Cheese out there, at Image and other places.
@@JohnAShort The more, the merrier, I say!
dez skinn, holding onto those 10% for dear life is strangely funny to me.
Excellent job. Had to watch twice. Can't believe mcfartlane. Even when I remember hearing about the story. Show's that his greasy, Hollyweird greed got the better of him . Good for his ass❤
Indeed! I was not at all heartbroken to read he didn't acquire Miracleman. In fact, he even tried to trademark Miracleman while negotiating with Gaiman. So, he would have handed Gaiman the copyright, but held the trademark and that...was not a classy move. It was blocked by Gaiman, but still. I had to pull that from the video because it deviated too much.
The Silver Age 4 was the first new issue without (unused) prior art from the 90s making it the first "truly new" material and it only lists Gaiman as co-writer so I am becoming a bit worried for the rest of the Silver Age and beyond so I am starting to worry how involved Gaiman is.
Mark Buckingham re-drew the Silver Age. In the video near the end are pages displaying the original artwork and the newly drawn artwork from the first issue.
You're right...I never noticed the co-writer credit in issue #4. That may be concerning and a sign that Gaiman might not be all that involved? After all, the first three issues were scripted in the 90's (although, the third issue was never published). So, the fourth issue should be a new script.
Great video on what has been such a congealed mess for so many years. Thanks!
Love to see M&M get a Right proper intro miniseries integrating him into marvels world and having him interact with all of marvels great Cosmic heavy hitters boy that would be boss ! 💥⭐⭐
Miracleman makes no sense outside of his universe. This would be a disaster.
i heard some rumor that actually the plan neil gaiman current run gonna lead miracleman to 616 comic universe
@@ebin9185 Well now that would be Max Awesome provided they do his character justice and leave out all the Social messaging and such 🌀
Love that audio in the beginning 💛
Oh man respect, I saw a video based on him a while back, he is and could be the biggest British based character ever
Beautiful editing. Loved the video
Mcfarlane owned nothing? Lmao, fuck man, he's as skilled in legal stuff as he's a skilled writer.
It's curious that throughout the convoluted history of Miracleman that DC never got involved. National/DC went after Fawcett for Captain Marvel, so why didn't they pursue Marvelman too?
You should do one on ROM the Spaceknight and the Micronauts.
Hell ya
What a mess - as is usually the case when the lawyers get involved.
Are you reading the new issues of Miracleman: Silver Age? I’m in love with what Gaiman & Buckingham have been able to do with the Miracleman world. Can’t wait to see what happens next.
Plot twist: DC swoops in at the end claiming Marvel/Miracleman has been a blatant ripoff of Shazam since the beginning starting the legal shenanigans all over again.
Seriously though, do any of these comic book writers and artists have any idea what a contract even is? Specifically how to read and sign them?
Marvel would definitely move forward with Miracleman without knowing for sure they own the rights.
Complete
For NOW
I need a drink.
So, Marvel now owns Miracle man which in turn means Disney now owns Miracle man! UH OH!😰
Miracle Man Confirmed For Kingdom Hearts 4!?!?
Yaay copyright law!!!
Lesson learned:always have a writtened contract or some-GREEDY-gus will rip you off.And go back on his word,which means-NOTHING !!!
And READ the contract. That's also important. :)
@@StrangeBrainParts MOST definitely. LOL. And if you can't read have someone read it to you. LOL.
Someone you trust and can rely on! And don't be afraid to Google terminology. :)
@@StrangeBrainParts Of course.
@@StrangeBrainParts A lawyer, if possible.
dude, what a headache :D
So, are the new issues silver age #s 4, 5, and 6? The LCS i worked for closed before any new material appeared (except for an annual, which i think had some new stuff), and I've tried to keep an eye out. This video and its comments are the first I've heard of them actually coming to be
I do believe issue 5 comes out this week. Issue 6 is scheduled for August? I cannot recall, exactly.
Issues 6 and 7 are coming in july and august.
The last issue for the Silver Age just came out yesterday, with a message that Buckingham and Gaiman's last arc, The Dark Age, will be coming out, though there isn't any scheduled release date yet.
@@jikorijo4516 how were they? I flipped through whatever issue came out in/around November, and wasn't moved to pick it up, even though I'd been waiting forever for it
@@HeyImRosko Sorry it took me a while to get back to you. Having now reread the entire story, I liked it. I liked learning about Young Miracleman, seeing him find out who he actually is, and how he feels about what Miracleman has done "perfecting" the world. I was surprised by Dickie's decision at the end and how it'll be reflected next in the Dark Age. While some of the things that happen or ideas explored don't seem as cutting edge as they probably would have been had The Silver Age actually been finished in the early 90s, I thought Gaiman and Buckingham did a better (and in their own unique way) job here than in The Golden Age, in exploring how much the world has changed when Miracleman took it over and pointing out the problems that exist even in an utopian world.
Hopefully, Marvelman/Miracleman would get a chance in the MCU
Directed By Zack Snyder*
@@donnae1899
Ideally, someone like Matthew Vaughn or Guy Ritchie
Don't know about a Marvel Miracle Man, I think theyd really water the character down.
I'm guessing a complete reboot of some sort once Neil Gaiman is done. What shape will Miracleman be in? No idea.
Does this mean Todd McFarlane owns several characters published by Eclipse and doesn't even republish those materials? Does he own the rights to "Zot!"?!?!
Kinda wish he didn't have the rights to spawn. Anything to erase that stain from human history
the legal side of Miracle-Man is certainly more interesting than Marvels comic run on Miracleman
The overriding thing to come out of this is alan moore is and has apparently ALWAYS been an absolute MENSCH.. he strokes me as someone who would rather die rhan tarnish his morals &integrity.. which in this day and age &days gone by seems very rare indeed
I think mcfarlane was being kinda brazen with his "acquisition" of marvelman but judging from revent events, I don't trust neil gaiman with copyright law enough to take his side
I also think he shoulda just given his characters back to mcfarlane, from what I've seen from angela's tenure at marvel it looks very bad
Why would you trust a fantasy author to be a copyright law guru
For real. Marvel has done next to nothing interesting with Angela aside from her Thor and guardians of the galaxy comics. They just cast her aside. In spawn, she could’ve been the leader of the scorched or something cool in recent years. I also think Todd would’ve made miracle man some cool stories had that panned out.
my brain aches.
I hate that the hacks at Marvel have Miracleman.
to this day I continue wishing that Mcfarlane had gotten a hold of Marvelman instead. everything he showcased proved to me that he had more in mind for the character beyond the miserable deconstructionist slog Moore and Gaiman made standard for the character. with the character now under lock and key over at Marvel we'll either never see him used again, used poorly, or further vandalized to a point where he means nothing to anyone.
Sounds like if I want to get into the comics industry I should find a way to buy into Miracleman. Seems like all the greats are attached. I don't even care about Miracleman.
Honestly, I find the background information more interesting than the actual work. Marvelman is really a dry read. Lots of ideas and concepts to engage with, but not much to simply "enjoy".
7th
Is the person next to Miracleman a Woman are a man 11:32
MiracleWoman