Siegel Estate Wins SUPERMAN Case

I am confused...If the dude sold the rights, why should any of his heirs be entitled to any of the prophits? Normally when you sell the rights to something, you no longer own them....Well, I don't really give a toss about JLA, but I would like to see a kick ass Superman sequal. I hope this doesnt affect it.

There was something in the contract that said that the rights would be return to the estate of the creators 70 years later.

70 years went by and DC refused to turn over the rights hence the law suit.

Joseph Shuster does not have an estate while Jerome Siegel does.

Wich is why DC is allowed to keep Shuster's half

Actually Congress passed a copyright law in the 70's that nullified previous said contracts. The Siegel's merely chose to use the rights given to them at that point and sued. The agreement between them and DC has never been complete on their part.

Shuster DOES have an estate that is being taken care of by his nephew and their agreement is up at 2013.

In 2033 BOTH of their contracts will be up.

This contract only applies to Action Comics 1. So everyone in that is going to be affected. Meaning if the Siegel's don't like story they can say no. Which is weird and I don't see that happening.

Well if you click on the link above it clearly states that they sold the rights of the character "to have and hold forever". The only thing making this lawsuit possible is a law that was passed in 1976. This seems like a bullshit decision to me. The heirs of both these guys shouldn't have a claim at all. But this is the way of the country, we're are so litigious it makes me sick. Why should a law be inforced retroactively and the terms changed when both parties agreed to a transaction in good conscience and aware of what they were doing. The character's succes wasn't guaranteed, if it had flopped would they be returning the money they've been paid, of course not.
Anyway if things don't go DC's way they have until 2013 to kill off SM or wrap up his entire storyline.
If they pull the character from DC I won't follow him anymore regardless of what company buys the rights. Greedy fucks reneging on a contract. The native Americans should be able to reclaim Manhattan also, I don't see much difference here, Oh, I forgot we killed most of them.

GUys check out alot of the Siegel woes in this book... http://www.mania.com/superman-vs-hollywood_article_57597.html

1 - Copyright laws were created, and always intended, to protect CREATORS, not BUYERS.
2 - Copyright laws should, under the spirit of what they are intended to do, be amended so that neither corporations nor private interests can BUY FULLY the rights to anything someone creates.
3 - Copyright laws were never intended to be FOREVER - they were intended to protect the creator's rights to initial profits from their creations, in order to encourage people to be creative and try new things. Therefore the law should revert back to a shorter time-span of protection: I'd argue a quarter century is JUST FINE.
4 - Heirs / willing copyright to others should only last for as long as the copyright protection from initial creation (right now that's like seventy-some years, but really should be much less) and no longer just because it transfered on death.


As it stands, copyright laws work to dull or retard creation of new things - why would DC promote some new super-heroes when they can stranglehold the rights to Superman forever? However, when Superman finally becomes public domain (like Aladdin, King Arthur, Sherlock Holmes, etc.) and EVERYONE can legally sell Superman stories, DC will scramble to create and promote THE NEXT BIG HERO. Hence creativity and new ideas will be empowered.


Copyright laws were never specifically about money - they were about protecting creators so they could create. Everything that has come afterward is corporations and lawyers mucking it all up for profit margins.

And you wonder why sometimes studio corporations sometimes botch comic flicks? Because of their arogance and hiring scribes and directors who may know the characters but don't know a monkey's dick from an ape's ass when it comes to the essence or origins of the characters is because they think they can make the material better than its creators and treat it as cash cow in name only. That's like Warners saying they can make DC better than DC. Considering their track record so far when it comes to translating to live action, half the time the direction they want smells worse than owl shit. Catwoman, Batman & Robin, Superman 3 & 4 anyone?? So let me enlighten the suits at Warners.....and unless you wanna eat pancakes through a tube, QUIT BEING GREEDY AND FUCKIN WITH SHIT!!. And if you don't get your act together, I will make it my personal mission to see to it that you're only making ViewMaster slide flicks.

I don't understand what the problem is. Either offer to buy the rights from them again or just give them 50% of the net profits AFTER costs. The way studios figure out movie costs the biggest money maker will just break even. Ask Peter Jackson about his Lord of the Rings profit sharing...

A few quick points:

1. Tacid's statement is incorrect. As noblenonsense pointed out, the basis for the Siegel family to reclaim the copyright was a provision of the 1976 Copyright Act.

2. The provision won't apply to most other comic book characters. Any character who was created as a work-for-hire will remain the property of the company for as long as the copyright lasts. It applies to Superman because he was created by Siegel and Shuster independently several years before they went to work for National Periodical Publications (DC's predecessor). They transferred the copyright to National. It's that transfer that the Copyright Act allows the heirs to revoke. In the case of most other comic characters, there was no transfer because characters created as work for hire are considered to have been created "by the company."

3. Noblenonsense state that in 2033 Siegel and Shuster's "contracts will be up." I presume what he is referring to is that under current copyright law the character of Superman will become public domain in 2033. It's not that anyone's "contract" will be up. It's just that the copyright will lapse under current law. That said, however ... I wouldn't bet money on it happening. Under the 1976 Copyright Act, Superman would have become public domain in 2013. The Sony Bono Copyright Term Extension Act that was passed in 1998, however, extended the term to 2033. As it gets closer to the time when Superman, Mickey Mouse, Bugs Bunny and others are to become public domain, expect that some of the biggest entertainment conglomerates in the world are going to be putting major pressure on the Legislature to extend the deadline again.

I would totally expect that the copyright extension will be extended. IMO as long as the copyright owner is using said characters I don't think they should loose the rights to them.
raybrn, now I'm really curious as to what characters published by DC and Marvel are open to this sort of court challenge.