...okay, here's a rundown of Marvelman history for Marvelman neophytes by a Marvelman neophyte. I should repeat that I have never actually read a single issue of the thing, because I am 27 years old and don't much like reading comics on screens.
So, okay. Best way to start is with a timeline.
1941: National Comics sues Fawcett Comics, claiming that Captain Marvel infringes on Superman. Their case is flimsy as hell, and basically consists of "He has superpowers and a secret identity."
1954: In arguably the single worst, most ignorant ruling in comics history, the judge finds in favor of National. Captain Marvel is cancelled.
(For a more in-depth look at the case, see Wikipedia's entry,
National Comics Publications v. Fawcett Publications.)
L Miller & Son, the British company that was publishing black-and-white reprints of Captain Marvel, suddenly finds itself high and dry. Writer-artist Mick Anglo creates a "new" character, Marvelman, who is exactly the same as Captain Marvel: a young reporter who transforms into a superhero by saying a magic word, who has two younger sidekicks and fights a mad scientist.
1982: Alan Moore brings back Marvelman in a British magazine called Warrior, edited by Dez Skinn, who claims to have the rights. This is the beginning of what Moore (and, later, fucking everybody) will become best known for: taking a classic superhero character and reimagining him in a darker form. It gets critical acclaim.
1985: Eclipse Comics begins reprinting Moore's Marvelman work in the US. Marvel Comics raises a stink about the name, so it's changed to Miracleman in the US; Moore vows he will never work for Marvel and, being Alan Moore, holds the grudge to this day.
1985-1990: Moore continues the series after the reprints.
1990: Moore quits Eclipse after a falling-out with the publisher. As he recounts the story years later, they've lied to him about having artist Alan Davis's permission to reprint his work, and Moore's begun to suspect they don't actually have the rights to Marvelman at all.
He passes the book along to his friend Neil Gaiman, but warns him of his concerns.
1994: Eclipse goes bankrupt, interrupting Gaiman's run in mid-arc.
1996: Todd McFarlane purchases Eclipse's creative assets, hoping to continue Miracleman.
1997: Todd McFarlane agrees to trade his rights to Miracleman to Neil Gaiman in exchange for the latter's stake in three Spawn characters the two of them co-created.
1997-2002: Gaiman, suspecting that McFarlane doesn't actually own any rights to Miracleman, backs out of the deal. (McFarlane claims Gaiman doesn't own any rights to the characters, Gaiman sues and wins, but that's another story.)
2002-2009: Gaiman and others slowly unravel the rights situation. It appears that Skinn never owned the rights to Marvelman in the first place, and in fact he was creator-owned all along. What happened is unclear -- the book Kimota! claims that Skinn had a handshake agreement with Anglo to use his character (though Moore thinks Skinn is lying) -- but it's believed that Anglo always had the rights. The book's in legal hell and can't be reprinted; Moore et al own the rights to the issues they did but not to the character.
2009: Marvel Comics buys Marvelman from Mick Anglo, who's now in his 90's and taking care of an ailing wife. Alan Moore agrees to let Marvel reprint all his work (provided his artists are onboard, which they appear to be), but requests that his name be taken off it and all his profits given to Anglo.
What happens from here is still to be seen, but Gaiman has indicated he wants to pick up where he left off.
Gotta run (I finally get a chance to write this post and it turns out I JUST BARELY do), but some more good sources are, as you might expect,
Wikipedia's Marvelman article and a recent Moore interview at mania.com (
part 1/
part 2). The interview's worth reading in and of itself; I particularly like the bit where he says if he were writing Batman today, he'd be...basically doing what they're doing in The Brave and the Bold animated series.
