Current Events > Fables creator, Bill Willingham, released franchise to public domain

(+) Yeah! (+)

When I first signed my creator-owned publishing contract with DC Comics, the company was run by honest men and women of integrity, who (for the most part) interpreted the details of that agreement fairly and above-board. When problems inevitably came up we worked it out, like reasonable men and women. Since then, over the span of twenty years or so, those people have left or been fired, to be replaced by a revolving door of strangers, of no measurable integrity, who now choose to interpret every facet of our contract in ways that only benefit DC Comics and its owner companies. At one time the Fables properties were in good hands, and now, by virtue of attrition and employee replacement, the Fables properties have fallen into bad hands.

Since I cant afford to sue DC, to force them to live up to the letter and the spirit of our long-time agreements; since even winning such a suit would take ridiculous amounts of money out of my pocket and years out of my life (Im 67 years old, and dont have the years to spare), Ive decided to take a different approach, and fight them in a different arena, inspired by the principles of asymmetric warfare. The one thing in our contract the DC lawyers cant contest, or reinterpret to their own benefit, is that I am the sole owner of the intellectual property. I can sell it or give it away to whomever I want.

I chose to give it away to everyone. If I couldnt prevent Fables from falling into bad hands, at least this is a way I can arrange that it also falls into many good hands. Since I truly believe there are still more good people in the world than bad ones, I count it as a form of victory.

more at link (there's a pretty long statement later in the article, if you're interested enough to read it):

https://screenrant.com/fables-public-domain-willingham-statement-wolf-among-us/

Nice! Feel bad he has to fight DC, though.

Maybe some fans will make Fable live up to the hype

edit: Wrong Fable lol

I thought this was about the video game and left disappointed it was a comic book.

Damn_Underscore posted...

Maybe some fans will make Fable live up to the hype

edit: Wrong Fable lol

BlueTigerLion posted...

I thought this was about the video game and left disappointed it was a comic book.

Lol, I thought this was about Fable too until I read more and realized my mistake.

DC in shambles

Yeah, this includes Wolf Among Us as well, which is a spin-off of Fables.

Fables is a nice comic book. Does this mean the works are like videogame roms but truly public domain?

I'm giving him a standing ovation for this.

Thats cool as hell

A true man of dignity.

HBOSS posted...

Fables is a nice comic book. Does this mean the works are like videogame roms but truly public domain?

It's probably going to be a labyrinthian nightmare of rights conflicts that make all the nonsense that went on with the Sonic comics look like child's play in comparison.

Things like bigby being public domain, but the big bad wolf video game not being public domain, and weird specific things like every outfit he wears or line he says in the game remains property of the company. If any of these games introduce any new characters that weren't in the comics presumably they wouldn't be public domain, but then in terms of fictional character history how the public domain versions of these characters think and feel and act would have to not tie back to properties that are still held by other people.

I'll be very curious to see how this plays out, because fables is awesome.

HBOSS posted...

Fables is a nice comic book. Does this mean the works are like videogame roms but truly public domain?

Yes. The characters can be used by anyone for any reason.

damn. that's some good shit. i wish him the best and hope other IPs follow in order to free themselves from the grasp of shit companies who do nothing but use IPs for useless shit instead of letting fans and creators take a stab at it.

Good for him even if ultimately it won't change anything in the industry besides corporations safeguarding their contracts to ensure this never happens again.

[Glass him]

Bill Willingham is kind of a piece of shit but this is a pretty fantastic "fuck you" to DC even if it doesn't do a whole lot in practice, so props to him in this specific instance.

Fables is a pretty good comic though outside of a couple of weird anti-abortion and pro-Israeli military moments.

Bass posted...

Nice! Feel bad he has to fight DC, though.

We should've listened to Alan Moore.

bump

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/0/4/1/AAE14lAAE2EZ.jpg

Okay, DC. But what about the ones not published by you?

King_Rial posted...

Okay, DC. But what about the ones not published by you?

Drown them in litigation regardless of legality until they're bankrupt and it's a moot point, I assume.

That's awesome. Good on him.

Ultimately, DC will likely make their own version of Fables and not have to pay any royalties for it. Plus, they'll use their position of power to sue anyone who has a version remotely similar to them. (This, kids, is known as the Disney Method.)

But it will open up the door for people to use the underlining content to put new spins on things. You might have Wolf Among Us In Space!! or a version of Fables which re-imagines everyone as punk rockers from the 1980s.

I know nothing about either intellectual property, so forgive me if either one of those are already part of the property. I don't have time to do extensive research before posting.

Still, it is a nice Fuck You to DC to make them fight to scramble for their own version of Fables or give it up for lost. I hope this serves as a warning for anyone who wishes to cheat content creators.

boxoto posted...

Since I cant afford to sue DC, to force them to live up to the letter and the spirit of our long-time agreements; since even winning such a suit would take ridiculous amounts of money out of my pocket and years out of my life (Im 67 years old, and dont have the years to spare)

This is so sad. It's so fucked up how money can literally buy court cases, regardless of who's right or wrong

DC says "wrong!"

https://comicbook.com/comics/news/dc-fables-comic-series-lawsuit-bill-willingham-public-domain-statement/

They threaten to sue anyone who dares

WingsOfGood posted...

DC says "wrong!"

https://comicbook.com/comics/news/dc-fables-comic-series-lawsuit-bill-willingham-public-domain-statement/

They threaten to sue anyone who dares

hmm i wonder if theyre doing this because of current fables production happening at DC. Afterall they were kinda in the middle of a couple projects.

Wonder if anybody has the fortitude to take on DC and their legal threats

Fables just isn't a big enough franchise to risk a lawsuit, particularly when you can just make your own fairy tale story with blackjack and hookers.

Hope this pans out well for the guy and whoever tries to make something of it. It's great to see the creators of things take control by any means against shitty corporations.

I thought this was about the fable games lol

If an indie game, a webcomic, and a series of furry images-for-sale based on reimagined versions of the characters popped up simultaneously, DC might run into an issue where they have too many fights to deal with at once or don't want to deal with the publicity of being the bully who knocks down the little guy.

Personally, I hope a half-dozen groups challenge this all at once.

Huge L on DC, I didn't know they were this petty and spiteful.

StarSpangled posted...

Huge L on DC, I didn't know they were this petty and spiteful.

What billion dollar corporation isn't?

StarSpangled posted...

Huge L on DC, I didn't know they were this petty and spiteful.

They always have been. Just look at their treatment of Alan Moore, not just watchman but everything he did for them. Or the long drawn out fight Siegel and Shuster had over Superman.

Really Willingham claiming that it's "the new bosses" who are the problem is weird because I have heard that DC has always done crap like this.

creativerealms posted...

They always have been. Just look at their treatment of Alan Moore, not just watchman but everything he did for them. Or the long drawn out fight Siegel and Shuster had over Superman.

Really Willingham claiming that it's "the new bosses" who are the problem is weird because I have heard that DC has always done crap like this.

Marvel is also just as guilty. Best way to support the comics industry is to buy indie or small press.

Lots of good comics you can get from Kickstarter as an example. Lots of stuff not just superheroes either.

StarSpangled posted...

Huge L on DC, I didn't know they were this petty and spiteful.

I'm honestly kinda surprised considering DC is better about royalties than Marvel.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FbbYcvBS9f0

I guess being less stingy than Scrooge McDuck isn't the same as being generous.

This guy is a conservative scumbag with a pretty poor reputation among the comic community, as he started injecting his values into later issues, including a Snow White anti-abortion arc to simply be petty toward fans.

FortuneCookie posted...

I guess being less stingy than Scrooge McDuck isn't the same as being generous.

DC goes full gestapo when it comes to copyright but they have a history of paying artists well.

https://www.cbr.com/starlin-has-made-more-money-off-dcs-kgbeast-than-marvels-thanos/

Tyranthraxus posted...

https://www.cbr.com/starlin-has-made-more-money-off-dcs-kgbeast-than-marvels-thanos/

This is why Disney is about the last studio that I would want to work for.

I'd be happy to direct the CGI reboot of Robin Hood or whatever, but I wouldn't want to surrender any of my original characters or concepts to them.

MabusIncarnate posted...

This guy is a conservative scumbag with a pretty poor reputation among the comic community, as he started injecting his values into later issues, including a Snow White anti-abortion arc to simply be petty toward fans.

I wouldn't call it an arc. She gets pregnant, the Fabletown doctor offers her an abortion, and she goes on an enraged tirade about how abortion is bad and illegal in Fabletown.

The only other time I remember abortion being mentioned is when Frau Totenkinder - who gains power by sacrificing children - implies that she became the most powerful witch in history by investing her money in abortion clinics.

My favorite "what the fuck, Bill" moment in Fables is when Bigby goes into a lengthy pro-Israeli military rant.

It's a shame Bill is a piece of shit, because Fables is largely a very good comic book and this public domain move is a perfect fuck you.

Yeah I doubt this will lead to anything.

The characters Fables use were already in the public domain. Use the designs or stories from a Fables comic or the games and DC will sue.

So what is left really?

pegusus123456 posted...

The only other time I remember abortion being mentioned is when Frau Totenkinder - who gains power by sacrificing children - implies that she became the most powerful witch in history by investing her money in abortion clinics.

This is like something Alex Jones would come up with

Punished_Blinx posted...

Yeah I doubt this will lead to anything.

The characters Fables use were already in the public domain. Use the designs or stories from a Fables comic or the games and DC will sue.

So what is left really?

So the public domain status of original Fables doesn't matter. Just like Disney's version of the Little Mermaid is absolutely owned by Disney, despite it being an adaptation of public domain source material, the renditions of the characters in Fables would be protected for their owner. You can make your Big Bad Wolf a shape-shifting, cigar smoking detective, but if you look to close to Bigby Wolf, you are risking a lawsuit.

Where the actual contention of this lawsuit comes in is who actually owns Fables to begin with. Let's assume Bill is telling the truth. If he is then his contract stipulated that he has ownership of Fables and all of its intellectual properties, but has an exclusive publishing and merchandising rights deal with DC. So he owns the stories and characters, but he is contractually unable to publish Fables without DC. By this logic he has the right to release the property to public domain. So someone could in fact make their own Bigby Wolf story, with the actual Bigby Wolf. Because these people would not be beholden to the exclusive publishing agreement, they could actually publish their story.

Now the previously published stuff, that's still copyrighted by DC. Bill might own the intellectual property, but the published stuff is more than just that. So someone shouldn't republish the old stuff.

Again this is assuming that what Bill said about the contract is true.

That's what I mean really. Someone could already make a story with fairy tale characters living in a city and being murdered of whatever. It just couldn't be too similar to Fables.

The only difference now is they could use the same nicknames like Bigby and maybe call it Fables. Maybe. They still can't use similar plots or designs.

I'm not really seeing some massive new opportunity for creators. At least nothing that's worth a court battle.

Garabandal posted...

This is like something Alex Jones would come up with

I'll be honest, while I don't agree with the stance on abortion...I do actually love it as worldbuilding.

It doesn't even have to be anti-abortion, some degree of the Fables' power comes from belief (so Snow White is much more durable and harder to kill than her sister, Rose Red), so you could just throw in a line about it being because so many people think it's murder that it works.

Punished_Blinx posted...

That's what I mean really. Someone could already make a story with fairy tale characters living in a city and being murdered of whatever. It just couldn't be too similar to Fables.

The only difference now is they could use the same nicknames like Bigby and maybe call it Fables. Maybe. They still can't use similar plots or designs.

I'm not really seeing some massive new opportunity for creators. At least nothing that's worth a court battle.

I think designs is where it's probably most contentious and where needing to know both the exact wording the contract and the creative process. But I think someone could probably get away with it.

I ultimately don't think the move will actually do much in practice. Fables isn't an ongoing series, it's hardly a juggernaut, and it's not like it had a ton of merchandise. I don't see any other writer doing anything particularly noteworthy or successful with the property. Best case scenario people can make Fables merch on like Etsy with an even lower chance of getting a C&D. For Bill, the actual best case scenario is that Bill gets DC back to the table and gets the payments he's owed. Like DC basically is forced to at this point if they want to pursue additional legal action.

pegusus123456 posted...

I'll be honest, while I don't agree with the stance on abortion...I do actually love it as worldbuilding.

It doesn't even have to be anti-abortion, some degree of the Fables' power comes from belief (so Snow White is much more durable and harder to kill than her sister, Rose Red), so you could just throw in a line about it being because so many people think it's murder that it works.

I agree. When I originally read the story I was unaware of Willingham's stances and the book hadn't gotten too preachy on the issue yet so I interpreted it more as a modern twist on child sacrifice than a criticism of abortion, though knowing what I know now that's clearly how he intended it. It's made even muddier by the fact that Frau is not only insanely powerful but she is squarely on the protagonists side and someone you are generally supposed to root for.

BlueTigerLion posted...

I thought this was about the video game and left disappointed it was a comic book.

Fucking same.

[LFAQs-redacted-quote]

It could be that this is him giving a middle finger to the "leftists currently in charge of DC." While I don't think he's a comicgater this feels like he's virtue signaling to them.