Toberoff has a lot of experience doing this type of case.Īlmost a decade ago, he represented the estate of comic book legend Jack Kirby over whether he could terminate a copyright grant on Spider-Man, X-Men, the Incredible Hulk and the Mighty Thor. For example, one of the complaints filed today ( read here) asserts, “Marvel had the right to exercise creative control over Lieber’s contributions and paid Lieber a per-page rate for his work.” The Marvel Method has been the subject of prior litigation such as a dispute a decade back over “Ghost Rider.”Īnd it will again. The litigation figures to focus on the “ Marvel Method,” a loose collaborative working atmosphere where initial ideas were briefly discussed with artists responsible for taking care of the details. The cases will focus on the creation of famous comic book characters and who should be deemed the statutory author. Petrocelli is filing several lawsuits in New York and California against Lieber, Don Heck, Patrick Ditko, Don Rico and Keith Dettwiler. The publisher was represented by Dan Petrocelli at O’Melveny, who just so happens to be representing Disney now in its efforts to keep rights to various Avengers. The heirs of the comic book creators are being represented by Marc Toberoff, who once famously represented Superman creators Jerry Siegel and Joe Schuster in an unsuccessful termination attempt against DC Comics.ĭC staved off termination by counterclaiming against Toberoff and asserting tortious interference of its rights.
For example, Larry Lieber (who worked at Marvel as a writer, too) filed termination notices over creations in May. Marvel is facing other termination notices.