Comic Creators, VFX Studios & Film Studio Contracts - a DC & Marvel issue 3 3

[Bosco685]

The Guardian published an article about the relationship between comic book creators and the film studios that use their creations. Along with the financial impacts, including forcing comic book creators to self-audit the use of their creations.

It's not a DC or Marvel sole problem. It's across the board. Including how Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster signed over their rights to Superman for $65/each. And how Jim Shooter treated Jack Kirby to force him to forego claiming rights to any characters.

Marvel and DC face backlash over pay: ‘They sent a thank you note and $5,000 – the movie made $1bn’

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Watch any superhero movie and you will see a credit along the lines of “based on the comic book created by”, usually with the name of a beloved and/or long-dead writer or artist. But deep, deep in the credits scroll, you will also see “special thanks” to a long roster of comic book talent, most of them still alive, whose work forms the skeleton and musculature of the movie you just watched. Scenes storyboarded directly from Batman comics by Frank Miller; character arcs out of Thor comics by Walt Simonson; entire franchises, such as the Avengers films or Disney+ spinoff The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, that couldn’t exist without the likes of Kurt Busiek or Ed Brubaker.

 

The “big two” comic companies – Marvel and DC - may pretend they’ve tapped into some timeless part of the human psyche with characters such as Superman and the Incredible Hulk, but the truth is that their most popular stories have been carefully stewarded through the decades by individual artists and writers. But how much of, say, the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s (MCU) $20bn-plus box office gross went to those who created the stories and characters in it? How are the unknown faces behind their biggest successes being treated?

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Comic creators are “work-for-hire”, so the companies they work for owe them nothing beyond a flat fee and royalty payments. But Marvel and DC also incentivise popular creators to stay on with the promise of steady work and what they call “equity”: a tiny share of the profits, should a character they create or a storyline they write become fodder for films, shows or merch. For some creators, work they did decades ago is providing vital income now as films bring their comics to a bigger audience; they reason – and the companies seem to agree – it’s only fair to pay them more. DC has a boilerplate internal contract, which the Guardian has seen, which guarantees payments to creators when their characters are used. Marvel’s contracts are similar, according to two sources with knowledge of them, but harder to find; some Marvel creators did not know they existed.

 

A Marvel spokesman said there was no restrictions on when creators could approach the company about contracts, and said that they are having ongoing conversations with writers and artists pertaining to both recent and past work. A DC spokesman did not return multiple requests for comment. But the use of these contracts is at these companies’ discretion and the promised money can fall by the wayside.

How Jim Starlin used social media to embarrass Disney in granting him more financial payouts.

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“The squeaky wheel gets the grease,” Jim Starlin, who created Thanos, recently told the Hollywood Reporter; Starlin negotiated a bigger payout after arguing that Marvel had underpaid him for its use of Thanos as the big bad of the MCU. Prolific Marvel writer Roy Thomas got his name added to the credits of Disney+ series Loki after his agent made a fuss. But these are creators that Marvel needs to keep happy; things can go very differently if nobody cares when you complain.

How Disney/Marvel has grown to be the tougher business partner to negotiate with. To include subtracting its legal fees from royalty payouts.

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Over the decades, Marvel and DC have become parts of Fortune 500 companies: the Walt Disney Company owns Marvel, and DC is owned by a subsidiary of AT&T. Now, deciding what share of the success their comic creators deserve is a matter of complex wrangling between Marvel and DC, which want to maintain good relations with their talent, and the vast bureaucracies above them.

 

Among creators, there is a general sense that it has become harder to get paid at Marvel. One source told the Guardian that Marvel subtracted its own legal fees from a protracted negotiation over royalty payments. Others who have worked for DC and Marvel say both count on artists and writers preferring not to spend time chasing them for royalties.

How comic book companies allow freelancers to self-audit use of their creations to account for expected payments.

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“Lawyer up, always, with comic book company contracts,” says Jimmy Palmiotti, longtime writer of DC characters such as Jonah Hex and Harley Quinn. “They are not in the business of feeding you the math.” Once a year, freelancers are allowed to audit the returns on their creations for DC and Marvel, but Palmiotti says it happens too rarely: “I can count on one hand the number of creators who’ve actually audited a major comics company.”

 

According to multiple sources, when a writer or artist’s work features prominently in a Marvel film, the company’s practice is to send the creator an invitation to the premiere and a cheque for $5,000 (£3,600). Three different sources confirmed this amount to the Guardian. There’s no obligation to attend the premiere, or to use the $5,000 for travel or accommodation; sources described it as a tacit acknowledgment that compensation was due.

 

Marvel declined to comment on this, citing privacy concerns. “We can’t speak to our individual agreements or contracts with talent,” said a spokesman.

How the comic book companies/studio owners can make the decision how unique a character is leading to special payments.

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Some creators told the Guardian that they did not know that Marvel even had the special character contract like DC. In fact, the Guardian has seen an application for the “Marvel Special Character Contract”, in which creators can formally ask Marvel whether one of their characters qualifies for extra payouts. In the application form, Marvel explicitly reserves the right to tell creators their characters aren’t original enough to get the bonus, warning that “the decisions are final” and not subject to appeal. DC uses the same measure; in 2015, the studio was criticised for cancelling payments to writer Gerry Conway for his character Power Girl, which the company retroactively decided was derivative of Supergirl and therefore ineligible for the contract, according to Conway. He no longer receives payments for her, he confirmed to the Guardian. DC did not respond to request for comment.

 

The Power Girl incident highlights how ethically fuzzy these contracts are, since they’re issued by DC and Marvel, drawn up unilaterally by the companies, and paid out when the companies account for their many films, TV shows, video games, trading cards, action figures and sundry other merch. One creator, who asked to remain anonymous, said he and other creators sometimes go to Target to take pictures of action figures of their characters for which payments are due, to demonstrate that their cheques are short.

How special creator contracts came about to spark even more creations versus holding back on future projects.

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As comics publishers evolved into major media operations, their staff grew concerned about mistreatment of talent. There were famous fights over royalties, and thorny questions over what credit was due to thousands of co-creators working in a shared universe. In 2000, a consortium of publishers founded a charity to directly aid artists who’d fallen on the hardest times, called the Hero Initiative. (Marvel is a founding member, and AT&T lets employees donate directly from their paycheques.) By the 1980s, people who worked in comics at every level were fans, in the same way that even the ushers on Broadway can sing and dance if called upon. In 1986, DC editor Paul Levitz and DC president Jeanette Kahn were working on new schemes to more fairly compensate writers and artists. Moore, Gibbons, and Miller’s contracts were meant to usher in a new era of fairness. It was a long time coming: some were already looking askance at DC after its treatment of Siegel and Shuster came to light during the production of the 1978 film Superman.

 

But Moore and Gibbons’s Watchmen was a huge success, going through multiple reprints – unprecedented for a graphic novel – and DC never had to let its right to republish lapse, so it never did. The pair had a right to a share of merchandise profits; DC produced merch, classified it as “promotional items” and told Moore and Gibbons they weren’t owed anything. The vaunted in-house contracts that can make creators’ lives livable can always be subverted.

 

To the extent that there is any semblance of fairness in the industry now, it’s primarily Levitz’s doing, alongside Kahn and Karen Berger, who is now at Dark Horse Comics. Levitz left DC in 2009, but his influence is still felt across the industry.

 

“You want to create a situation where you never get to the old Russian joke where they pretend to pay us, and we pretend to work,” Levitz says. “You want people to win when the companies win. I’m proud of the fact that we improved the quality of how we treated creative people.” More than one creator recounts calling Levitz to ask for more money because of a scene in a lucrative Batman movie that lifted plot points or names from their work, then being shocked when they got it.

 

Edited January 16, 2023 by Bosco685

[D84]

To sum up, big corporations are .

[Bosco685]

On 8/10/2021 at 10:31 AM, D84 said:

To sum up, big corporations are .

But it really is interesting what the companies put these creators through just to self-audit if they are getting what is owed.

Having to drive over to a retailer and take pictures of action figures to prove your character is being merchandised?? That's nuts!

[D84]

On 8/10/2021 at 9:34 AM, Bosco685 said:

But it really is interesting what the companies put these creators through just to self-audit if they are getting what is owed.

Having to drive over to a retailer and take pictures of action figures to prove your character is being merchandised?? That's nuts!

Completely, but it's not surprising. 

[media_junkie]

It is not surprising.  You don't become a billionaire or a Multi-billion dollar company by being nice.  At some point along the way you have screwed over your employees or your consumers.  

[Bosco685]

On 8/10/2021 at 10:54 AM, media_junkie said:

It is not surprising.  You don't become a billionaire or a Multi-billion dollar company by being nice.  At some point along the way you have screwed over your employees or your consumers.  

I met Neal Adams' shadow freelance artist here in Richmond as he lives in the area. We ran into one another at military model convention when it turns out he is good friends with someone I know. He does a lot of work behind the scenes he really doesn't get credit for, as NA sub-contracts to him so as to keep up with deadlines. Amazing artist!

Yet he lives in a trailer, just scrapes by as a living, and yet his Batman pages would be in high demand. But they have someone else's name on the page. So it is an industry that feeds on itself.

[Cat]

On 8/11/2021 at 1:28 AM, Bosco685 said:

I met Neal Adams' shadow freelance artist here in Richmond as he lives in the area. We ran into one another at military model convention when it turns out he is good friends with someone I know. He does a lot of work behind the scenes he really doesn't get credit for, as NA sub-contracts to him so as to keep up with deadlines. Amazing artist!

Yet he lives in a trailer, just scrapes by as a living, and yet his Batman pages would be in high demand. But they have someone else's name on the page. So it is an industry that feeds on itself.

Well well well, isn't that interesting. Is Neal going all Pat Lee on us? Though at least he's got an excuse at his age. 

[Bosco685]

On 8/10/2021 at 12:54 PM, Mecha_Fantastic said:

Well well well, isn't that interesting. Is Neal going all Pat Lee on us? Though at least he's got an excuse at his age. 

I was surprised too.

When he was first introduced to him it was as 'he works with Neal Adam'. As he got more comfortable, it was 'I actually draw a portion of his pages'. 

[Cat]

On 8/11/2021 at 2:59 AM, Bosco685 said:

I was surprised too.

When he was first introduced to him it was as 'he works with Neal Adam'. As he got more comfortable, it was 'I actually draw a portion of his pages'. 

I'd love to know what portion. Just backgrounds, figurework too, just layouts, etc? 

[WolverineX]

On 8/10/2021 at 10:31 AM, D84 said:

To sum up, big corporations are .

End stage capitalism.

They are killing our world too for short term profit.  

 

 

[Bosco685]

[Gatsby77]

On 8/10/2021 at 12:59 PM, Bosco685 said:

I was surprised too.

When he was first introduced to him it was as 'he works with Neal Adam'. As he got more comfortable, it was 'I actually draw a portion of his pages'. 

Maybe that explains the...I guess the word is "cartoonishness" of some of Adams' recent work?

The last cover I remember really liking of his was his All Star Superman variant, what - 15 years ago?

The Green Lantern # 8 variant and Batman Odyssey work just looked far too...cartooney - not at *all* like vintage Adams.

Even his 80s-90s Continuity work still looked more like him stylistically.

[Bosco685]

When even someone of Neil Gaiman's stature has to call this out...there's a problem!

#DISNEYMUSTPAY UPDATE: DISNEY IS STILL NOT PAYING

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This past April, I wrote about writers' struggles to get Disney and Disney-owned publishers to provide unpaid royalties and missing royalty statements--in some cases, going back years--and the formation of the #DisneyMustPay Joint Task Force in response.

 

The problem: Disney has acquired many publishers and imprints over the years, along with their properties and contracts. In many cases, however, Disney is taking the position that while they've purchased the rights to those properties, they haven't acquired the corresponding obligations stipulated in the contracts...such as payment and reporting. From the Task Force website:

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Creators may be missing royalty statements or checks across a wide range of properties in prose, comics, or graphic novels. This list is incomplete and based on properties for which we have verified reports of missing statements and royalties.

• LucasFilm (Star Wars, Indiana Jones, etc.)
• Boom! Comics (Licensed comics including Buffy the Vampire Slayer, etc.)
• Dark Horse Comics (Licensed comics including Buffy the Vampire Slayer, etc.)
• 20th Century Fox (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Alien, etc.)
• Marvel WorldWide (SpiderMan, Predator, etc.)
• Disney Worldwide Publishing (Buffy, Angel)

Drawn from multiple professional writers' groups, the Task Force's mission is to identify and advocate for writers who are owed money and accounting. There has been movement since April: several writers--including Alan Dean Foster, who was the first to go public--have successfully negotiated with Disney and have been paid. BOOM! Studios, which holds licenses for multiple Disney-owned comic book and graphic novel franchises, has offered to work with the Task Force to resolve royalty issues for comics writers and other creators (though to date little progress has been made). And two additional important writers' organizations, WGA East and WGA West, have joined the Task Force.

 

[Bosco685]

At least with Gaiman he isn't about completely trashing a publisher. He just wants fair treatment.

[Bosco685]

 

[Bosco685]

Looks like it isn't just comic book creators.

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VFX artists are speaking out against Marvel, with many refusing to ever work with the entertainment giant again. This comes as artists share accounts of unworkable deadlines and immense pressure leading to stress and unsatisfactory final products. Many have requested to never be put on a Marvel project again, saying that the studio has the "worst VFX management out there".

 

These allegations have been made on the subreddit r/VFX, with artists across the industry sharing their negative experiences with the company. Almost no one in the subreddit has a good word to say about the employer, with many saying that the money and star-power aren't worth putting up with poor working conditions.

 

In a thread titled "I am quite frankly sick and tired of working on Marvel shows", Reddit user Independent-Ad419 expressed their frustration with the studio. "Marvel has probably the worst methodology of production and VFX management out there", they write. "They can never fix the look for the show before more than half the allocated time for the show is over. The artists working on Marvel shows are definitely not paid equivalent to the amount of work they put in."

 

[Bosco685]

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A former Marvel VFX artist opens up about what they say were poor working conditions at the studio. After the Infinity Saga, the Marvel Cinematic Universe is moving forward with Phase 4, with no signs of slowing down any time soon. The MCU has grown exponentially with the arrival of multiple new heroes, as well as and the expansion from films into TV series via Disney+. In fact, Marvel president Kevin Feige says the MCU franchise plans are now mapped out until 2032.

 

However, despite the accolades directed at many newer Marvel films and TV series, not everything about the universe has been praised. Recently, the MCU has been called out by many for what is seen to be poor CGI work and declining special effects quality. The most recent example of this was the new Disney+ series She-Hulk: Attorney at Law trailer, which was panned on social media for what many saw to be extremely lacklustre CGI work in creating the superhero alter ego of Tatiana Maslany's new MCU character, Jennifer Walters. Many found the latest She-Hulk trailer and images to be representative of the MCU's struggling VFX quality.

 

Now, a former Guardians of the Galaxy and Spider-Man VFX artist, Dhruv Govil, has supported his peers in the industry who have taken issue with the working conditions at Marvel Studios. Responding to an article posted by The Gamer on Twitter that claimed VFX artists were refusing to work with Marvel, Govil added his own personal experience. The former VFX artist said that he had seen fellow colleagues "break down" from being "overworked," and credited working on Marvel projects with his decision to change industries.

 

However, even as newer projects like Eternals, Thor: Love and Thunder, and WandaVision have arrived on screens, comments from viewers about spotty VFX work have become more common. Location shoots have been hindered due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, forcing Marvel Studios to rely more heavily on green screens. This has placed more burden on VFX artists. However, Govil's tweet suggests that this is not the only problem, but that extreme time pressure and a declining budget often also affects working conditions on an MCU project. The artist's comments also indicate that he feels Marvel VFX artists are not properly compensated for their efforts.

 

[Bosco685]

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In July 2021, Scarlett Johansson stunned Hollywood with a lawsuit accusing Disney of breach of contract for sending Black Widow day-and-date to Disney+, a move her lawyers said diminished its box office (and the star’s backend compensation). As that legal battle stretched into the summer, two other Black Widow stakeholders were quietly seeking what they believed they were owed. The comic book creators behind Yelena Belova, the character played by Florence Pugh, spent months in a back-and-forth with Marvel to receive payment for her appearance in the film.

 

Writer Devin Grayson and artist J.G. Jones believed they would take home $25,000 each for her appearance in Black Widow thanks to paperwork they signed outlining how much they would receive for films, TV shows, video games and action figures featuring Yelena. But when Grayson and Jones, who created Yelena in 1999, eventually received payment in November, that $25,000 dwindled to about $5,000 without explanation.

Leave Disney/Marvel Studio alone. They are struggling already.

[Bosco685]

 

[Bosco685]

Unfortunately people need to collect a paycheck no matter how much creators in a studio mock them.