The 1980s was a period of vital activism on the part of an admittedly factionalized comics' professional class. Mainstream creators were finally liberating themselves from the financial shackles of the dominant comics companies and their usurious economic policies. They did not liberate themselves from the dominant creative trends, although that possibility too was dangled before us, and matters of artistic principle were argued between mainstream creators and companies -- something that is, in any serious sense, almost unthinkable today.

Inspired by the ethos of the underground comics movement, the alternative press gained momentum with a loose group of artists and publishers who together represented ideals and principles in direct opposition to those embodied in the Marvel-DC axis.

Scott McCloud unveiled his Creator Bill of Rights in 1989 and accompanying this was a sense that individual creative achievement, equitable financial administration, and editorial vision, could trump the impersonal monolith of corporate comics culture.

In retrospect, that was naive, and it is remarkable the extent to which the more things change the more they stay the same. In terms of following through on the ideals publicly expressed throughout the '80s, the '90s has been the Time of the Toad, in which people and institutions have behaved in ways that were so self-serving and self-immolating, so devious, conniving, and crave, that not even the more squalid conduct scattered throughout the history of comics could have prepared us for what amounted to a betrayal.

Frank Miller, in a recent Comics Journal interview, confirmed the general feeling of moral fatigue among those who were most vocal about building a decent profession; indeed, Alan Moore, who swore he would never work for DC again, is now -- because of a series of business machinations of which he had no input but to which he ultimately could have said no -- working for DC again and there is every reason to believe that a general erosion in the struggle is the reason he is a party to it.

Our intention here today is to flog nine people or institutions that have been particularly culpable in perpetuating or acquiescing to the prevailing trend toward the consolidation of power, the worship of money, the rationalization of limitless compromise, and a general degradation of dignity among the profession. Some figures are more tragic than contemptible, but they all represent a failure of the moral imagination to preserve what had been fought for earlier.

Oklahoma City

Accused: Oklahoma City authorities (plus the meddling private organization , Oklahomans for Children And Families)

This indictment is intended to make an example of Oklahoma City, and the authorities of that community should be understood as standing in for backwater fascists throughout the United States.

Five counts of DISPLAYING OBSCENE DISREGARD FOR FREE SPEECH as reflected in 1995 Oklahoma City charges against Planet Comics retailers John Hunter and Michael Kennedy. The logic behind the charges was that the naughty images contained in certain comic books published by Verotik, Boneyard Press and Eros Comics are harmful to minors and, since everyone knows comics are for kids, any store selling such titles is, ipso facto, harming children. The fact that the comics in question were segregated in the store and kept out of the reach of children did not apparently register on local authorities.

One count of CREATING A PUBLIC NUISANCE when five police officers entered the Planet Comics store without warning, forced customers to leave and prohibited store personnel from answering their own phones.

Numerous counts of ARMED ROBBERY as police officers removed boxes of comic books, as well as computer equipment and files from the store.

One count of VIOLATION OF FAMILY VALUES AND DISRUPTION OF DOMESTIC HARMONY as evidenced by the broken marriage of one retailer in the wake of the bad publicity and financial hardships resulting from the long prosecution of the Planet Comics owners. The courtship and marriage of the prosecutor and the arresting officer during this same period is not a mitigating factor in any way.

Also charged with the repeat offense of ILLITERATE, STONE-DUMB, REDNECK PANIC IN THE FACE OF ANY CULTURAL WORK MORE SOPHISTICATED THAN THE ANDY GRIFFITH SHOW, as evidenced by the same community's later confiscation of Volker Schlondorff's award-winning film adaptation of Günther Grass' The Tin Drum.

WIZARD

Somewhere along the line, somebody got the idea in their head to create a magazine that not only celebrated the concept of fandom for fandom's sake - but worked damned hard to perpetuate the same - to keep fandom at its least intellectual, least thought-provoking, and altogether bottom-dwelling level. In 1991, the comics industry at large said "Hello" to Wizard, and "Good-bye" to its sense of integrity. It gives me giddy pleasure to indict Wizard Magazine on the charge of...

ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT.

When Wizard first broke into the comics market, at the hands of Gareb Shamus, calling itself "The Guide to Comics," it seemed no more than an ambitious attempt to give Overstreet some nice, healthy competition: a price guide with some fairly innocuous mainstream filler material. This was the Chromium Age, after all, and readers desperately needed a source that could tell them how much last month's hologram-covered premiere issue had jumped in price (the eighties having been no kinder to comics aesthetics than to hairstyles or sitcoms). Can't blame Wizard for filling a gap.

Well, it's eight years later, and the industry, though in a recession, has managed, at least, to begin to shake the speculators and the gimmick-of-the-week trend so prevalent a few years back. Wizard, however, now calling itself, "The Comics Magazine," has succeeded in holding on to this particular albatross of the industry, perpetuating the ideal that the flashier the work, the more mediocre the writing, the better. If I might be permitted a quote from February 1999's "How to Draw Wolverine" feature, Leinil Francis Yu sums up the Wizard philosophy: "Now you're ready for your pinup. This is what it all comes down to." Pinup, indeed.

Is Wizard funny? Sure, it's an entertaining magazine. There's no question. It's mindless fluff. It doesn't require you to think about anything but what the next hot property is going to be. "Open up Wizard, and turn off your mind." Might as well be honest.

Worse, it has set itself up as the next hot property. Free "gifts," multiple covers, polybagging. Aren't you waiting for mail-in Gareb Shamus action figure offers? Be honest; it wouldn't shock you.

In Shamus' premiere editorial, "Welcome to the Complete Comics Magazine..." he professed:

"I believe that in your journeys throughout the comic book world, information is hard to assemble. You must use one source for new comics, one for your values, one for your interviews, and so on. Now, all under one cover, you get it all. Original artwork by your favorite artists, interviews with today's top personalities, previews of new unreleased books, plus much much more."

The idea that Wizard ("the Complete Comics Magazine") contains everything you could possibly need to know about comics is enough to give anyone the cold sweats. Indeed, Wizard's content has steadily moved away from anything remotely to do with art (After all, who needs to know anything about real comic art when you can crank out a steady succession of splash pages?), and has long since propelled itself to the forefront of promoting comics as a springboard for films and action figures. How many kids currently reading comics are thinking to themselves, "If I could come up with the next marketable product, I could be rich! Yeah, I'd have to draw comics for a while before Universal Pictures calls me up, but it would be worth it!" Isn't it frightening that to the next generation of mainstream comics artists, Wizard might very well be what comics is?

Is Wizard controversial? No. Certainly not. It's tough to be controversial when your magazine is devoted to perpetuating the sales of already hot-ticket items. But does Wizard pander? No, that's CBG's job. Wizard doesn't need to pander when it's turning its readers into zombies. Has Wizard given up its principles? No, it never proclaimed to have any to begin with. That is to say, a magazine dependant on the mainstream comics industry flooding the market with pubescent, testosterone-induced material has whatever principles the mainstream press needs them to have. Does Wizard have an opinion on anything? Possibly, but if they do, you can be pretty certain it was someone else's first.

Perpetuating the same base mentality that inundates the Internet at large, and adopting the flashy, garish MTV design that Gen-Xers seem to feel they require in large doses, Wizard's unfortunately high-profile position as the comics industry's ambassador to newstands everywhere is an embarrassment to any of us who have invested any interest whatsoever in the comics art form. Think about it, people: this is what Joe Average sees on the stands of Barnes and Nobles; this is what Joe Average currently equates with comics as a whole! With such introspective articles as an investigation into how much reality there is to Iron Man's armor and "Ringsides," a five-page debate over which is the better Green Lantern, is it any wonder that near every headline in mass media dealing with comics begins with the tag, "Pow! Bam! Zing!..."? Wizard exists as part of the front line of the comics industry and, as such, has a responsibility to the art form. The vast majority of stuff pumped out by the mainstream is bad enough - do we really need an high-profile, independent party out there promoting it?

Now, let's take a second to take a look at... ahem... Wizard's news pages. Rare, it needs to be said, is any Wizard newsbit not reporting a mainstream artist's latest project, or, God help us, what a spandex-clad character's latest antics are. A headlining news item from a few months back reported Magneto's attempt to take over a country as a new base of power, and then there was the ongoing "X-Men Watch." Question: What kind of person calls this news? Answer: The people that Wizard tells it's news. Any attempts at actual investigative news, are as weak as (if not directly lifted from) company press releases. Is there anything more shameful?

Why yes, of course there is, and Wizard found it. More shameful than regurgitating press releases is calling items like Wizard's long-running items, "We Looked It Up" and "Thumbing Off," news. The former defines, for the avid reader, such obscure comics-related words as "Asgard" and notes the current careers of such obscure creators as Fabian Nicieza and John DeMatteis (despite that any career changes would get huge coverage elsewhere in the newspages, anyway); the latter is a short review list of the current likes and dislikes of the Wizard staff. And then, there're the polls ("What is the Crappiest Halloween Candy?" and "Who is the Sexiest Female Character in Comics?" were recent features), The Buzz Bin (Wizard's rumor mill), and Wizard's high-profile coverage of the Dawn look-alike contest. With material like this, is it any wonder the comics industry is ghettoized?

Probably the one thing we can never knock Wizard for is its service as an ongoing source for Viva! material, second only to Diamond Previews.

Dave Sim

CHARGE #1: BOOSTING SPECULATION BOOM IN 1992

In a masterful 1992 speech to Diamond retailers, Sim advocated the speculator frenzy as a positive development in the comics market and one that ought to be vigorously exploited by all forward-looking retailers. As subsequent events proved, he also managed, through his natural gift for the boosterism of all the myths that are required to prop up the untenable thesis that greed is the benevolent engine of the marketplace, to be the worst profit in the history of comics. Here's what he said:

"Five months ago, at the first stop on the Tour, in San Fransisco, Alpha Flight #106 had just shipped and was sold out in virtually every store in the Bay area within hours. Last week, in Minneapolis, at the Great Eastern Convention, I saw a copy with a price tag of $30. Many of you will cringe and groan inwardly when I say that. There is an embarrassment in the direct market about the investment speculation side of our business: a shame that comes naturally to the liberal minded and the idealistic: a sense of participating in something unsavory and greedy. I don't see it that way. I never have and I never will. Far from something seedy and underhanded, it is something very powerful and of great value. I could ask everyone in this room what they would, or are selling Alpha Flight #106 for, Six dollars, $10, $12.50, $15. Three dollars. Some of you would price it according to its Wizard Magazine listing; some according to the Overstreet Update, some at half what the guy down the street is charging. What is extraordinary about this is the autonomy you have in choosing your own price. Each person who owns a store controls reality in that store. You don't have to phone head office to ask how much to charge for Alpha Flight #106, you don't receive instuctions to raise or lower your price from some distant authority... Larry Marder informs me that there are stores in Chicago selling Free Cerebus for six dollars. Supply and demand does not apply in the comic book marketplace. Supply and desire does. You want it, it's six bucks. You don't want it, someone else will give me six bucks. If you can get it for three bucks down the street, get it for three bucks down the street. If they are a Cerebus fan/collector/investor and it is the only copy they've ever seen, the odds are they will pay the six bucks. Desire overcomes reason.

"Viewed one way, the way that causes most of you to be embarrassed by this side of your business, this is grasping, swinish, piggy capitalism. Viewed another way, the way I see it, it represents business confidence, optimism in our future, a tangible manifestation in hard currency of a belief in ourselves and what we, comic book creators, publishers, distributors, warehouse personnel, retailers, fans, collectors, readers, and investors have built from nothing into a $100,000,000 a year industry in less than three decades."

CHARGE #2: EARLY BOOSTERING OF IMAGE

Refer to indictment of Image.

CHARGE #3: MISOGYNIST RANT

Comics has long been a boys' club. When it came to women, this carried with it either an ineptitude that was the result of arrested development or, at worst, outright misogynistic attitudes. Sim further coarsened public discourse by penning a jeremiad against half the human race in 1995. A few highlights:

"The Male Light is jeopardized on all fronts. The Devouring Rapacious Female Void is not a thing to be taken lightly, to be explained away, to be rationalized into neutrality."

"There are no rules to Emotional Argument. This was the fundamental reason, I believe, that women were (rightly) denied the vote for so long."

"After a divorce the average male standard of living rises... the average female standard of living drops... This was presented as living proof of the Global Economic Structure. I think the more rational explanation is that the excision of a five to six foot leech form the surface of a hman body means that that body is going to have more of its own blood in its own veins."

"There have been many historical precedents for women withdrawing sexual favors in order to assert their Power. I venture to say that if you want to find the leading cause of Domestic Violence the subject is worth looking into."

CHARGE #4: BOOSTERING SELF-PUBLISHERS AT THEIR EXPENSE.

Last but not least, we can attribute to Sim the introduction of a ruthless form of realpolitik to a segment of the industry -- the outspoken creator -- that was theretofore based on a recognizable morality. It was always my contention that Sim's championship of self-publishers was a disingenuous disservice to all concerned. He finally admitted this in his 1997 Cerebus Guide to Self-Publishers. In the "Preamble," he wrote:

"...I was amused by the shamelessness of my politicking. Shameless because, as my Legion of Critics have pointed out, I made it sounds as if self-publishing were the land of milk and honey and all other cartooning venues wre analagous to Dante's inner circles of hell. Well, such is the nature of politics. Having accepted that my self-chosen mission was to counter the prevailing industry view that self-publishing was only marginally different from 'vanity press' publishing and that success in such environs has the same odds as buying a lottery ticket, I was aware that the wise political animal (and I fancied myself as wise -- or at least clever -- political animal) counters extreme propaganda and disinformation on the part of his political opponents with likewise extreme propaganda and disinformation at his own end of the political spectrum.

"...Let me admit to the great amusement which accomopanied my efforts in those years. Aware as I was that I was behaving in a completely unscrupulous fashion (all politics being, in some small or large measure, unscrupulous), I very much enjoyed the wildfire which caught and swept across the direct market in large part because of my absolutist position. Even as I shastised myself for the real human suffering that resulted (how many young men and women, in good faith, have bankrupted or nearly bankrupted themselves, their families, and their friends in the name of bringing their work to market -- work which had not a snowball's chance in hell of achieving any measure of success? Dozens, unquestionably. Hundreds, very possibly. Thousands is not out of the realm of possibility.) I excused myself for this because of my certainty that the end... justified the means.

"...I was going to 'campaign for only a period of time. So long as there came an endpoint to my efforts, I would allow myself a degree of latitude in crossing ethical boundaries..."

And so on.

Marvel

Marvel is like the Teflon Don of the comics industry. We all know they've done some pretty dastardly things, but it's rare than anyone calls them on it. And even when someone does, it's generally settled quietly, and brushed under the carpet. Time to lift up the carpet and see what's underneath.

CHARGE #1: REGICIDE

Perhaps the most widely known, and most unforgiveable blot on Marvel's record, is the heinous treatment of Jack "King" Kirby, the very man who helped to found and forge the comics giant. A number of issues arose in the Kirby war, ranging from credit for creation of characters, ownership of copyrights, and the return of an enormous back-log of original art.

Despite having long since adopted a "goodwill" system for returning their artists' work, Marvel held tight to the work of their most famous artist. "We own it entirely," said Shooter, then-Editor-in-Chief of Marvel. Insisting on redundancy, Marvel acquiesced to return the art, under the condition that Kirby sign an additional acknowledgment of Marvel's copyright ownership over the art (something no other creator was asked to do).

When presented with the artwork release form by Marvel, Kirby insisted upon a special "condition" before signing the release, that he be given credit as sole creator of certain of Marvel's characters, including Spider-Man, the Fantastic Four and the Hulk. Marvel's response? That it was not prepared to accede to Kirby's demand that he be credited as sole creator in cases where it is not justified - despite that Stan Lee, for decades, has been unjustly credited as sole creator in numerous cases where he clearly was not (even going so far as to credit Lee at one point as sole creator of Captain America, despite his utter lack of involvement in any way in the creation of the character). The further irony in Marvel's demand that Kirby sign away copyright ownership before being given a co-creatorship tag should did not go unnoticed by the world at large

Marvel's comment on their conduct? "We have behaved impeccably," said Jim Shooter, who was promptly fired a year later under a veil without comment from Marvel.

Eventually, Marvel did return just under 2,000 pages of Kirby's art (a far cry short of the approximate 13,000 pages Kirby did for Marvel over the years), the rest reportedly either "lost" or "stolen." How many Marvel and former-Marvel employees have original Kirby art on their walls, I wonder.

CHARGE #2: HIGHWAY ROBBERY & BUGGERY

Still fresh in the minds of Marvel's freelancers is its notice sent out just in time for Christmas last year, demanding return of overpaid funds stretching back nearly a decade. With not so much as a "whoops," or a "we're sorry for the inconvenience," Marvel's letters littered the professional comics community in an attempt to bail water from the boat then sinking into bancruptcy.

From a whopping $4000.00 bill to a measily $53 bucks reportedly overpaid to Steve Gerber, Marvel's me-first attitude in punishing those associated with it for its own screw-ups continues to endear it to the comics community at large.

CHARGE #3: TREASON

Not satisfied with merely screwing its creators, Marvel set its sights on bigger fish: the retailers and the distributors.

In March, 1994, Marvel sent out copies of its "Marvel Mart" catalogs, inserting the first batch in a handful of its May cover-dated comics. Offering not only its regular fare, but also comics, trade paperbacks, and related merchandise only available through the catalog, Marvel seriously threatened the already dismal customer base of retailers. If this weren't bad enough, Marvel took the opportunity to hammer another nail in the retailer coffin with an illustration in "Marvel Mart." After capturing some shady characters lurking around a comic shop shoplifting off the racks, Spider-Man comments, "This shopping thing is way too dangerous!"

Ironically, although the Marvel Mart situation was, at the time, characterized by Capital as "more of a series of dumb mistakes than of a Machiavellian master plan aimed at wiping out direct market retailers," in December of 1994, illegally terminating its dealership agreement with Capital City Distribution, Marvel purchased Heroes World in an attempt to set up a monopolistic distribution of its publications. Announcing that Marvel products would be henceforth exclusively distributed by Heroes World, and that Heroes World would carry no other publishers, Marvel effectively made it next to impossible for other distributors to operate in the black while still carrying a full selection of Marvel titles - and what a selection of titles!

CHARGE #4: TERMINAL BAD TASTE

With a spectacular history of buggering its artists, is it any wonder that the creators and creations it currently promotes are among the worst in the history of comics? Besides beginning that nasty trend in universe-wide cross-overs with Contest of Champions in 1982, Marvel's position in the industry has allowed it to flood the market with year after year of aesthetic misdirection. The company itself calls this trend "Marvelution," announcing at one point that "Every year the comic book business changes. And every year Marvel adapts." Let's trace the history of Marvelution over the past fifteen years:

• 1986: Its answer to DC's series of successful and critically acclaimed graphic novels, Marvel launches The New Universe.
• 1987: Alpha Flight writer Bill Mantlo quotes Jim Shooter as stating, "There are no gays in the Marvel Universe."
• 1988: Beginning its first serious foray into film in years, Marvel releases the made-for-TV instant-classic, The Incredible Hulk Returns, and the equally abhorrent animated series, Marvel Action Hour.
• 1989: Captain America, the movie.
• 1990: Jumping on the speculator-wagon, Marvel prints McFarlane's Spider-Man #1 with four variant covers, each in a slightly more limited quantity than the previous. Also in 1990, continuing a brilliant career in movie adaptations, Dolph Lundgren stars in The Punisher.
• 1991: A double-bill signaling the beginning of the end for Marvel's aesthetic taste on a company-wide level: X-Force and X-Men.
• 1992: A particularly bad year, and always at the forefront of bad taste, Marvel launches Marvel U.K. and the 2099 series. Also in 1992, in another cowardly move by the powers-that-be, Alpha Flight member Northstar's fight with AIDS is revealed to be nothing but an easily cureable fictional space-disease.
• 1993: Another foray into imprinting, Marvel launches Heavy Hitters, in all its foil-embossed glory.
• 1994: The film so terrible they wouldn't release it: Fantastic Four; and Marvel's first, and worst, move into retcon revamps: the Spider-Man clone.
• 1995: Despite an earlier, much better pilot, Marvel reaches new lows in animated cartoons with X-Men: The Animated Series.
• 1996: Trying to make life easy for the few of the late-'80s speculators still buying comics, Marvel revamps each of its flagship titles in "Heroes Reborn." To cap it off, Marvel hands Captain America over to Rob Liefeld, launching the series with, yes, another four variant covers.
• 1997: Heroes Reborn: The Return.
• 1998: Marvel chickens out on its non-Code horror imprint.
• 1999: Marvel's newest abysmal imprint, M-Tech, threatens to swamp another already-overloaded genre. Also, the offspring of, get this, Wolverine and Elektra: Wild Thing (ironically, also the title of one of those failed Marvel U.K. series).

Comic Buyer's Guide

AGGRAVATED PUFFERY AND PREMEDITATED PANDERING TO ADVERTISERS as evidenced by news features that purport to satisfy reader demand for more stories about the life of comic-bag supplier and longtime advertiser Bill Cole.

IMPERSONATING A NEWS MAGAZINE - CBG postures itself as the comics industry's newspaper of record but devotes no more energy to actually covering the news than it takes to re-type press releases.

PERSISTENT PROMOTION OF CONCEPTS HARMFUL TO THE PUBLIC GOOD including the fetishizing of collectibles and the promise of rising back-issue prices.

RECKLESS DISREGARD FOR THE INTERESTS OF ITS OWN READERS as evidenced by entire columns devoted to Topo Gigio and Mark Evanier's in-flight dinners.

Stan "The Man" Lee

Oh ho ho, True Believers, in the wake of over 30 years of hucksterism and buffoonery, The Comics Journal court has no choice but to charge Stan Lee with one count of allowing self-satire to become reality, one count of counterfeit relevance, and one massive count of ungovernable greed in the hogging of credit.

COUNT ONE: ALLOWING SELF-SATIRE TO BECOME REALITY

Many Stan Lee apologists would argue that the persona Stan has created and perpetuated over the last four decades is an example of ironic self-effacement: the carnival barker who is fully aware of how absurd he appears, yet continues to hollowly shill product with a wink and a nudge. Well, his faux-hip rat pack routinewas tired in 1963, but it is beneath contempt in 1999. It is no accident that Martin Scorsese outfitted Paul Newman in oversized, gold-framed, rose-tinted eyeglasses and a moustache for his 1986 sequel to The Hustler, The Color of Money. The latter film's "Fast" Eddie Felson was depicted as an anachronism, a has-been feigning some kind of hepcat machismo. Much of what made that role great was Newman's interpretation of the character. A former cock-of-the-walk realizing that he could still have an impact, albeit of a different kind: it consisted of him relaxing into a more reserved life with the Helen Shaver character, selling liquor and playing pool on the circuit.

Much as the TCJ tribunal would like to credit Stan wih that kind of self-awareness, his latest foray into creativity - and his only foray into creativity in the past, oh, 20 years or so (not counting his Moebius-drawn regurgitation of a Silver Surfer story in, what was it, 1990?) is the sorry, sad internet entity known as StanLee.net (and, of course, its capitalist-minded brother, StanLeeMedia). Debuting over a year ago, Stan promised us new heroes to exploit and market. Of course, no one has seen any of these new heroes (other than "Krog," a large, monstrous biped covered in/composed of rock. Sound familiar?), despite Stan's claims that he has the "top talent in the industry" working for him. What "top talent?" Jim Salicrup? I have my own idea what happened when they asked Stan for all these new characters: He signed the papers, said "a few new characters shouldn't be a problem at all! That oughtta take a day or two," then he realized that his creative energy, his spark, his bread and butter - otherwise known as Jack Kirby - was no longer available to do the creating for him. Uh-Oh!

COUNT TWO: COUNTERFEIT RELEVANCE

Stan has endorsed so many books which he clearly hasn't so much as seen, let alone read, that the mind boggles. How many publications about or containing comics have suffered the taint of Stan's "endorsement"? An example: on the jacket copy of Al Jaffee's collection of Mad Magazine "fold-in" covers, Stan says "My fingers hurt from all the folding!" The book, however, is laid out so as to eliminate any need for folding: the left-hand page features the unfolded complete painting, the right-hand page features the folded, gag version. Stan didn't have to fold a single page, but as we all know, Stan never even saw the book.

COUNT THREE: UNGOVERNABLE GREED AS EVIDENCED IN THE HOGGING OF CREDIT

There is an old, familiar body of evidence lurking behind this particular indictment, one which has been well-documented in the pages of The Jack Kirby Collector and elsewhere.

Invoking Jack Kirby in any discussion of Stan Lee's greed is hardly newsworthy. It was during the Kirby art debacle of the '80s that most of us learned just how empty a shell Stan Lee is. Never mind the fact that Stan has claimed sole creator credit on everything from Captain America to Thor; never mind the fact that all the Marvel cartoons, TV shows and movies over the past thirty years or so have carried Stan Lee creator credits (with notable exceptions being last year's Surfer cartoon, on which Kirby was given a posthumous ((and therefore royalty-free)) co-creator credit after a deluge of mail from fans demanded it, and the Blade movie, which is embroiled in lawsuits between Marv Wolfman and the house of idea)S Stan was curiously silent during Jack's battle for his art, and that Stan knowingly took - and continues to take - credit for characters he either co-created with Kirby and Ditko, or had nothing to do with, such as Captain America, The Silver Surfer, and Thor. It's a small matter to inform Marvel management that a "created by" credit is inaccurate. No one is denying Stan's impact on Marvel, and comics at large, so why does he continue to remind people of his stature? Either his ego is alarmingly delicate (note toupee and Rolls Royce, Stan-fans), or he actually believes all the press he got in 1966.

Just because someone uses so-called irony to continually refer to himself as greedy and credit-hogging does not mean that those descriptions are wholly inaccurate. In a "Stan's Soapbox" dated February 1999, Stan is asked "Who actually came up with the famous saying, ''Nuff said'?" His response in full: "I'd like to take credit for it, but I think I read it somewhere when I was a kid and it just kinda stuck in my memory. But though I didn't create it, I guess you can credit me for popularizing it. You know me, I'll take any credit that isn't nailed down!" 'Nuff said indeed. The great irony here isn't in Stan's supposed self-effacement even as he happily takes full creator credit for all of silver age Marvel, but rather that this self-aggrandizing huckster is the same man who wrote the oft-repeated phrase "with great power comes great responsibility." What has Stan done with his great power? When his greatest collaborator needed an influential ally, Stan turned his back. When it came time to give credit where it's due, Stan took all that he was entitled to, and more. That's not great responsibility, that's greed and hypocrisy on a mass scale.

DC

INTELLECTUAL POLLUTION

Introduced into the world that crabgrass of genres the super hero comic book and is therefore largely responsible for the comics field's reputation for infantile pap. It should come as no surprise, then, that DC's most prominent imprint, Vertigo, is entirely responsible for the popularization of the current trend of hackneyed, semi-literate comics for hiply depressed black-clad teenagers.

Ironically, perhaps, DC manages to appeal to, and perpetuate, the wearers-of-black, while still publishing comics about animals in capes. For evidence, check out DC's new "JLApe" stories. Those days of Krypto and Bat-Hound are not behind them, apparently. Let's hope that doesn't beget yet another unfortunate DC-originated trend.

In response to their exclusivity deal with Diamond, DC must be charged with both first degree murder and conspiracy to engage in monopolistic practices. Poor Capital City Distribution could not have foreseen the savagery of DC's mortal assault on its collective person: like a possum caught in the headlights of a speeding semi, they may have wondered, "What will happen next?" By going exclusive, DC started the stampede to the exclusivity now enjoyed by Diamond--and, in addition, structured this deal in such a way that in a mere year or two, they will be allowed to purchase Diamond, their own distributor, outright. The last time DC owned the nation's premier comics distribution franchise was in the early sixties, during the ascendancy of Marvel... they allowed Marvel 8 titles. If they wanted to add a new title, an old one had to go. So, retailers, independents, self-publishers -- ladies and gentlemen of the jury -- if you think Diamond is bad now, how does a DC-owned distribution monopoly strike you? For their bestial, sneering brutality and eye toward monopoly, the prosecution suggests -- no, demands -- capital punishment.

Image

Attempting to charge Image as a whole with any crimes or misdemeanors creates a convoluted legal mess: the original perpetrators have either been apprehended by Marvel or DC (or both, as in the case of Erik Larsen), been deported from comics into the territory of the action figure (as in the case of Todd McFarlane), or have fled the scene [of the affrontery], regressing to the petty infractions of juvenile delinquency (as in the case of Rob Liefeld). However, despite the difficulties inherent in prosecuting this amorphous entity, The Comics Journal feels it is necessary to charge Image with: ONE COUNT OF CORRUPTING THE INNOCENCE OF A GENERATION OF YOUNG COMICS READERS WITH CHROMIUM-PLATED SPECULATION, ONE COUNT OF WORK-FOR-HIRE HYPOCRISY, ONE COUNT OF ACCESSORY TO THE HOMICIDE OF A DISTRIBUTOR, and 17 COUNTS OF CRIMINAL NEGLIGENCE FOR THE LOSS OF SALEABLE PROPERTIES.

The first count -- CORRUPTING THE INNOCENCE OF A GENERATION OF YOUNG COMICS READERS WITH CHROMIUM-PLATED SPECULATION -- is well-nigh indisputable. Without either decency or good taste, certain Image "houses" flaunt their disregard for comics as an art by artificially inflating the "collector value" of individual issues via alternative covers, foil-stamping and other such gimmickry. Without naming names--okay, it's Top Cow -- this court finds no alternative but to throw the gold-embossed, hologram-covered book at Image for instigating and perpetrating speculator fever.

The second charge, ONE COUNT OF WORK-FOR-HIRE HYPOCRISY, is particularly telling. Image was supposedly formed as an alternative to the corporate greed sweatshop policy at Marvel. Yet, at first opportunity, multiple Image founding members shirked their duties as creators for favor of the same work-for-hire practices. The difference, of course, is that McFarlane, Lee Liefeld and company were stroking the checks, not cashing them. Their policies changed as quickly as their perspective, and the result is that Todd McFarlane -- arguably the most vocal proponent of Image, and probably the most successful Image "creator," as evidenced by his ludicrous multi-million-dollar purchase of some baseballs -- has not been actively involved in comics production for years. His Spawn books, KISS comics, Ozzy comics and the unforgettable Cy-Gor are all written, drawn, inked and edited by work-for-hire lackeys.

As for the third count -- ACCESSORY TO THE HOMOCIDE OF A DISTRIBUTOR -- there is no alternative to a stern sentence. Certainly, it was DC that dealt Capital City a fatal blow, but it was Image's choice to go exclusive to Diamond that served to put the distributor under, beyond any hope of defibrilation. Image should be thankful that there are no signs of premeditation on their part: their actions were clearly driven by cowardess and avarice, so they are charged not with conspiracy, but as a mere accessory to the murder.

As for the final charge -- 17 COUNTS OF CRIMINAL NEGLIGENCE FOR THE LOSS OF SALEABLE PROPERTIES -- the only argument put to the court is in the form of the titles of the very properties themselves. In no particular order, these former Image properties, now presiding elsewhere, are: Supreme, Glory, Youngblood, Desperados, Deathblow, Divine Right, Grifter, Wetworks, Wild C.A.T.S. , Crimson, Leave it to Chance, Gen 13, Darkchylde, Danger Girl, Battlechasers,Bone, and Astro City.

Kitchen Sink Press

The ignominious saga of Kitchen Sink Press from 1993 to present is an object lesson in how an independent publisher with its own recognizable point of view can emasculate, and ultimately extinquish, itself by adopting the same values to which it has traditionally stood in contrast -- all the while acting under the delusion that all the compromises, Vichy-like collaborations, and incremental adoption of commercial values is all part of a clever scheme to simultaneously reap extravagant material rewards while maintaining your integrioty -- in short, to beat the system, to eat your cake and have it, too.

In a story that could have been titled "And Here My Troubles Began..." it was announced in 1993 that KSP bought Kevin Eastman's Tundra Publishing. As is so often the case when large ambition meets large money, the first sign that things did not bode well was that the first casualty of this corporate transaction was the truth when the nature of the transaction was misrepresented, obfuscated, indeed, lied about.

Although the press was told (ballyhooed may be more accurate) that Eastman's only connection to the new KSP was that of a contributing artist, he in fact owned 51% of it -- which is only right insofar as he invested an additional $2 million into the company that purportedly bought his.

There was an immediate, not say sinister, sea change in the priorities of the new company: as soon as big money was at stake and big profits a necessity, a small, independent comics publisher tried to become a media player, moved from the inexpensive boondocks to the high-rent East Coast, doubled its overhead, opened offices in Hollywood, spent money like water, and pursued synergy through TV and movie deals (all to no evident avail). Predictably, the more time and energy devoted to Hollywood deal-making and networking, the less time and energy there was to pursue an editorial vision.

After blowing through a small fortune in less than a year -- the amount is in dispute, but it was reportedly between $1 and $2 million -- the new company had to rope investors in who would pump more money into the company, which would in turn obligate the company to ratchet up its profit goals in order to satisfy the avaricious requirements of the investors. In a scenario that could've been written by Preston Sturges and directed by Oliver Stone, the investors eventually decided that KSP was a black hole and bailed, which meant new investors had to be found and a way devised to stiff creditors and reorganize the company. Or something like that. The laws dictating American business practices were accomodating to these needs.

At this point there was nothing much left of Kitchen Sink Press except its name and a reputation hanging by a 10-year-old thread. The publishing arm of KSP is now gone, and the candy division -- Kitchen Konfectionary -- has more recently changed its name to the wittier True Confections.

The devolutionary cultural and political ecology of a deterministic, market-driven ethos that took hold of comics in the '90s is confirmed by certain aspects of the fall-out, e.g., Will Eisner and Scott McCloud are now being published by DC Comics.

Following the reading of the charges and discussion with the surprisingly ample audience (standing room only), members of the peanut gallery were invited to make nominations for the 10th Enemy of Comics. Among the contenders were:

KEVIN EASTMAN
ALAN MOORE
EROS COMIX
READERS
RETAILERS (for making sure quality material is unavailable)
DEAN AND JAN MULLANEY (of Eclipse) for ripping off creators
DYNAMIC FORCES
ANOTHERUNIVERSE.COM
STEVE GEPPI

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