Bolding added by me. I can't tell if that's a typo, or if he's implying he's calling his characters Echydnas to avoid trademark confusion with Sega. If he is, then at least he's finally learned something after years of saying his characters are nothing like Sega characters. [/quote] Nah, this is probably the real reason:
Thing is, he already had established it as Echidnaopolis, and if the court case has shown anything is that he doesn't want to betray the work he did. It's either a typo, or he had a strong reason to do it.
He got paid at the time he wrote the stories. How much he deserves now, if any at all, is 100% dependent on the wording in the contract he signed when he took the job. He was work-for-hire, as all Archie writers/artists are to my understanding, which means he got paid by the page. If he wanted to negotiate future payments based on reprintings of his stories, he would've had a tough time as nobody offers that EVER unless you're a literary god. Chances are if you're work-for-hire (I.e. freelance) you're only writing it because you need to pay your bills at that point in time, and maybe you're storing some nuts for the future, but really I don't see anyone becoming a millionaire off writing freelance for a licensed comic book. This entire case is either pure greed or pure lunacy on Penders's end. Regardless of whether he has a case or not, he was hired as a freelance writer and should've understood at the time that anything he creates for Archie becomes the property of Archie. If he wanted to write an awful story about a race of beings that literally gave up technology because they were too stupid to understand and comprehend it then maybe he should've saved that for his own instead of working it into a licensed comic.
I agree, but I can also say I can see why he did it. Work on anything long enough, and even if it's not yours, you'll take pride in it and want to leave your mark on it in some way. I'd say it all boiled down to the fact that he was a part of the comic for too long, got too attached and decided to bring elements he personally wanted, even if they may not fit in a way that best worked with the source material... and it certainly wasn't the best place for him to try building a story he could fully call his own. But the same can be said for any fan artist or fan fiction writer. Again, not defending his actions, but that history of Ken Penders thing that ran on the front page for some time was really enlightening, and I can at least see how he came to his point of view.
At the last paragraph about describing the case, I AGREE WITH YOU 100% It's actually pure greed and lunacy pitted with desperation and stubborness to not CHANGE jobs when your 'family' needs money, and thinking that writing is all what the man can do. This guy could work in a supermarket, or used his fame, or rather, 'infamous' name for jobs but here he is, being a sad man, spending tons of his hard-earned $$$ suing Archie Comics, and Sega and wasting their money, time, and patience. Sega needs funding, Archie Comics is doing okay, but I do hope the Lawyers and Court Judges read this and absolutely block these cases. It's just a huge waste of time spawned by excess ego-ness. You will go broke first. That's why it's Freelancer Writers, they are independent, they write what the company wants with ideas shared, if they get fired they move on END OF STORY. But this guy, on top of wasting money, loosing much more credibility, making his name look worse, and potentially scaring future freelance writers is, of-course, just boldly stupid. Well done Penders, well done. And this guy's writing is like that of fan-fic. It's like this guy is this horrible indie writer (Ian is an Indie Writter and a fan) who makes these stories up from SATAM and that without continuing his ideas. Make your own comic or whatever. But don't be all cry-baby if you decide to sell it online and Archie and SEGA is going to smack you so hard. But, you know, stay legal. I want to honestly punch him in the face. Good ideas, but horrible drama, horrible art (I blame Archie's lack of quality), horribly executed and free ideas were rushed. You can blame Archie for that, but that's the point of it. He honestly was signing up for a contract by a Comic Company who makes money off selling them to stores, and stores buying their stock, and people subscribing and buying online, and them giving him an hourly rate. Nothing will change. The business model is the same. You can't change that. Make your own Archie things. No-one cares.
You're hugely mistaken, most comic publishers pay royalties for reprints. Archie is one of the few companies that doesn't.
Really? I've read in several places that Marvel and DC are pretty shitty when it comes to paying their writers. Regardless, when signing a contract you should understand the terms of the contract.
Those panels you guys posted from the dark ages are terrible. I know they're not going to redraw them for the Archives releases, but at the same time, holy lord that's going to look shitty. Their new, younger fan base who are buying these old releases so they can check out the historic issues are going to be so incredibly turned off.
Agreed. Jesus Christ, do I remember how bad Ron Lim was. I remember wanting the 100s as a kid and, I swear to God I'm not making this up, the art was so offensively bad, my mom wouldn't let me have them. And to this day I'm so glad because I would have regretted it. I mean really, how hard can it be to draw a cartoon like hedgehog and fox.
Wow, I've had the issue with Dr. Quack since it came out, and I always hated how Sonic looked. Never did I notice how Tails looked in that panel.
I still want to see what he's going to do about Angel Island and the Chaos Emeralds. [/quote] I'm convinced his Lara-Su Chronicles are nothing but a charade, because without them he has no case against Archie. I don't think he has any plans to publish them, unless it's to keep up the charade in the event he wins his case.
Ken speaks again. And once again, he contradicts himself. [quotename='Ken Penders']In fairness to the fans, I'm not looking to take an axe and rewrite Sonic history. I'm essentially saying THE LARA-SU CHRONICLES picks up where "The Die Is Cast" in SONIC #144 leaves off and continues from there. What will be established once and for all is that Locke did not die until the events of "Father's Day", nor was there ever more than one Enerjak. The history of my characters will be as I established it, a lot of missing details will get filled in that I never had the chance to tell previously, and readers will finally see the scope and character interaction I was shooting for. Believe it or not, Ian's stories still happened. No one needs to choose what did or did not happen. This was why I was always perplexed about how things went down back in the day, because I never felt what I was doing in M:25YL tied anyone's hands.[/quote] So, Ken says Ian's stories happened in the continuity of his series...except for the ones he doesn't want to have happened. Yeah, that's lovely. Guy would've been better off saying none of them happened rather than picking and choosing. Then there'd at least be consistency. And he wouldn't be contradicting himself within his own post. But I have to give him some credit: It takes balls to re-open a previously filled in plothole (Archimedes knowing of Enerjak as a legendary evil when he never did anything legendary or even used the name before that moment), just to keep to his creative vision of a guy making a supervillain name out of "jacking energy". Also, Mace is gay. Ken just thought he ought to mention that because why not, apparently. [quotename='Ken Penders']And yes, Mace comes out of the closet. I decided I was going to have a family of gay parents with kids among the supporting characters. I wanted to do something along these lines back then, but baby steps, y'know?[/quote]
Wait a minute. Mace the Echidna. Knuckles' baby brother. A character whose only characterization in Mobius: 25 Years Later was "hot dang he sure has a way with the ladies!!1!" He's supposed to be gay. Not just gay, but apparently with a partner and kids of his own? Unless they're just supposed to be there on the sidelines to help Mace come out of the closet or... ...I just...why do I get the feeling this latest turn of events is based solely on the backlash when his plans with Rotor were revealed?
Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't Kneecaps Knuckles' younger brother? I have no clue who Mace is... EDIT: Nvm, that is Kneecaps...
Ken responded to both things in his latest post. [quotename='Ken Penders'][quotename='Mavrickindigo']"Ian's Stories still happend" + "There was only one enerjak" = CONTRADICTION[/quote] Actually, when done right, that's called damn good writing, as well as taking the fans feelings into consideration.[/quote] Ken's calling his own work "damn good writing" before it's even released. Lovely. Humble, even. [quotename='Ken Penders'][quotename='Mavrickindigo']Also, with Mace's ONLY character trait being "ladies' man", why did you decide to make him gay, of all people?[/quote] My initial thought was that creating a group of new characters - in this case, a family unit with gay parents - required some rational to be part of the story beyond the novelty of seeming to be trendy. Ergo, Lara-Su has a gay uncle she interacts with. No convoluted coincidences required. As for Mace's initial appearance, anyone reading his initial appearance in "The Unveiling" won't have a problem interpreting Demi-Na to be his girl BFF and realizing Julie-Su was referring to the husbands, not the wives, when talking about their married friends. Clearly, Mace has settled down.[/quote] So, basically, a retcon. I like that first part there, where he admits he just wanted to add some gay characters but didn't want to make it seem like he was adding them for the sake of adding them, and so retroactively made an established character gay. You know, maybe he shouldn't have outright admitted he was trying to make it seem not obvious.
Sadly for him, all he really is doing is adding gay characters for the sake of doing so. And possibly getting his characters wiped out of any future comic. (including the likeable ones) At least they're just being set aside rather than a full wipe.
Sega to get directly involved in Archie vs Penders mediation Source: TSSZ Well, now things get interesting.
