We know that Gaiman has been working directly with Marvel about this, via Marvels & Miracles, so he’s obviously onboard if the opportunity arises. Similarly we know that Joe Quesada travelled to Northampton to talk to Alan Moore several years ago, to make things right, and this is why Marvel got to do a reprint of Moore’s Captain Britain work a few years back, and again just recently, so we know Moore is also OK with Marvel, on this at least.

It seems that specifically what they’ve bought the rights to is Mick Anglo’s Marvelman, presumably meaning the comic packaged by Anglo’s Gower Street Studio for L. Miller & Son Ltd/& Co. between 1954 and 1963, a total of something in excess of 300 issues. (Actually, from about 1960 they were all reprints, but the comic ran until 1963 none the less). This is all well and good, but nobody is really interested in seeing this stuff, except as some sort of novelty item. The fact that Marvel own this is ultimately not the most exciting news there could be. Even during the height of the acclaim for Moore’s Miracleman run, nobody was clamouring for reprints of this original material.

Another question worth asking is this: Did Mick Anglo actually own Marvelman, and did he have the right to sell it to Marvel? The comics were Published by Miller, who certainly had a copyright notice in them claiming to own all the contents, but Marvelman’s creation is perhaps unique in the history of comics, so who knows what happened when it was being discussed between Anglo and Miller, and who actually owned what?

However, what this does all point towards, hopefully, is that after they’ve reprinted whatever they’re going to reprint, or done whatever is it they wish to do with Marvelman, they may then move forward to secure, and announce, their ownership of the rights to the later work, known as Miracleman, that of Alan Moore and collaborators, and then, after that, the Neil Gaiman and Mark Buckingham work, which remains unfinished. Gaiman and Buckingham produced a six-issue Golden Age storyline, which was to be followed by The Silver Age, which they were two issues into before Eclipse Comics, its then publisher, wend down, and which was eventually to be followed by The Dark Age. These unpublished but announced storylines are really what I want to see.

And one thing I noticed, while reading about this just now, and listening to Joe Quesada talking about it, is that everybody is being scrupulously careful not to mention Miracleman. It’s ‘Marvelman’ this and ‘Marvelman’ that, but no mention of Miracleman, because, presumably, this is the part of the character that is still tied up in all sorts of legal shenanigans, with Todd McFarlane apparently having bought the rights to it at the sale of Eclipse’s assets. Did Eclipse actually have the right to sell this at that time, and did Todd McFarlane actually purchase anything legally binding? This is one of the big questions that overshadows the title, and one that we’re finally going to see some sort of resolution of, it would seem.

I have been slowly researching a very long and very thorough article called Who Owns Marvelman? over the past several years, but it would seem the time has come to finally get down to writing it on a more than desultory basis! When it’s finally done, announcements will be made…