Today, at Comic-Con, Marvel did the unexpected. They announced that they purchased the rights to the legendary character Marvelman, a character originally created by Mike Anglo for British publisher Quality Communications(along with American publisher Eclipse Comics).
Marvelman has had a storied, and troubled history in the world of comics. He’s a character who can be directly connected to Superman through lawsuits. Originally, Captain Marvel was created shortly after Superman, actually eclipsed Superman in popularity for a time. DC was not very pleased with this, so they sued. Now, as I said, Captain Marvel was really popular, even moreso than the iconic Man of Tomorrow. With the loss of this character, Quality sought to reclaim some of the readers lost with the disappearance of Captain Marvel. So what do they do? They created an English replacement. His name? Marvelman, naturally. Pieces of his origin are familiar. He’s a young reporter who’s empowered by an astrophysicist(not a wizard) and imbued with powers by uttering the word “KIMOTA!”(That would be “ATOMIK!” backwards). And yes, they’re based upon atomic energy.
As I said, he’s had a storied history, and oddly enough, the most interesting part is not fictional. He ran for 346 issues in the 50’s and 60’s(in a weekly publication) until Anglo’s relationhsip with Quality ended. He then entered a sort of limbo until the great Alan Moore reinvigorated the character in the early 80’s by putting his signature touch on the character. It was filled with all the darkness we’ve come to love from Moore. he dealt with psychoses, rape, and ideas like apotheois.
However, due to Marvel Comics ownership of the name “Marvel,” he could never be called what he was best known as. Instead, he had to be known as “Miracleman.” This led to Moore proclaiming he would never work for Marvel ever again, after creating the character Captain Britain.
After Moore’s departure from the title with issue #16, Neil Gaiman took over the reins along with current Fables penciler Mark Buckingham. His run, although planned for eighteen issues, was cut short after eight, when the American publisher Eclipse Comics(the current owner of the character) folded.
Later, Todd Macfarlane purchased the assets of Eclipse, allegedly with the intent of reviving Miracleman for the new Image Comics. But there was a dispute with Gaiman, who also claimed to own the rights to the character. Which he did. Alan Moore, who owned part of the character, gave his portion to Gaiman after he departed the series. Gaiman and Macfarlane battled over the the character, until the courts ruled in Gaiman’s favor.
But today, Marvel announced that Marvelman now rests in their hands, and will be joining the Marvel Universe next year. Time can only tell how this will work. How will he co-exist with characters like The Hulk, or The Sentry? Will he be a cosmic character? Will he be an Avenger? Only time will tell, and I’m excited to see where it leads.
