The biggest scandal, however, has to be one that's still ongoing. And one that's been going for decades, without any sign that it's going to change. Simply put, working for the Big Two is a terrible job. You have to work long hours, alone, in your house, on multiple projects at once just to scrape a living. You could see yourself getting dropped at any moment thanks to changing trends or marketplaces. Worst of all, any characters, storylines or whatever that you create during your time at DC or Marvel will be owned by them, not you. Any residuals, royalties or whatever from their use in other media like, if they get adapted to film or television will almost certainly not get back to you. Jack Kirby, the genius artist and writer who basically created the entire Marvel Universe (before Stan Lee slapped some hyperbolic, alliterative text on top), had most of his original artwork destroyed and his contributions to the comics canon ignored. Steve Gerber created Howard The Duck and fought with Marvel for decades to get the rights to the character back. Bob Kane gets credited as sole creator of Batman, but he did bugger all work and all the glory whilst Bill Finger toiled in obscurity. In extreme cases you have people like Bill Mantlo, Marvel stalwart and creator of characters like Rocket Raccoon, who has huge medical bills. Mostly everyone who works in comics is a freelancer. That means no health insurance, no pension, no guaranteed work, and the possibility of losing their jobs at any minute. Now there's a scandal.
Tom Baker is the Comics Editor at WhatCulture! He's heard all the Doctor Who jokes, but not many about Randall and Hopkirk. He also blogs at http://communibearsilostate.wordpress.com/
