As if the history of DC on Film being written wasn’t enough, now DC Comics is finally getting the history book it deserves. DC Comics: The Story of a Universe by Sean Howe and Sam Thielman has just been signed, as announced in one of those book deal columns, and posted by Thielman. (The news is a week old but no one else posted it so here you go.)
I can’t imagine two more qualified people!
Howe is the author of Marvel Comics: The Untold Story, an impeccably researched and thrillingly told story of the behind the scenes story of Marvel. Thielman is currently the graphic novel reviewer for the NY Times, but has written about comics for The Guardian, The New Yorker and elsewhere. Suffice to say these two gentlemen have the knowledge to write this story and I can’t wait to read it!
The book will be published by Harper One, with a 2027 publication date. Rakesh Satyal is the editor and David Patterson at Stuart Krichevsky Agency brokered the deal.
And what material they have. Off the top of my head:
- Comics Original Sin: Siege and Shuster selling Superman for $130, and the endless lawsuits it led to.
- Teenage Bob Kane taking credit for creating Batman while Bill Finger and Jerry Robinson did the work
- William Moulton Marston and young women who helped him write Wonder Woman.
- DC sues Captain Marvel out of existence
- Bob Hope comics
- Julius Schwartz and the birth of the multiverse
- Mort Weisinger and his love of weird cover situations
- Carmine Infantino and his love of apes
- The DC Implosion
- Jenette Kahn, a person whose impact was incalculable
- Vertigo and the British Invasion
- The New 52
- The move to Burbank
And so on and on. A rich mine of stories indeed. Sam and Sean, you have a big task ahead of you, but you got this. I have just one plea: give Dorothy Woolfolk her due!
Photo credit: Scott Beatty
 and Sam Thielman are writing DC Comics: The Story of a Universe, a history of DC Comics){kind=link}
I’ve been hoping for a book like this for years. I like Marvel, but DC (as a company and much of its output, particularly in the 1980s) is so much more interesting to me. I hope they spend an outsize amount of time focused on the Jenette Kahn era (again, particularly the ‘80s). I think she’s one of the 10 most important people in comics in the second half of the 20th century for the innovations she introduced and the talent she nurtured and cultivated.
Good List Heidi, other topics off the top of my head I’d like to see: Some of this might have been covered in other books and I’m having a brain fart.
– Carmine’s early 70s format change to 52 page for 25 cents. Was there an agreement with Marvel to do the same format? Carmine says so, but I’ve not seen any other evidence of this agreement other than his say so.
– Carmine’s original plans for Kirby, some say he just wanted him to work on existing titles rather than do original stuff.
– Clear up the Wonder Woman/Wonder Man/Power Man/Power Girl stories.
– The Philippine Invasion. Tony DeZuniga and Carmine have different stories (and amounts) regarding how much was paid and to be paid to the artists. If possible, how much was Tony (and his wife) making before moving back to the Philippines. Were they making the same amount in US dollars with the agreement, got a raise for doing shop owner/agent work, were they taking a pay cut?
– DC’s building up the infrastructure to support “evergreen” a graphic novel market.
– Eddie Berganza.
– The fall out with Alan Moore and (for a time) Frank Miller.
– Neal Adams and the return of original art. There was an argument about DC owing taxes on it which doesn’t fully make sense to me, explaining that out would be nice.
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