After Disney-Marvel Deal, Cartoonist’s Heirs Seek to Reclaim Rights

The Walt Disney Company’s proposed $4 billion acquisition of Marvel Entertainment may come with a headache: a brand-new superhero copyright dispute. Heirs to the comic-book artist Jack Kirby, who has been credited as the co-creator of characters and stories behind Marvel mainstays like the X-Men and Fantastic Four, among many others, last week sent 45 notices of copyright termination to Marvel, Disney, Sony Pictures, Universal Pictures, 20th Century Fox, Paramount Pictures and others who have been making films and other forms of entertainment based on the characters