Valiant Harbinger Hardcover
Cancelled By Diamond Due To
"Legal Dispute"
Cancelled By Diamond Due To
"Legal Dispute"
The Harbinger: The Beginning hardcover was slated to go on sale this Wednesday. It featured an all-new story by Harbinger creator Jim Shooter as well as collected the original 1990’s Harbinger #0-7.
But now the book has been cancelled in the direct market, due to, in Diamond's words, "legal reasons."
This probably refers to the copyright dispute between Valiant Entertainment LLC (publishers of the Harbinger hardcover) and Valiant Intellectual Properties LLC. You can read about that battle in this Newsarama article.
The mood at the the Valiant fans forums was initially grim.
One fan had this to say:
But the discovery that "Harbinger" could still be ordered through Amazon, certain independent retailers, and Valiant Entertainment directly, lifted their flagging spirits.
Indeed, as if this writing, the book was still available on Amazon and had reached #19 on their graphic novels charts.
The bigger question is: if the dispute between Valiant Entertainment & Valiant Intellectual properties is at the heart of the Diamond cancellation, what does that mean for the future of the Valiant characters?
And what about that damn goat? Is he coming back too?
And Diamond takes another step toward obsolesence, erasing any real progress to be had from dropping reorder charges...
ReplyDelete"what does that mean for the future of the Valiant characters?"
ReplyDeleteThis is a trademark dispute, not about copyright. The ownership of the stories and characters is not in dispute. Valiant Entertainment owns them, as they bought them in a bankruptcy auction. It's only the right to market them under their names ("Harbinger", "The Visitor", etc.) that is in dispute.
Worst case scenario: Valiant Entertainment will have to sell these books and characters under new titles. Essentially, the same situtation DC has with the classic Captain Marvel.
And the unspecified "legal dispute" that Diamond claims to be the reason why they pulled the book, may not be the one between the two "Valiant"s. It could be that Valiant Entertainment's own direct sales to retailers (undercutting the discount that Diamond offers) could be a contractual violation.
(my analysis on both issues, here and here.)
Hi
ReplyDeleteI ran across this site (came here from Wikipedia through Yahoo) while searching for part three of an article Valerie wrote back in 2006 called "Second Life of VALIANT Comics?"
http://valiantfans.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=410754#410754
I was wondering if anyone knew where I could find it :)
PS: I'm the fan that posted that pic from AD at the VALIANTfans.com forum, heh