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How Marvel almost put DC out of business (hint: it has nothing to do with story quality)
J David Spurlock
13 September 2016
Nice PR for Jack Kirby's line at DC. Many don't know it but, about the price change seen here, it was all part of a dastardly plan by Marvel to put DC out of business and it almost worked. Long story but, Marvel's plan was to jump price from 15 to 25-cents with page increase, knowing DC would follow. There was a paper shortage then and printers required publishers to buy a year's worth of paper in advance. What DC didn't know was, Marvel was set to reduce back to 32 pages but at 20 cents instead of 15, as soon as DC went to big books for 25-cents and DC had committed to a year of paper at the bigger page-count. The change from 15 to 20 cents also let Marvel give distributors a bit more discount. All was designed to kick DC off the spinner racks and put them out of business. Though it did not put DC out of business — thanks to Carmine Infantino and his making the Superman movie deals — it did damage their sales enough that Marvel rose to the top position for the 1st time — which they have pretty much held ever since.
Aaron Noble: Remarkably devious!
J David Spurlock: Carmine went into it in his auto-biography. It was likely the battle of his life. It really was corporate warfare. Though Carmine saved the company, WB execs blamed him for losses in the publishing division — though he salvaged the year thanks to his Superman movie deal — they terminated him. He actually pioneered their future as DC has made more on licensing than publishing ever since. Though Marvel's plan seems to have been Martin Goodman's, Carmine blamed Stan for going along with it, and their relationship was never the same afterward. Though Stan continues to respect Carmine as one of the most important men in the history of the industry, he seems to feel all is fair in the dirty world of corporate warfare. I told Carmine, "To cover yourself, you should have had WB sign off on your response game-plan in advance." He said every time he tried to, they said, "You're running it; you make the decision." (Spurlock20160913Infantino.jpg">
Michael Hill: Stan never did know why Carmine left. Does he say the same thing about Peter Paul?
J David Spurlock: He still claims he doesn't know why Ditko left. He even asked me, why Ditko left! The last time we saw each other was in the VIP greenroom at BEA in NYC on 5-30-14. The closest we came to discussing my campaign for Marvel method artists to receive co-author credit was our discussion on why Spider-Man co-creator, Steve Ditko left Marvel. We also talked about Jack Kirby, Carmine Infantino, Jerry Robinson, Harvey Kurtzman and the trouble that came from doing business with Peter Paul. Possibly the most interesting/revealing part was Stan talking about how he tried to court MAD and Little Annie Fanny creator Harvey Kurtzman, to head a humor mag or line, for Marvel. Stan said that Harvey chose to stay at Playboy in hopes that an Annie Fanny movie would be produced — which never was. Interesting to note is that when Kurtzman did work for Goodman/Timely/Atlas/Lee in the late 1940s, Kurtzman was able to keep his copyrights — on Hey Look, etc.
Michael Hill: Funny, I would have thought that Harvey would have moved heaven and earth to work with Stanley again.
J David Spurlock: I'm guessing you are being facetious. Stan had a comics-related TV show for a while. On one episode, he interviewed Harvey Kurtzman and Jack Davis. It is palpable that Stan was nervous around Harvey — or other intelligent, experienced men like Eisner, who understood the bigger publishing world outside the seedier business of comic books, and who owed nothing to Marvel — and might not go along with his takes, just for the sake of cordiality.
Michael Hill: See the Paul Wardle quote of a few days ago. I'm sure Kurtzman thought it was all in good fun.
Patrick Ford: Lee tried to rope in a bunch of high end talent in the early '70s. In addition to approaching Kurtzman he made a pitch to Will Eisner. And he tried to interest Underground talent in working for COMIX BOOK. It all either never got off the ground or flopped.
J David Spurlock: Eisner said for him to replace Stan (so Stan could move to LA), job one would be to institute a royalties to the freelance creators -- just like real publishers. One of Stan's superiors who was there, turned and stared at Stan like, "where did you get this nut -- he wants us to pay creators???"
Patrick Ford: Another pitch Lee made to Eisner was for Marvel to publish THE SPIRIT.
I'm not so sure about Eisner's claims. I keep in mind he lied about his testimony concerning the lawsuit DC filed against Fox and also the fact that he formed one of the first comic book sweat shops.
J David Spurlock: Though the plan started with Marvel, DC actually launched 25-cent books 1st. Carmine was doing what he could to stay ahead. He might have caught word of Marvel's planned increase via either their shared printer or distributors. (A similar thing happened when Atlas launched, telling creators they would be returning original art. CI immediately announced DC would begin returning art. Carmine began returns immediately, Atlas did not -- I'm not sure Atlas ever did.)
Rough Timeline: Jack goes to DC; launches 4th World books; after some issues, page-count and price jumps to 25-cents; Marvel quickly reverts to 32-pgs at 20 cents; Marvel launches MANY new titles to grab rack space (knowing many will fail after a few issues); DC launches MANY new titles to hold rack position, knowing most will fail; Deal is made for Superman I & II; Despite saving the business by holding rack space and profiting from Movie deal, CI is let go because new titles failed (as he expected); Superman film I is released with CI's name removed from credits.
Michael Hill: Nice.
Patrick Ford: I wish I could have been in J David Spurlock's shoes when Lee said he did not know why Ditko had quit. Or let's say I wish knowing what I know now I wish I had been in his shoes.
It would have been nice to be able to tell Lee that Ditko just wrote an essay where he says he quit because Lee refused to speak to him.
Of course Lee would have replied, "He said that? Can you imagine me not speaking to anyone?" And then I could have said, "Well, it's interesting because Ditko goes on and on about the fact you refused to speak to him. He says you were either too afraid, or to angry, to speak to him. There is no mistaking what Ditko is saying. His comments are very detailed and precise. Are you calling Ditko a liar?"
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