One of the great mysteries of comics which we enjoy exploring here at Stately Beat Manor is Platinum Studios. This long running “publisher” has been the recipient of glowing profiles over the years, its business model hailed as “genius”, despite the fact Platinum never actually published anything for nearly a decade of its existence. Getting the he Cowboys and Aliens movie — based on a Platinum property — produced was the holy grail for owner Scott Mitchell Rosenberg, (above, far left) and now that it’s finally come out, to middling box office, he’ll probably spend the next decade spinning out its success, just as he did with MEN IN BLACK in the 90s. Before Platinum, you seem Rosenberg was the head of Malibu Comics and before that Sunrise Distributors, both businesses which had “interesting” histories. HOwrver, getting a producer credit on the MEN IN BLACK film after finding an obscure comic to sell to Hollywood, made Rosenberg a “MAde” man in Hollywood terms. In addition, there has been much outcry over the years over creators who signed away all the rights to their work to Platinum, only to see it all go into a dark hole of development.

Yet, over the last few years, despite many pactings, partnerings and acquisitions, Platinum’s finances have not been not so great — you can see them in their public filings as a penny stock — until COWBOYS & ALIENS got made.
At any rate, Platinum seems to have mastered the “comics to movies” model while hardly producing any comics, such an efficient, waste-free model that we’re surprised more people haven’t adopted it. With the actual existence of the C&A movie, the publishing arm of Platinum seems to have come to a close as well. In June of this year, VP of Development Dan Forcey left the company, prompting one ex-Platinum creator to tweet that the company was dead.