After suspending work on Hero By Night earlier this month because of slow payment from Platinum Studios, and then learning this week that the publisher had put an abrupt end to any negotiations of rights, cartoonist DJ Coffman announced he’s finally been paid in full by the company.

His comic was the winning entry in Platinum’s inaugural Comic Book Challenge in 2006; the first issue debuted in Deecmber 2007. Coffman became a vocal supporter of Platinum, frequently defending the company against criticism on his blog and in the comments sections of other sites.

In a blog post titled “Closing The Book On Platinum, Moving On,” he revealed the check arrived yesterday with a letter terminating his “consultant agreement. That’s fine, Coffman writes, “because in my mind it was terminated when checks never really showed up on time in the terms of that agreement.” Still, he asserts, there’s no argument over who owns the property:

… my original contract is still intact with them, and I’ve never once ever disputed the fact that Platinum owns Hero By Night, I gladly and willingly SOLD IT TO THEM, straight up. Trust me, there are no loopholes or weaselly ways out or about it, they own it, it’s fine, and I’m still connected and I’ll still make money with anything they ever do with it, and that’s what I originally signed on for with Comic Book Challenge.

At COMIXtalk, Xaviar Xerexes evokes Raiders of the Lost Ark imagery to summarize the “final results”: “Coffman paid what he’s owed; Platinum boxing up Hero By Night like the Ark of the Covenant.  Platinum owns the copyright on it so it can do what it wants, including never doing anything with it again.”

This entry was posted on Friday, June 27th, 2008 at 11:56 am and is filed under Comic Books, Creators, Industry. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.