Something I don't understand

[james_davis_nicoll]

Why the change from having Jonathan Kent support Superman's career as a hero to opposing it?

Supergirl, as I recall, has always had someone trying to discourage her. In the old days it was Superman. And I cannot recall if the Danvers had any idea she was Supergirl; they may not have had the option to support or discourage her.

Not that comic book characters age in real time but if she was 16 in her first 1959 appearance, Supergirl would have become an adult at a very interesting time for women's rights in the US...

Comments

[graydon saunders (from livejournal.com)]

There are early 40s Superman animations that are out of copyright, so the straight-up image of Superman is probably defensible without the parody defense.

Then you've got the parody defense and it being a one-time thing only indirectly for sale. Making a habit of using Superman's image would (I expect) be a problem, but going after this particular comic in the US strikes me as impossible.

[sean o'hara (from livejournal.com)]

Doesn't work that way. Copyright and trademark are separate things, and a particular work dropping into the public domain doesn't undermine the trademark holder's rights. You can put out a Blu-Ray of Max Fleischer Superman cartoons, you can even use images from the cartoons on the cover, but you can't commission your own original art of Superman, because that's still protected by DC's trademarks -- and trademark holders are actually required to defend their mark if they want to maintain their rights, which is why you get Disney suing preschools for painting Mickey and Donald on the walls.

I'd guess the comic is relying on the parody defense. But it's important to note that parody only applies if the derivative work is commenting on the original. If you stray too far and use the original work for general social commentary, you put yourself at legal risk.

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

It's probably relying more on DC's general goodwill. They've been famously lawsuit-crazy in the past, but these days they're more likely to try to co-opt good cartoonists who do sufficiently interesting things with their characters. Kate Beaton made those sketches of surly Wonder Woman and ended up doing one or two short comic stories about her for a DC indie collection.

Of course, it's playing with fire.

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

...am I right about that? Perhaps I am not right about that. I thought that was the case, but Beaton's work for the Big Two seems to have been for Marvel.

[liviapenn.livejournal.com]

I think you're thinking of Noelle Stevenson (her webcomic is Nimona) -- she draws a lot of fanart as well, and has also done Wonder Woman stories for DC.