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Look! It Moves! by Adi Tantimedh #37: Painting Pretty Pictures of Plagiarism

Look! It Moves! by Adi Tantimedh #37: Painting Pretty Pictures of Plagiarism
Yeah, yeah, I just can't resist the alliteration. Nothing like a plagiarism bomb going off in comics to get my snark on, and the case of Nick Simmons' INCARNATE is a clear and indisputable case of plagiarism. It's one thing if it was a few panels here and there that had been 'referenced' from BLEACH, it's quite another for that many just in the few pages Rich showed, which are probably just the tip of the iceberg. I only assume this because I never read INCARNATE itself. I have, however, read BLEACH and seen the anime. Quite often, and regularly, in fact.

Look! It Moves! by Adi Tantimedh #37: Painting Pretty Pictures of Plagiarism

With over 30 volumes of BLEACH already published, which translates into more than 6,000 pages of artwork available, it wouldn't surprise me if INCARNATE could have ended its entire run consisting wholly of panels and images directly ripped off from BLEACH, and probably still have thousands of panels left over to rip off for several more entire comic series if anyone wanted to do so. Even my cursory understanding of contract and copyright law indicates this material is actionable. Majorly actionable. As in, if the owners of BLEACH wanted to sue, they could potentially either buy up Radical or wipe it off the map.

Look! It Moves! by Adi Tantimedh #37: Painting Pretty Pictures of Plagiarism

By last weekend, Nick "Son of Gene 'KISS"' Simmons, was claiming that he never even saw or heard of BLEACH. That's either insanely disingenuous or an outright lie. Or it was a fake facebook blogger taking the piss, as is the trend these days. [EDIT: It was – Rich] The evidence of direct swiping is far too glaring in the pages of his comic. However, what if the latter were true? That would mean that Simmons' 'assistants' drew the pages for him, and he was taking credit for their work without even paying proper attention to what they were drawing. And unlike him, these assistants not only knew BLEACH, they practically lived and breathed BLEACH, judging from the pages drawn. Too bad they didn't know not to directly trace panel images rather than assimilate the art style into their own to draw proper, non-traced panels to tell the story. It's possible that he might decide to shift blame away from himself by throwing these 'assistants' under the bus and claiming it was all their fault for copying a comic he didn't know, which means he's been calling himself a ' comic artist' without actually doing any proper drawing. Either way, he does not come out of this looking good, since he would be branded as both a liar and a thief. His reputation will now live or die by the internet. He really should either come clean or shut up and take legal advice, because the more he talks at this point, the deeper he's digging the hole he put himself in from the beginning.

Look! It Moves! by Adi Tantimedh #37: Painting Pretty Pictures of Plagiarism

Now, it's all very well to point a finger and tut-tut at another lazy and mediocre artist stealing from a famous work, but the bigger picture here is that Radical Publishing failed to spot any of this before approving his comic for publication. Of course, Radical has done the right thing and ceased publication of the book and launched their own enquiries, as the official line usually goes, but the damage is done, and it could have been totally avoided. They're trying to minimize the trouble they're in, and they are in deep, deep shit.

I'm sorry, but Radical has seriously dropped the ball here. BLEACH is not some obscure indie comic that just came along recently, it is owned and published by a major conglomerate (with very big lawyers) and has been around since 2002, and the English translation has been around in the US since 2004. It is, at the end of the day, only a multimillion-dollar cross-media franchise that covers not only comics but prose novels, anime TV shows, anime theatrical movies, toys, clothing, snacks, soft drinks, and video games. It is a property that is popular all over the world, selling tens of millions of copies, and that's tens of millions more than the sales of comics from Marvel, DC, Dark Horse, and Radical, combined. And the editors and publishers at Radical were just so provincial and out of touch as to completely miss that? Honestly, I would think it was part of their job to be at least aware of a muitimillion-dollar property in the same industry as theirs, and the claim that it's some 'foreign' property no one's ever heard of and therefore not worth being aware of is utterly lame-ass in this age of the internet and Google searches. The anime is only on every Saturday night on the Cartoon Network's Adult Swim in America. The man who helped found Radical Publishing used to be the Vice President of Dark Horse Productions, a company whose manga division was successful from its editors proactively researching and looking for manga titles to licence for US publication. How could he not be aware of BLEACH? If anything, Nick Simmons and the stable of artists who assisted him have proven a lot more aware of what's out there than the guys running Radical are. Being professional should mean more than just making sure their books are brought out on time. It also means knowing what the fuck is out there, guys. Ignorance holds no water in the eyes of the law. If Radical comes out of this in one piece, they should count themselves fucking lucky.

Look! It Moves! by Adi Tantimedh #37: Painting Pretty Pictures of Plagiarism

And even if they don't get clobbered by a lawsuit, Radical's reputation as a publisher is now seriously tainted. Either they'll be known as the publisher too out to lunch to notice one of their books ripped off one of the biggest comics franchises of our time, or if it turns out that they knew and deliberately published anyway thinking nobody would notice and they could get away with it, then that makes them stupid on an epic and criminal level. Neither bodes well for them and also tars the reputation of comics publishers and the industry in general. It looks like juvenile Amateur Hour shit. I'm trying to figure out which is worse, to be criminally clueless or cluelessly criminal?

Look! It Moves! by Adi Tantimedh #37: Painting Pretty Pictures of Plagiarism

We're in an age where publishing is a high-stakes rush to own and control intellectual properties that could potentially end up being worth millions in cross-media exploitation, and Comics are part of that game now. Really, comics have always been part of that game, only it's even clearer now than before. Comics are no longer just a quaint little backwater where creators and editors act like it's a fun little clubhouse or drinking club where they can just hang out and shoot the shit and bask in geek adulation at Comicon. Everyone who works in the media now has to be aware of what everyone else is doing, what work is being produced out there, in order to stay on top of the game. And to avoid creating or publishing work that might be construed as so similar as to be legally actionable. The stakes are very high now. The hearts and minds of geeks everywhere now translate into the lifeblood of the companies that produce content that they fall in love with. Let Radical's epic fail be a major lesson to us all.

Staying informed at lookitmoves@gmail.com

© Adisakdi Tantimedh

Look! It Moves! by Adi Tantimedh #37: Painting Pretty Pictures of Plagiarism

Look! It Moves! by Adi Tantimedh #37: Painting Pretty Pictures of Plagiarism


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Rich JohnstonAbout Rich Johnston

Founder of Bleeding Cool. The longest-serving digital news reporter in the world, since 1992. Author of The Flying Friar, Holed Up, The Avengefuls, Doctor Who: Room With A Deja Vu, The Many Murders Of Miss Cranbourne, Chase Variant. Lives in South-West London, works from Blacks on Dean Street, shops at Piranha Comics. Father of two. Political cartoonist.
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