In the pictures above, the man on the left is Jack Kirby, hailed by many as the most important creative talent ever in the comic book business. The guy on the right is Johnny Carson, who has often been called the biggest star ever in television. What do these men have to do with each other? In 1982, Mr. Carson got confused about something and inadvertently made some slanderous remarks about Mr. Kirby on The Tonight Show. Mr. Kirby was very upset about this and filed a lawsuit against Mr. Carson. It was all settled with an on-air apology followed by an exchange of money.
On Friday, July 21 at the Comic-Con International in San Diego, I will (as usual) be hosting the annual Jack Kirby Tribute Panel. It starts at 2 PM in Room 8 and we'll have members of the Kirby family present, along with four top comic book artists — Neal Adams, George Perez, John Romita and Mike Royer — discussing Jack's work. That alone oughta pack the place. But we'll also take some time to flash back to the Great Kirby/Carson War. I'll be showing videos of both the original Carson statements and of his apology, and we'll be hearing from Paul Levine, the lawyer who represented Jack in that matter. I showed this tape a few years ago at a panel but (a) we didn't have time to tell the entire story and (b) a lot of folks have asked to see it again. So there's yet another reason to attend this fine panel…as if the chance to learn more about Kirby was not reason enough.