Thus my original point. His estate may have the legal right to challenge this, but I think it's ethically wrong since there was a clear understanding by Kirby that he did not own what he created for Marvel back in the day, even if Marvel's treatment of him and his original art was ethically wrong too, and even if Disney's using its power and wealth to unfairly influence the law and the lawsuit are also ethically wrong.


As comic fans, we tend to automatically root for our favorite creators against the Goliath publishing companies that have so often misused them, but I see a lot of gray in this.

...because they made the bargain, knowing full well what they were agreeing to.

If I'm in a bad spot and sell you a box of my comics for a meager $20 and then, on top of that, some of the books in that box skyrocket in price far beyond anything I'd ever expected, do I have a right to sue you for further compensation? We had an agreement.


That being said, I am unaware of the law you're describing and don't know its history nor legal basis, so I cannot comment there.

Again, I can't comment on the law. I know nothing about it.

But people make bad bargains every day, and people work in fields controlled by employers who make contracts that exploit them every day, too. Will congress make laws to redress every single one of those fields? I'm still waiting to see miners get better health and death benefits.

In Kirby's case, he had other career options. He didn't have to take a job in the comics field if he was unhappy with the terms that came with that kind of employment. I'm glad he chose to work for Marvel, but that was his choice, and he accepted the terms that came with it.

I thought we were just engaging in a robust conversation. I had no ill feelings towards either you or your perspective. Sorry if that wasn't mutual.



I actually completely agree with you here. My entire point is that no one should be able to circumvent original terms. Disney should not be able to extend copyrights beyond the amount of time they were originally supposed to last, and the Kirby estate should not be able to change the terms of his employment in hindsight. If we allow parties to go back and revise the rules after the fact to suit their own interests, whether it's because they have money/power or because they are downtrodden and have our sympathy, it's a very slippery slope that undermines the very concept of law.



I certainly wasn't blaming anyone.

Fair enough. Good luck with your brief, btw.

What is at dispute is what those original terms were. If Kirby was solely "working for" Marvel 24/7, then Marvel/Disney has always owned everything since Kirby's pencil hit paper, and Disney will retain ownership for 95 years or as long as Congress keeps extending corporate copyright terms. Marvel claims that this is what the "clear understanding" was.

If Kirby was working for himself as a freelancer, which means he was the original copyright owner of his creations until such time as he transferred those copyrights to Marvel for publication; then the Kirby estate has the right to reclaim those copyrights after 56 years, per the 1976 Act.   This is what the Kirby family and Mark Evanier say happened.  Evanier's testimony, to me, is very persuasive on this.
 
Under both scenarios, Marvel indisputably owned the copyrights for the past 56 years and Kirby/estate has no legal claim on "points" or partial-ownership for those 56 years. No one's reneging there. What's at issue now is the future.

If the law had never been changed in 1976; the copyrights would have expired into the public domain after 56 years.



The Constitution charges Congress with writing copyright law.  The copyright termination provision in the 1976 law was created only to "redress" the inequities created by a different section of the very same law; that part extending the term of copyright beyond 56 years.

That's the sum of it.  Both of those linked Hollywood Reporter articles get into more legal detail, and are written by an active  entertainment lawyer...

This bit I can answer. Marvel's lawyers wanted the explicit agreement from Jack that Marvel owned the characters because Kirby had already made public statements claiming that he owned them. They didn't ask this of anyone else because no one else had made such statements. With Kirby, they were afraid that giving him the artwork could be construed as acknowledging his ownership of the characters depicted in the artwork.

On the case as a whole, I think a lot depends on how the court sees the difference between this dispute and the one between DC and Siegel & Shuster. In that case it was completely clear that S&S had created Superman on their own and brought the completed project to DC, signed a contract and were paid for it. With Marvel it was more like, Martin Goodman told Stan to start a superhero team book, Stan brought Jack in and they brainstormed the basic outline and then Jack went home and fleshed out the story and the characters and drew it. There was no guarantee that Marvel would buy any or all of what he drew, but it was something the editor asked for, not something that Jack brought in already complete.