BobRo goes off

The Pulse has a lengthy and revealing chat with former DC Production Guru Bob Rozakis, touching on characters he created (like The Calculator) and series he penned (Teen Titans and Batman Family), with a decent amount of bitterness, too. Which, unfortunately, is all too common -- and understandable -- in this industry:

THE PULSE: There have been a couple indirect references to your Calculator stories in IDENTITY CRISIS [the very same JLA members of the Satellite Era he originally fought are all featured and Air Wave was mentioned as a possible suspect in the murders], how does it feel seeing these stories and characters used almost 30 years later in one of the biggest events to hit comics?

ROZAKIS: Since I haven’t seen my name in any credits nor received any remuneration, I guess I feel the same as every other comics creator who has had his work co-opted or cannibalized by others.

I get really irked by interviews like this. Irked because obviously talented people are getting the short end of the stick when it comes to writing assignments, but equally annoyed when people who, while talented, are also making a bit too much of their contributions. At one point, Rozakis muses that since his Teen Titans rnu was so maligned, he was in part responsible for the success of the highly-different and more popular Wolfman/Perez New Teen Titans. Possibly said with tongue planted firmly in cheek, but this isn't the first time a writer has made a similar claim, which is what I find bothersome.

But Rozakis does make one excellent point that I think we should all keep in mind: Why are comic book editors not giving work to people who have successfully written books for mass audiences, instead of continually relying on writers that are used to the current small-market comic book mentality? I don't have the answer, but there are plenty of older writers I'd love to see doing more work. And Bob Rozakis is one of them.