Full Description
Superman may be faster than a speeding bullet, but even he can't outrun copyright law. Since the dawn of the pulp hero in the 1930s, publishers and authors have fought over the privilege of making money off of comics, and the authors and artists usually have lost. Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, the creators of Superman, got all of $130 for the rights to the hero.
In Empire of the Superheroes, Mark Cotta Vaz argues that licensing and litigation do as much as any ink-stained creator to shape the mythology of comic characters. Vaz reveals just how precarious life was for the legends of the industry. Siegel and Shuster-and their heirs-spent seventy years battling lawyers to regain rights to Superman. Jack Kirby and Joe Simon were cheated out of their interest in Captain America, and Kirby's children brought a case against Marvel to the doorstep of the Supreme Court. To make matters worse, the infant comics medium was nearly strangled in its crib by censorship and moral condemnation. For the writers and illustrators now celebrated as visionaries, the "golden age" of comics felt more like hard times.
The fantastical characters that now earn Hollywood billions have all-too-human roots. Empire of the Superheroes digs them up, detailing the creative martyrdom at the heart of a pop-culture powerhouse.
Contents
Introduction: Comic Book Babylon
Chapter 1: In the Beginning
Chapter 2: World of Tomorrow
Chapter 3: More Super Than Tarzan
Chapter 4: Shadow Realm
Chapter 5: Superman versus Wonder Man
Chapter 6: The First Generation
Chapter 7: Superman, Inc.
Chapter 8: Patents and Patriots
Chapter 9: Up, Up And Awa-a-y!
Chapter 10: Battle of the Century
Chapter 11: The Adventures of Superboy
Chapter 12: The Trial
Chapter 13: Progenitors
Chapter 14: Judgment Day
Chapter 15: Crackdown and Crash
Chapter 16: Resurrection and Renewal
Chapter 17: Copyright Wars
Chapter 18: Masters of Invention
Chapter 19: Evolutionary Imperative
Chapter 20: Superman and Captain America on Trial
Chapter 21: The King and the Man
Chapter 22: Legacy
Acknowledgments
Notes
Bibliography
Index
