I think Moore would have a big problem suing because so much of his "original" work is based on their existing characters. Even "Watchmen" started as his spin on the Charleton characters.
For example:
Do you compensate Alan Moore for "creating" Rorshach when he bascially was a renamed version of the Question? And when you do, what about Ditko's rights? Do you have to credit Ditko as a co-creator of Rorshach? I can't see Moore going for that.
Yeah, it gets really complicated. As innovative as the storytelling in WATCHMEN is, the characters as you say are all unquestionably thinly veiled imitations of copyrighted Charleton heroes, that DC editorial management asked Moore to create, so he could do his story without killing off the previously copyrighted Charleton heroes. So it gets really complicated who "created" or owns the characters in WATCHMEN. Plenty there for DC to keep Moore in litigation for many years.
But from the other perspective, the Charleton characters re-packaged in WATCHMEN existed for roughly 2 decades virtually unknown, until Moore's innovations brought them to the peak of sales and acclaim that they never would have in other hands. Still, even with that argument, they were never 100% Moore's creation, a lot was there before Moore entered the picture.
And if taking an existing character and putting a new spin on it (ala, again the Question) entitles one to compensation as the creator what about characters who were revised and revamped but kept the same name? Is, for example, Frank Miller now entitled to be considered a co-creator of Batman because of how radically he re-envisioned aspects of the character?
It really is more of a minefield than Kirby supporters like to believe. And, as I've said before, Jack Kirby was a well-established pro when he worked for Marvel in the 1960s and knew exactly how work for hire operated. He got paid the same whether a book sold well or it flopped. He certainly didn't hand his paycheck back in when a book didn't sell. He gambled that signing off his rights was a better bet than keeping the rights and self-publishing.
I would hope that Miller is compensated for his enormous contribution to the Batman mythology. While he did not create Batman, his ideas are visible in the last 30 years of Batman stories by other creators, and elements in THE DARK KNIGHT RETURNS are adapted into several of the Batman movies, that have grossed in the hundreds of millions, if not billions. I'd hope that Miller at least gets generously compensated in royalties on the DARK KNIGHT RETURNS and YEAR ONE trades and hardcovers. He probably receives none for his concepts in 30 years of stories his two works inspired. And likewise probably no compensation for his ideas used in the films and cartoons. And since he did not actually create Batman, that is a reasonable limit.
I feel the same way about Kirby's work for Marvel and DC. That he (or his family/estate) should get a percentage of the profits for any new published book of the art and stories for which Kirby is directly credited. And at least a tiny slice of the movies based on these concepts, such as X-men, Avengers and Fantastic Four, particularly the movies and series adapting the stories Kirby specifically created. At some point, like Shakespeare, Edgar Allen Poe, or Jules Verne, all these characters will become public domain, and belong to neither Marvel or the Kirby estate. And at that point, anyone can publish them without copyright/ownership issues.
John Byrne in an editorial in FANTASTIC FOUR CHRONICLES, published in 1982, said that he accepts the work-for-hire arrangement without complaint, because he accepts that while the company profits off his work if it is successful, the company also can take a financial loss if his ideas are not well received by readers. And whether it sells or not, he still gets paid. With additional royalties if it is successful.
In Alan Moore's case, I don't really understand his level of animosity toward DC, who while they obviously didn't cut him in on the additional licensing revenue,
still made him a millionaire! While he arguably could be compensated more, he has been far more compensated than other workhorses and major contributors to Marvel and DC, such as Jack Kirby, Steve Ditko, Gil Kane, Berni Wrightson and others, whose best work was published before the modern system of royalties and creators' rights was put in place in the early 1980's.
In a COMICS JOURNAL 138 interview in 1990, Gary Groth interviewing Alan Moore voiced his contempt for the Image Comics guys, whose characters like McFarlane's SPAWN and Jim Lee's WILDCATS were barely veiled copyrighted re-workings of the Marvel series they had just left (like the Charleton heroes re-invented in WATCHMEN). And after a few issues by McFarlane and Lee, they farmed out these characters to other new talent who, just like at Marvel or DC, got paid work-for-hire. In Groth's words, the only difference between Marvel and Image is "who owns the shit." There is no creative innovation, there is no better compensation of work-for-hire talent.
[** CORRECTION: The issues discussed were in Gary Groth's interview of Neil Gaiman in COMICS Journal 169, July 1994. My apologies for the initial defective memory. ]
But really, how is this any different than someone who works as a restaurant manager, a stockbroker, a bank loan officer, a massage therapist, an advertising account executive, a nurse, or a middle manager?
In any of these fields, you could argue your labor is far more profitable for the company than the compensation they give you. As a rule of thumb, one article I read said whatever a company is paying you, they are earning at least double what they pay you, or you wouldn't be there in the first place. I've calculated at several jobs they earn 4 or 5 times what they pay me for my labor. One more than tenfold.
So is the comics field really that much different in its compensation? Simply because they're glamorous characters and intellectual properties, those contributions to a company are more visible than in other fields.
I think the current creators have a pretty good gig. 10 years ago, I knew a guy who had worked for Marvel, and he said at entry level, a creator doing one 22 page book a month with page rates alone (not including royalties if it sells well) earned about 50,000 a year. One assumes that as they become more established professionally, that goes up. And (as with the Image Comics guys) they can, once established enough break off and work for Dark Horse or Image, or start their own company to get a greater compensation for their established following and marketability.
As in any other field.
Arguably that's as fair as any other professional field, you establish yourself, develop marketable talent, and then seek greater compensation for that established talent.
