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- The story of comics is full of disturbing stories, like its group of superheroes larger than life.
- DC Comics filed a lawsuit against another company originally holding Shazam, the captain at the time, for $ 4 million and eventually defeated.
- DC buys the rights of the superhero in 1972, but can not call him captain Marvel because Marvel takes the name. So, DC has named it after the magic slogan that makes him a super hero.
- In 2019, "Captain Marvel" and "Shazam!" The films are released at one month interval.
Here is the transcript of the video.
Despite his recent revival of the pop culture landscape, superheroes and comics have been with us for over 80 years. Like its larger-than-life characters, the story of comics abounds with insane stories. They are sometimes more entertaining than the heroes themselves. It also allows you to see what others do not have, like the irony of these two movie adaptations starting with only one month apart.
Although they may seem unrelated, these two heroes share a much longer story. only trial, we might not have seen any of them. To tell this story, we have to go back to where we started and start with a man you'll recognize right away.
The arrival of Superman on the comic scene was revolutionary. His debut in 1938 in "Action Comics # 1" essentially gave birth to the superhero genre and what is now called the Golden Age comics. He was everywhere, in his own national radio show, his comics, his animated shorts and his television series. It was shared in almost every format except one: movies. This is because someone else has taken his place.
Captain Marvel is another hero who made his debut in "Whiz Comics # 2" at the end of 1939 and published by Fawcett Comics. Billy Batson, a 12-year-old orphaned American journalist, can turn into an adult superhero by shouting a word. Captain Marvel was an instant hit when he launched his new independent "Captain Marvel Adventures" series, which was to sell more copies than "Superman". In fact, for a time, Captain Marvel was the most popular superhero of the time, so popular that he became the first superhero to be adapted to a movie.
Now, there is more history behind this. The studio behind the film, Republic Pictures, originally worked with DC, or at the time at National Comics Publications, to create a "Superman" image, but they already had a cartoon deal with Paramount Pictures, which forbade them to sign. So Republic Pictures picked "Captain Marvel" instead. DC was obviously not happy. Fawcett had already released "Master Man", an obvious copy of "Superman" that they stopped publishing after DC threatened to sue. They thought that "Captain Marvel" was only another imitation.
In June 1941, National Comics finally sued Fawcett for violation of copyright. It began with National Comics Publications against Fawcett Publications, one of the longest legal battles in the history of comics, which lasted more than 12 years. Here is what happened.
DC's argument was simple: Captain Marvel's main powers and characteristics were too similar to Superman and therefore constituted a violation of his copyright. Fawcett argued that, although these two characters are similar, it was not such an offense and that similar exploits had already been performed by other fictional characters such as Popeye or Tarzan.
To prove their point, National Comics had prepared a binder containing: 150 pages long with panels of their comics of "Superman" juxtaposed with similar panels of "Captain Marvel". Everything was closely watched, from their costumes, their boots, their capes, their ability to travel great distances, their ability to fly, their extraordinary strength and speed, their invincibility to bullets, shells, explosives and their secret identity.
The verdict was clear, the judge finally ruled that "Captain Marvel" was actually a copy of "Superman", but that it was Fawcett who had won the lawsuit. . All this was due to a small mistake, an error that looked like this. It was the symbol of copyright used in the 1950s. Fawcett's lawyers discovered that McClure Syndicate, the newspaper company that had published the "Superman" comics, had forgotten to place these symbols on several of their tapes and argued that DC had no copyright on "Superman", which the court accepted.
It was a devastating news for DC. It meant that he did not have Superman and that everyone could publish Superman stories without legal repercussions. It lasted more than two years. Of 160 "Superman" bands, published from January 1939 to April 1950, less than half came from Detective Comics.
DC immediately appealed and, despite the damages, the decision was reversed. The judge in the case, Learned Hand, told "Captain Marvel" a deliberate and shameless duplicate of "Superman" and asked Fawcett to stop all his publications and pay DC the damages he owes. Fawcett settles
In 1950, the golden age of comics is over. Sales dropped to unprecedented lows, and Fawcett simply decided it was not worth fighting. They paid $ 400,000 in damages, nearly $ 4 million by today's standards, and with the last issue it seemed like the end for "Captain Marvel". As you well know, this was not the case
A new publication that no one knew at the time filed the name of the mark after it was abandoned by Fawcett. This publication called Marvel. We had to repeat the sales falls and six variants before Carol Danvers, who most of us know now, badumed the role of Captain Marvel in 2012.
Meanwhile, DC Comics, looking for a new hero to add line up, bought the rights of all Fawcett's superheroes in 1972, including the original Captain Marvel. The irony was that DC could not call him Captain Marvel because Marvel had the name and decided to give him the name of the generic term that turned him into a superhero. And in 2019, these two films come out a month apart.
National comic book publications versus Fawcett's publications perfectly illustrate the dividing line between plagiarism and inspiration and the delicate balance that all artists had to find in the early years a growing pain.
If there had not been Superman, a revolution in the history of pop culture, we would not have had Shazam and he 's n'. There had not been Shazam, we would not have had Captain Marvel. Ironically, Superman, as we know, may not have existed without Shazam. In the early years, "Superman" also drew heavily on the original "Captain Marvel", as did Dr. Sivana, his sworn foe of mad science, who had led Lex to the fight against Lex, and as for the fact that Superman has the gift of flying, Captain Marvel who achieved this feat first. A Superman who can not fly, can you imagine that? Me too, and that alone could be enough reason why we need Shazam.
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