Megathread The Lara-Su Chronicles and Ken Penders topic - READ PAGE 164, POST 4096

[horridus]

35 minutes ago, PinkFloydMania said:

So SEGA owns the copyrights to the comics, but not the stories in the comics... ? Am I stupid, how does that make any sense?

 

17 minutes ago, Promethean0416 said:

In the language of the Penders:

I'm still wrapping my head around this, is the script separate from the actual comic? I know characters can be copyrighted by design, but this is just baffling...

Okay, while I'm not an expert in this subject, I have picked up a few things here and there, and this is basically how it works-

Standard operating procedure for licensed works is that you operate under a Work-For-Hire contract. A work-for-hire contract in a nutshell says that everything you make for the license holder belongs to the license holder, which in this case would make SEGA. Characters, places, and yes, stories belong to the license holder under the Work-For-Hire contract. This is a standard in the Comic book business and contrary to what Penders likes to claim, absolutely nobody goes into this without having a crystal clear understanding of things.

He is purposely obfuscating the issue by bringing up Magazine print rights, which do not typically operate under Work-For-Hire contracts. If you were to make an article or short story that is to be printed in a publication, the story/article would remain YOUR work because YOU made it. The publication you made it for would have the right to publish it first and profit from it, but it'd ultimately belong to you provided you registered them as your copyright. Copyright, it should also be mentioned, does not cover broad ideas. You can for example write about a band of heroes setting off to defeat an evil overlord and copyright the characters, provided those characters aren't Gandalf, Gimli, Aragorn, Legolas and Frodo going off to fight Sauron, since THAT is very specifically the purview of Lord of the Rings.

So yeah, in short? Penders is omitting the fact that comic books using licensed characters are made under the work for hire contract, and the only reason he has copyright over his characters and stories is the fact that those contracts mysteriously vanished. Hence, Penders and all the other writers who came onboard before Flynn all own the stuff they made (supposedly. Evidently it may not even be THAT clear cut). He is correct in asserting he has the copyright for his stuff that we know of, as would Karl Bollers of Mike Gallagher, but he is absolutely incorrect in that anything post 2012 would belong to the creators. The only thing that would stop the publication of post-Reboot works at this point is SEGA's own desires and priorities, not legal barriers.

Penders is very purposely refusing to engage in good faith here, and trying to claim a level of expertise he doesn't have. At least some of it is necessary because Penders entire claim hinges on him never receiving a work-for-hire contract, but at the end of it? Yeah, he's pretty full of it. His circumstances are unique, and him trying to act otherwise is fundamentally dishonest.

[babsiwuff]

1 hour ago, horridus said:

Okay, while I'm not an expert in this subject, I have picked up a few things here and there, and this is basically how it works-

Standard operating procedure for licensed works is that you operate under a Work-For-Hire contract. A work-for-hire contract in a nutshell says that everything you make for the license holder belongs to the license holder, which in this case would make SEGA. Characters, places, and yes, stories belong to the license holder under the Work-For-Hire contract. This is a standard in the Comic book business and contrary to what Penders likes to claim, absolutely nobody goes into this without having a crystal clear understanding of things.

He is purposely obfuscating the issue by bringing up Magazine print rights, which do not typically operate under Work-For-Hire contracts. If you were to make an article or short story that is to be printed in a publication, the story/article would remain YOUR work because YOU made it. The publication you made it for would have the right to publish it first and profit from it, but it'd ultimately belong to you provided you registered them as your copyright. Copyright, it should also be mentioned, does not cover broad ideas. You can for example write about a band of heroes setting off to defeat an evil overlord and copyright the characters, provided those characters aren't Gandalf, Gimli, Aragorn, Legolas and Frodo going off to fight Sauron, since THAT is very specifically the purview of Lord of the Rings.

So yeah, in short? Penders is omitting the fact that comic books using licensed characters are made under the work for hire contract, and the only reason he has copyright over his characters and stories is the fact that those contracts mysteriously vanished. Hence, Penders and all the other writers who came onboard before Flynn all own the stuff they made (supposedly. Evidently it may not even be THAT clear cut). He is correct in asserting he has the copyright for his stuff that we know of, as would Karl Bollers of Mike Gallagher, but he is absolutely incorrect in that anything post 2012 would belong to the creators. The only thing that would stop the publication of post-Reboot works at this point is SEGA's own desires and priorities, not legal barriers.

Penders is very purposely refusing to engage in good faith here, and trying to claim a level of expertise he doesn't have. At least some of it is necessary because Penders entire claim hinges on him never receiving a work-for-hire contract, but at the end of it? Yeah, he's pretty full of it. His circumstances are unique, and him trying to act otherwise is fundamentally dishonest.

I’m going around in circles at this point, I’m sure.  But like, why does all this shit MATTER to him so much?  You don’t hear Bollers or anyone else obsessing over their Sonic careers like this.  A good example is in the SEA3ON project, Mina is shown in the trailer.  No fuss from Bollers over it, he’s moved on.  But if that were one of Ken’s characters, he’d have thrown a fit.  

[Rabbitearsblog]

6 minutes ago, babsiwuff said:

I’m going around in circles at this point, I’m sure.  But like, why does all this shit MATTER to him so much?  You don’t hear Bollers or anyone else obsessing over their Sonic careers like this.  A good example is in the SEA3ON project, Mina is shown in the trailer.  No fuss from Bollers over it, he’s moved on.  But if that were one of Ken’s characters, he’d have thrown a fit.  

I agree with this.  There were many other writers that worked on the Sonic comics before Ian Flynn came along and none of them are making a big deal over what happened with the Archie Comics like Ken Penders is. I'm glad that the other writers have moved on and are doing other things and are not complaining about what's going on with the Sonic franchise right now.

[Rabid-Coot]

I think it works like if Archie had a Story about say Sonic goes to the shop to buy a chilli dog from Mary the Mara Sega would own the story and character and be free to adapt them into a game show or movie but republishing the exact comic would need Archie involved.

[horridus]

2 hours ago, babsiwuff said:

I’m going around in circles at this point, I’m sure.  But like, why does all this shit MATTER to him so much?  You don’t hear Bollers or anyone else obsessing over their Sonic careers like this.  A good example is in the SEA3ON project, Mina is shown in the trailer.  No fuss from Bollers over it, he’s moved on.  But if that were one of Ken’s characters, he’d have thrown a fit.  

2 hours ago, Rabbitearsblog said:

I agree with this.  There were many other writers that worked on the Sonic comics before Ian Flynn came along and none of them are making a big deal over what happened with the Archie Comics like Ken Penders is. I'm glad that the other writers have moved on and are doing other things and are not complaining about what's going on with the Sonic franchise right now.

Weeeell there WAS Scott Fulop, AKA Kent Taylor, who for a hot minute attempted to start his own row with Archie and tried to act as if Mogul was gonna be a thing... only to get shut down and forgotten almost immediately afterwards. That said, Fulop last I checked didn't have a social media account where he made an ass of himself 24-7, so, your point still stands.

As for Penders, keep in mind a few things- Ken's Sonic career is the only thing in his entire career in comics that gave him any kind of mainstream success, and more than that, the Lawsuit is probably the crowning achievement of his professional career. He fixates on these things because otherwise he has nothing, and I mean NOTHING else going on for him. He hasn't lasted a year at any other of his comic jobs, and his Knuckles work is the closes thing to being his very own comic that he was ever going to get. It affords him this self-image he has of being a highly successful, highly influential creative within Sonic- he see's himself not as just one of several writers who wrote for a licensed book, but as someone who crafted a COMIC book with huge mainstream success, and who later Fought The System and Won. That his victory came under incredibly specific circumstances and may not even be the 'victory' he sells it as, or the fact that Sonic was already a red-hot property a the time of his writing on it, are the reality of things that Penders never, ever wishes to properly acknowledge. At one point he could admit that the Archie book was popular because Sonic was popular and that, at a time, there was nothing else major coming out. These days though it's a different story, and Ken is the SAVIOR of the Sonic book, the lead writer for a comic franchise that outsold X-Men at one point.

Penders has basically wrapped his self-worth up in his time on Sonic to a deeply unhealthy extent. You know that stereotype of the former high school athlete who made That One Touchdown and then promptly never achieved anything else of merit ever again so he constantly retreats to That One Touchdown? That's Ken Penders. The others who worked on Sonic have moved on because ultimately they have other things going in life, and none of them have ever harbored the same kind of delusion that Penders does about how much of their stuff was popular because of them versus how much it was because of Sonic. Ken labors under the belief that Sonic is a comic franchise he led to glory and that its popularity was a reflection of how well received his writing was. So while Bollers has moved on to become an Eisner nominated writer, Penders loudly talks about the lawsuit and his 'victory' and his project that's gonna come out any day soon, because doing otherwise means facing up to the fact he needed Sonic more than it ever needed him. Keep in mind that Penders was convinced that his contributions to the book were absolutely vital for it- he envisioned himself as being John Byrne and Chris Claremont for the X-men, someone whose contributions form the crucial backbone of the book without which it could not survive. Now imagine what must have gone through his mind when the book rebooted and tossed everything out, and not only didn't Archie or SEGA try to work something out, the book continued to do well without anything of his... and the Sonic franchise on the whole survived just fine without him.

His entire career on Sonic was effectively proven to be utterly meaningless in the grand scheme of things.

So he clings to Sonic and the Lawsuit and will probably continue to do so until the day he dies, because there is literally nothing else that makes him seem like the Big Shot he desperately wishes he was. It's either that or face up the fact it was all for nothing, and that his self-image was only ever in his head.

[Spidey3525]

52 minutes ago, babsiwuff said:

I’m going around in circles at this point, I’m sure.  But like, why does all this shit MATTER to him so much?  You don’t hear Bollers or anyone else obsessing over their Sonic careers like this.  A good example is in the SEA3ON project, Mina is shown in the trailer.  No fuss from Bollers over it, he’s moved on.  But if that were one of Ken’s characters, he’d have thrown a fit.  

Sonic is the only successful thing Penders worked on. All of his other endeavors bombed hard or have been stuck in development hell (like The Lost Ones lasting one issue). And he was spoiled with the amount of freedom he got on the book; with both Sega and Archie editorial barely paying attention to the book, he able to do whatever he wanted with Knuckles (a freedom few writers get, let alone on a licensed property). This just led to his ego becoming massive, which is why he expected Archie to come crawling back to him after Penders quit when Sega and Archie finally started paying attention to the comic and set guidelines. But they didn't do that, and all of a sudden, this new writer does a much better job than Penders did, especially with the characters he created. He clearly wanted to be a part of the book, which is why one of his conditions for if they wanted to continue using his characters was that he gets control over his characters (Julie-Su, Locke, etc) would be used. But they went with the reboot instead, leaving Penders' legacy behind. And then Archie lost the license entirely and IDW was able to start over without any that baggage. He keeps stirring up trouble because he's convinced his characters are so valuable, and by extension, him. But all he's done has ruined the legacy he could've had. The Archie continuity is long gone, reprints are very unlikely, and it becomes harder and harder for more people to actually read these stories. The odds of new fans learning about Lara-Su, Julie-Su, or Geoffery grow slimmer by the day and Penders will be a footnote at best in the grand history of Sonic comics. 

[babsiwuff]

1 hour ago, Spidey3525 said:

Sonic is the only successful thing Penders worked on. All of his other endeavors bombed hard or have been stuck in development hell (like The Lost Ones lasting one issue). 

This part makes me giggle forever.   Because Ken brags about his stupid Lost Ones comic being a "hit".  Meanwhile, my friend ALSO had her own comic through Image, it was an entire graphic novel, it really WAS a hit, and it landed her a nomination for an Eisner award.  Eat it, Penders.

(Side note, read "Stray Dogs".  It's SO.  GOOD.)

As for Geoffrey and the pig character and stuff, I don't get how Ken can claim ownership of their designs.  They were all literally in SATAM as auxiliary background Freedom Fighters.  They just didn't have names.  

 

 

[Promethean0416]

Oh, it was a hit, all right. A "one-issue hit wonder!"

Also, I will check Stray Dogs when I get a chance, thank you for the recommendation.

Anyway, more on the "commission", with the cape being fixed. Also, with Lien-Da's coloring of choice, seems like more of an attempt to advertise his "project", but whatever floats the commissioner's boat, I guess:

 

[babsiwuff]

29 minutes ago, Promethean0416 said:

Oh, it was a hit, all right. A "one-issue hit wonder!"

Also, I will check Stray Dogs when I get a chance, thank you for the recommendation.

Anyway, more on the "commission", with the cape being fixed. Also, with Lien-Da's coloring of choice, seems like more of an attempt to advertise his "project", but whatever floats the commissioner's boat, I guess:

He sure sounds sulky.  XD  He had to LISTEN to people and *GASP!* take their advice!!

[horridus]

2 hours ago, Promethean0416 said:

Oh, it was a hit, all right. A "one-issue hit wonder!"

Also, I will check Stray Dogs when I get a chance, thank you for the recommendation.

Anyway, more on the "commission", with the cape being fixed. Also, with Lien-Da's coloring of choice, seems like more of an attempt to advertise his "project", but whatever floats the commissioner's boat, I guess:

Geeze, he sounds so... sullen about it. I guess making such a basic mistake about something he gave a decade of his life to would take the wind out of anyone's sail. And it would seem that in addition to her LSC colors, Lien-Da ALSO has a cyborg arm here... boy I hope whoever paid for this is getting exactly what he wants, even if I highly doubt it.

Interesting to note how much better Lien looks here compared to the other bits of promo-art he's done for LSC. Really highlights just how unappealing that semi-realistic style of his is. Not that this is great or anything, but compared to the LSC style its downright spectacular.

[The Tenth Doctor]

4 hours ago, Promethean0416 said:

 

"Fully completed prior to San Diego Comic Con".

Yeah, he's totally selling this as a print, not just a 'commission'.

[babsiwuff]

I just noticed something.  Ken’s stupid female echidna names are hyphenated versions of real names.  Lien-Da (Linda), Lara-Le (Lauralee), and if I recall there’s a few others like “Mari-Su” “Can-Di” “Melin-Da” and stuff like that.  I don’t know whether that’s cringey or clever.  

[Promethean0416]

39 minutes ago, babsiwuff said:

I just noticed something.  Ken’s stupid female echidna names are hyphenated versions of real names.  Lien-Da (Linda), Lara-Le (Lauralee), and if I recall there’s a few others like “Mari-Su” “Can-Di” “Melin-Da” and stuff like that.  I don’t know whether that’s cringey or clever.  

IIRC, those are Superman references to a degree. Kal-El, Lor-Zod, etc.

[horridus]

1 minute ago, Promethean0416 said:

IIRC, those are Superman references to a degree. Kal-El, Lor-Zod, etc.

Yeah, it is. Hell, Knuckles' mom, Lara-Le? She has Superman's biological mother's name, Lara, and her family name of Le? Is "El" backwards.

Let that sink in a moment.

[Promethean0416]

Well, here's his first preview page again for the main story, and wouldn't you know it, it's NOT final due to a correction in the art he has to make:

And of course, he just wants his usual attention of "Hey, lookie, lookie!"

[Spidey3525]

38 minutes ago, Promethean0416 said:

 

While we don't know much about the plot for this series, I still find it dumb that the characters are believing that Knuckles- excuse me, K'nox- is actually dead, considering that part of the Guardian tradition is to fake your death, and he's probably chilling in Haven 3 or whatever and spying on his daughter with the magical surveillance system all over the island. 

[babsiwuff]

14 minutes ago, Spidey3525 said:

While we don't know much about the plot for this series, I still find it dumb that the characters are believing that Knuckles- excuse me, K'nox- is actually dead, considering that part of the Guardian tradition is to fake your death, and he's probably chilling in Haven 3 or whatever and spying on his daughter with the magical surveillance system all over the island. 

Well, he did say this once:  

 

[horridus]

3 hours ago, Spidey3525 said:

While we don't know much about the plot for this series, I still find it dumb that the characters are believing that Knuckles- excuse me, K'nox- is actually dead, considering that part of the Guardian tradition is to fake your death, and he's probably chilling in Haven 3 or whatever and spying on his daughter with the magical surveillance system all over the island. 

Given what we do know seems to indicate that this will all be heavily recycled from the basic plot of the Knuckles comics in general? It honestly wouldn't surprise me if this was in fact where things are leading, or that K'noxoff dying is just a massive, anti-climactic fakeout.

This is the same man who made an entire storyline where someone becomes God, and not only does nothing of consequence happen, but it ended with a friggin recap issue.

3 hours ago, babsiwuff said:

Well, he did say this once:  

Everytime I see this, all I can think to myself is that while he might own the stories, he doesn't own the majority of the characters in that book. He owns stories he can't actually republish without opening himself up to legal trouble.

[Promethean0416]

Welp, he posted a new tweet on a rough redesign for another shirt and, well...one of the characters on it is showing a little too much, which is the reason I am not posting the tweet here (one will have to view it on Twitter to see why).

As it was said by the man before, rated PG-13 for "mature audiences".

Also now wondering what that one guy looks like now, Ernie Hudson? Carl Weathers? Thoughts?

Edited May 26, 2023 by Promethean0416
Fixing

[horridus]

14 minutes ago, Promethean0416 said:

Welp, he posted a new tweet on a rough redesign for another shirt and, well...one of the characters on it is showing a little too much, which is the reason I am not posting the tweet here (one will have to view it on Twitter to see why).

As it was said by the man before, rated PG-13 for "mature audiences".

Also now wondering what that one guy looks like now, Ernie Hudson? Carl Weathers? Thoughts?

Ah, just what the world needs more of-

Spoiler

teenage chameleon nipples.

Probably not necessary to spoiler that, but I'm not taking chances. Fucking Christ. I can remember when this was for 'Young Teenage Girls'. And then it was for 'Everyone'. Now who's it for? God only knows, and he probably regrets it deeply.

... and yeah, I'd say Taylor looks more like Ernie Hudson now. Maybe in the fullness of time he'll morph back into being Michael B. Jordan.

Seriously though is it really THAT difficult to just... stick with a look?

[The Tenth Doctor]

"I see it no different from Sonic and Sally"

Ken, you gave Salma

Spoiler

Nips.

I never saw Sally have those. Which, considering Salma is a lizard based lifeform, makes no biological sense. Alien or not.

[babsiwuff]

2 hours ago, horridus said:

Given what we do know seems to indicate that this will all be heavily recycled from the basic plot of the Knuckles comics in general? It honestly wouldn't surprise me if this was in fact where things are leading, or that K'noxoff dying is just a massive, anti-climactic fakeout.

This is the same man who made an entire storyline where someone becomes God, and not only does nothing of consequence happen, but it ended with a friggin recap issue.

Everytime I see this, all I can think to myself is that while he might own the stories, he doesn't own the majority of the characters in that book. He owns stories he can't actually republish without opening himself up to legal trouble.

You didn't know?  Ken's above the law! 

Speaking of which...okay.  So Salma is a MINOR and he just posted....oh my god. 

[The Tenth Doctor]

4 hours ago, babsiwuff said:

You didn't know?  Ken's above the law! 

Speaking of which...okay.  So Salma is a MINOR and he just posted....oh my god. 

Pretty sure he's used the excuse of "Alien culture, can do what I want. They don't see it as wrong." to argue why nudity is acceptable.

[Promethean0416]

14 hours ago, horridus said:

Ah, just what the world needs more of-

  Reveal hidden contents

teenage chameleon nipples.

Probably not necessary to spoiler that, but I'm not taking chances. Fucking Christ. I can remember when this was for 'Young Teenage Girls'. And then it was for 'Everyone'. Now who's it for? God only knows, and he probably regrets it deeply.

... and yeah, I'd say Taylor looks more like Ernie Hudson now. Maybe in the fullness of time he'll morph back into being Michael B. Jordan.

Seriously though is it really THAT difficult to just... stick with a look?

Ah yes, the many faces of Taylor (codenamed: Falseface)...

...wait, which one was Michael B. Jordan again?

[horridus]

9 hours ago, The Tenth Doctor said:

Pretty sure he's used the excuse of "Alien culture, can do what I want. They don't see it as wrong." to argue why nudity is acceptable.

Precisely. It isn't exactly an invalid argument either- what is and is not socially acceptable on our own world varies wildly between culture to culture and century to century. The 10th century is not the 15th century is not the 20th, and even neighboring nations like France, Germany and Italy have their own ideas of what is or is not proper, let alone the differences of cultures in different continents at different time periods. The troublesome thing though is deciphering when such things are a stark look at legitimate differences in a culture, and when its just a fig leaf for something a lot more sordid.

Penders only ever trots out this argument because he see's it as a Get Out of Jail Free Card. He blatantly lacks the kind of insight or maturity to tackle something so complicated, and this image is purely done for titillation than any form of legitimate world building. Like, when he last showed her she had conveniently located scale clusters acting as organic pasties. There's literally no reason for 'em to be this way beyond him wanting to have attention and set himself up as some kind of Bold Artist Standing Against The Puritans.

5 minutes ago, Promethean0416 said:

Ah yes, the many faces of Taylor (codenamed: Falseface)...

...wait, which one was Michael B. Jordan again?

Agh, my bad there- it was Anthony Mackie, and its the second to last on the right.

Point of order... it shouldn't be this difficult to keep what he claims to be one of the main characters consistent looking, and yet with every update he seems to have re-invented the guy's looks entirely. If he hasn't figured it out after nearly twelve years of this then he never is.