JimShooter.com – Page 19 – Writer. Creator. Large mammal.

This part of the story hasn’t ever been told.

I was hired by Editor in Chief Marv Wolfman in December of 1975. My first day on the job as “associate editor” was the first working day of the new year, Monday, January 5, 1976.

Marv lasted only three more months or so before leaving to become a contract writer-editor. Marv said he quit. President Jim Galton later told me otherwise. But, be that as it may, Marv exited gracefully, or was allowed to.

The plan was for Roy to return as EIC. At one point, we spoke. Where I come from, it is proper that when a new boss comes in, the assistant or assistants offer their resignations. Why? Because a new boss is likely to want to bring in his own assistants, and would rather not have to go through a messy process of firing people or tolerating people he or she doesn’t want. I told Roy I’d leave voluntarily if he preferred, and that if that was the case, I’d appreciate being given freelance work. Roy said, no, I could I stay. He told me, however, that there were a number of people who had to go, and a few he intended to bring back. He named names. I won’t.

The Secret Origin of the TRANSFORMERS – Part 2

By Jim Shooter

On June 22, 2011

In 03 Marvel Comics, 05 Secret Origins

I failed to mention it in the previous installment, but Knickerbocker Toys was a maker of “soft” toys—that is, plush toys and girls’ toys. They produced the famous Holly Hobbie dolls, for instance. In 1983, their business was sliding, though. Mysterions was a last-ditch attempt to get into boys’ toys, obviated when Hasbro acquired them.

(ASIDE: I had the pleasure of meeting the real Holly Hobbie once, creator of the eponymous character. Brilliant, talented woman. I have an autographed copy of her book.)

Once Hasbro signed off on the treatment, we began work on the comics. I assigned the series to editor Bob Budiansky. Bob was (and probably still is) smart, hardworking, creative, organized, detail-conscious and above all a good editor.

And then I’m a little fuzzy on the details. I’ve heard that Bob says a number of names we (Marvel) proposed for the robots were rejected by Hasbro. I don’t doubt Bob, who is a solid citizen as well as a talented creator and effective editor. I just don’t remember. Maybe Bob or Jim Salicrup, if you read this, can shed some light. I don’t think I was very hands-on at that point.

At any rate, Bob eventually was pressed into service creating names and dossiers for the robots and he did a terrific job.

Meanwhile, treachery was afoot….

The Secret Origin of the TRANSFORMERS – Part 1

By Jim Shooter

On June 21, 2011

In 03 Marvel Comics, 05 Secret Origins

In 1983, a toy company approached Marvel Comics seeking development of a toy property for comics, animation and other entertainment. The toys in question were cars and other vehicles that could be opened and unfolded into ROBOTS. Very cool.The toy company was KNICKERBOCKER TOYS. They called their toy property, based on technology licensed from a Japanese company, the “MYSTERIONS.”

Marvel Comics was their second choice as a creative services provider. They had gone to DC Comics first. The executive who approached us showed us what DC had created for them. It was a comic book. He only had photocopies. I don’t believe the thing was ever printed.

It was awful. Apologies to whomever created that thing, but it was pathetic and wrong-headed to an unbelievable degree. The art was well-drawn, I’ll allow that, but the storytelling was chaotic. The story, as best one could discern it, was unnecessarily, excessively dark and violent. The dialogue was peppered with “Hells” and “damns,” and I can’t swear to it almost 30 years later, but I think there was a “bastard” or two in there.

And now, a few positive words about Marvel Financial V.P. Barry Kaplan

By Jim Shooter

On June 21, 2011

In 03 Marvel Comics

By the time I finally got Marvel’s board to agree to allow a royalty program (and that was a tough sell), DC had already announced theirs. Easy for them. Only three or four DC titles sold enough copies to qualify for royalties under their plan, and one, Superman, just barely, because royalties started after the first 100,000 copies. Teen Titans was their number one book and it sold roughly 175,000 a month. So, their exposure was minimal. Unless sales increased dramatically, their program would cost them almost nothing. As I’ve mentioned before, Vince Colletta once showed me three DC royalty checks that did not total one dollar. They were hoping that their plan would help them steal talent from Marvel, which would theoretically boost sales, in which case they’d be happy to pay out some royalty money.

Meanwhile, at Marvel, our line AVERAGE was over 200,000. EVERY Marvel title would pay royalties from the inception of our plan, assuming we matched DC. Even Dazzler sold 140,000 copies a month. From inception, if sales stayed the same, our plan would take around a million dollars off of the bottom line. Make that make sense to a room full of business sharks who don’t give a rat’s ass about anything but the bottom line, I dare you. But I did.

Rooting Out Corruption at Marvel – Part Four of a Bunch

By Jim Shooter

On June 20, 2011

In 03 Marvel Comics

Trickeration

Once the mystery of the benevolent lapping scam was solved, Financial V.P. Barry Kaplan made attempts to recover some of the money. A few creators who had benefitted from the advance-vouchering that had been going on actually worked off their debt, or paid the money back. Very few. Barry judged many to be hopeless cases, gave up on them and wrote the debt off. One creator allowed us to publish a story to which he owned all rights as a make-good for what he’d been advanced. A few of the clever and sleazy types, including one artists’ studio owner, realized that with John Verpoorten dead, she could simply deny everything, insist that all the work that had been paid for but never done had, indeed, been done and delivered. She couldn’t help it if inept Marvel comics had “lost” the work. She got away clean.

But anyway…. We thought voucher scamming was done with. Under the new rules, editors signed vouchers and accounting handed out the checks. No more opportunity for lapping.

Ah, but we were dealing with creative people, remember. And a few of them got creative about ways to circumvent the safeguards.

Plagiarism

By Jim Shooter

On June 20, 2011

In 03 Marvel Comics

This exchange took place among the comments about “An Airplane Ride or Three with Herb Trimpe.” It addresses instances of plagiarism by Bill Mantlo. I post it here again in response to several requests.

dailypop said…

“Speaking of the Hulk I was wondering if you could shed some light where the idea of the child abuse story came from. There has been much speculation about this from different people including Barry Windsor Smith. I have never heard your side of the story.”

Dear dailypop,

Barry came to me with a completely penciled and written graphic novel. It was the about the development of the “mighty, raging fury” inside Bruce Banner, who, he revealed, was the product of an abusive home. I looked it over. I thought it was brilliant, one of the best comics stories I’d ever seen. I offered Barry a contract and an advance. He turned me down — temporarily. He proposed to finish the thing — then, if I would agree to publish it as created, no alterations whatsoever, he would sign a contract and take the money. I was willing to agree to that in writing on the spot, but he said, no, when it’s finished. Okay. Fine by me. I already knew, from what he’d shown me, that there’d be no problem.

ROM Comments and Answers

By Jim Shooter

On June 19, 2011

In 10 Questions / Answers

Michael Netzer left the following comment on The Coming of ROM: A Knight’s Tale:

Dear Jim,

You remain one of the more gracious people in the comics world. Your sense of fairness and goodwill towards creators have inscribed memories of one of the more engaging and steadfast people I’ve ever had the pleasure to work with.

Those were strange days indeed. And though the strangeness seems to still haunt from time to time, it channels a little more succinctly these days. Certainly drawing that Rom cover the way I did was not really intended as anything against you or Marvel, but rather brought about by other things happening around me. I appreciate that you understood that back then and let me know so.

Still, looking back on it all, it’s not clear that it could have been different, or should have been, considering the cards dealt. I suppose something about embracing extreme states when they impose themselves, is part of all of our development, each in our own way. That you can sum it up today, also with a few positive words, is an uplifting indication that it wasn’t all for naught. Much appreciated, sir.

Tue: Alan Weiss was pretty close to Neal also around that time but he never went to extremes such as this. I told the story about this cover in an article some 6 years ago <http://bit.ly/keN5y9>, which shows just how out of the box things were for me in that period.

Interesting that this should come up now because I haven’t done anything like that with art since then… at least until recently. In that I’m still on the periphery of the industry and have some thoughts about some of the goings on, I found myself burning one of my drawings last week in order to make a somewhat lighthearted statement about DC’s handling of Superman in Action 900. Here’s the video. <http://bit.ly/lrNEA0> Links in its info lead to the entire story behind it. But like I said, the entire affair is also channeled towards a more succinct benefit <http://bit.ly/iozgYf> from the incident.

Portrait of Jim Shooter by Bill Sienkiewicz

By Jim Shooter

On June 17, 2011

In 12 From Storage, Uncategorized

Because you demanded it! Jim took pictures today of the portrait Bill painted for him using his new iPhone’s camera. Pardon the reflections of the kitchen in the the glass.

The Coming of ROM: A Knight’s Tale

By Jim Shooter

On June 17, 2011

In 03 Marvel Comics, 05 Secret Origins

Sometime early in 1979, Marvel Comics President Jim Galton called me to his office to discuss an opportunity to license a toy property—ROM, the Spaceknight. We’d had some success with the Micronauts, which the legendary licensing/toy genius Stan Weston had pitched to me, and I had licensed, so Galton was immediately interested in a new Parker Brothers toy that he had somehow become aware of. Galton knew nothing about comics, and couldn’t care less about them—but he was very interested in making money. If one toy property worked, why wouldn’t another?The name “ROM,” by the way, comes from Read-Only Memory. It was one of the first toys with a chip inside that allowed it to do simple tricks like making sounds and flashing lights.Galton and I flew up to Boston on the Eastern Airlines Shuttle—remember that?—and drove out to wherever Parker Brothers offices were—in a beautiful, wooded setting, as I recall—and met with their brass and licensing people. We worked out a deal. I’m certain we had a pretty standard licensing deal, except that the creator of ROM, Bing McCoy, had a significant participation. After Parker Brothers was out of the mix, I suppose we paid only Bing McCoy’s portion of the royalties.

I created the basic premise for the comic book series—the fundamental backstory (beyond what Bing and Parker Brothers had graven in stone). Bill Mantlo and whoever the editor was fleshed it out. For instance, Brandy Clark was definitely Bill’s creation, or at least he named her. On the other hand, Clairton (a small town in the Pittsburgh area, near where I grew up, transplanted for story purposes to West Virginia) and Galador are names I provided.

When Is an Art Director Not an Art Director?

By Jim Shooter

On June 16, 2011

In 03 Marvel Comics

(NOTE: I wrote this a long time ago, but it’s germane to the tales of old Marvel I’ve been telling.)

During my time at Marvel the people that held the position of Art Director were John Romita, Sr., Marie Severin (briefly), and John Romita, Sr. again. Dave Cockrum shared duties with John Romita for a while, as did Don Perlin toward the end of my tenure.

First of all, the title “Art Director” at Marvel during the 70’s and 80’s is completely misleading. It was a staff artist position. Of course, it made sense to have a really outstanding artist on staff. Things came up constantly for which a quality piece of art was needed, for presentations, PR, whatever, and if you had to track down a freelancer each time, it would be a nightmare. Stan trumped up the title “Art Director” so he could pay outstanding, versatile artist John Romita more money. The brass above Stan would never have agreed to pay a “staff artist” as much, but an “Art Director?” Sure.

Fortunately, the brass was completely ignorant of what went on in the comics creative department, so they were easily fooled. Seriously—most of the upstairs execs and the brass of parent company Cadence Industries had never opened a comic book, and they were proud to say that. Few had ever even ventured onto the floor we occupied. We scared them, I think.