Pat Lee

Patrick "Pat" Lee (born June 28, 1975 ) is a Canadian comic artist and publisher. Over the years he has worked for several publishers and companies and has managed some of them himself. Many of the stations in his career are marked by controversy.

Life and work

Pat Lee tried his hand at comic strip art for the first time at the age of sixteen after graduating from high school, but it wasn't until 1994 that Rob Liefeld , one of the founders of the Image publishing house, discovered Lee at a comic book fair in Toronto and hired him as an illustrator. For Liefeld's Extreme Studios he drew titles such as Bloodpool , Extreme Sacrifice , Black Flag , Glory , Darkchylde , Avengeblade , Extreme Prelude and Prophet , before moving to the image studio Wildstorm Productions, where he worked for Jim Lee'screated the WildC.ATS series . Several issues of the Wetworks series followed before he took over the drawings for the Wolverine / Punisher: Revelations miniseries appearing at Marvel Comics .

In 1996, Pat founded Dreamwave Productions with his brother Roger Lee, which initially ran as a studio within Image Publishing. In addition to his duties as a draftsman for titles he created himself such as Darkminds and Warlands , Pat Lee also took on the role of publishing house president . Dreamwave also worked with various magazines and marketing companies and was responsible for the music video for Janet Jackson's song "Doesn't Really Matter".

In late 2001, Dreamwave was licensed by toy manufacturer Hasbro for a new comic series based on the Transformers toy series. At the same time, Dreamwave separated from Image Comics and, from 2002, brought out the various Transformers licensed series, which initially dominated the sales charts of the US comic distributor Diamond for several months, now as an independent small publisher. This was followed by other licensed works such as Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles , Mega Man or Duel Masters , but also own titles such as Shidima or Fate of the Blade .

Except for the Transformers , none of the licensed series lasted more than a few issues. Lee increasingly gave the series he had drawn, including the Transformers , to other draftsmen and increasingly took on commissioned work for other publishers, including editions of House of M for Marvel or Superman / Batman for DC . On January 4, 2005, Dreamwave officially declared bankruptcy.

In the following years Pat Lee and his brother Roger ran a new studio called Dream Engine, which was registered in Roger's name. Pat Lee drew comics such as the miniseries X-Men / Fantastic Four for Marvel and Cyberforce for Top Cow. After leaving Dream Engine, Lee founded a new company, "Pat Lee Productions", which, according to him, focuses on the areas of film, video games, photography, concept design and self-developed clothing. Pat Lee has worked for the comic publisher Dynamite Entertainment since 2010.

Controversy

Since Dreamwave closed, Pat Lee has been criticized for his business practices. In an interview with the Newsarama website, former Transformers authors Adam Patyk and James McDonough said they had been fired from Dreamwave before the bankruptcy due to disputes about their payment and had subsequently filed a lawsuit about outstanding payments. In another interview, Transformers writer Simon Furman claimed that just a month before the bankruptcy, Lee "looked him straight in the eye and said everything was fine." Comic journalist Rich Johnston repeatedly reported on controversial details regarding Lee, including allegations that Dreamwave's capital and employees were transferred to the new company Dream Engine in January 2005, before the bankruptcy, and that Lee had the bankruptcy Transferring ownership of a corporate Porsche to himself as a private individual, allegations that Lee bought an apartment for half a million Canadian dollars before the bankruptcy , a list of Dreamwave's debts and creditors, and the allegation that illustrator Alex Milne was a ghost artist in Lee's place Top Cow's Cyberforce series was drawn without being named, with Lee eventually stopping payments to Milne after Top Cow asked for confirmation that Lee was the sole illustrator of the series and Milne refused to cooperate in Lee's favor.

In December 2010, Pat Lee gave Johnston an interview during which Johnston repeated all of the above allegations. Lee admitted that many of the Dreamwave artists had "paid delays" before they went bankrupt and said he regretted not being able to speak to everyone beforehand, but claimed in return that Most of the writers and illustrators at Dreamwave were aware that Dreamwave was in financial trouble: "We didn't announce it, but people weren't paid in full, it was very obvious." He also said, "Me barely paid myself at Dreamwave and didn't pay myself for a long time so the company could pay other bills. ”As for the Porsche, Lee claimed that it was merely leased from Dreamwave and that he (Lee) was“ ultimately personally responsible for the car ”, while the apartment was only“ a small apartment in Toronto ”on which he had to pay off a mortgage. Regarding Alex Milne's work as a ghost draftsman for Cyberforce , Lee claimed he "forgot to adjust the credits when the assignment was completed," which Lee said was clearly his own fault, and offered Milne to provide him with the necessary receipts that Dream Engine still owed him money. He also claimed that he did not remember firing Milne and that he was informed in an email in May 2007 that, to the best of his knowledge, Milne had been paid in full. Other allegations made by Johnston during the interview include allegations that Top Cow confirmed to him [Johnston] that Lee had promised the publisher that it would do all of the work on Cyberforce itself, and that Marvel had confirmed to him [Johnston] Lee did not comment at all on having been instructed not to pay any more money [for outsourced projects like X-Men / Fantastic Four ] to Dreamwave, but rather to Dream Engine. Nor did Lee respond to an express request to provide evidence that he had not tried to siphon money on large contracts from Dreamwave to Dream Engine in the months leading up to the bankruptcy. However, Lee announced plans to launch a "creative payback movement" with the aim of raising funds for former Dreamwave artists who were financially disadvantaged by the bankruptcy.

Individual evidence

1. ^ "Dreamwave Productions Closes Up Shop," Comic Book Resources, January 4, 2005. Accessed January 8, 2011.
2. ↑ Alex Segura Jr .: The Dreamwave Bankruptcy: From the Writers Point of View . Newsarama.com, July 26, 2005, archived from the original on March 29, 2009 ; accessed on November 23, 2013 (English). 
3. ↑ Interview with Simon Furman ( Memento of the original from August 31, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , Transfans.co.uk, September 2005. Accessed January 9, 2011. 
4. ↑ Rich Johnston, “Lying in the Gutters: Not Paying Award,” Comic Book Resources, Jan. 3, 2005. Accessed Jan. 9, 2011.
5. ↑ Rich Johnston, “Lying in the Gutters: Unjust Desserts,” Comic Book Resources, July 11, 2005. Accessed January 9, 2011.
6. ↑ Rich Johnston, “Lying in the Gutters: Dream a Little Dream,” Comic Book Resources, Aug. 1, 2005. Accessed Jan. 9, 2011.
7. ↑ Rich Johnston, “Lying in the Gutters: Handful of Dust,” Comic Book Resources, Feb. 28, 2005. Accessed Jan. 9, 2011.
8. ↑ Rich Johnston, “Lying in the Gutters: Just What Are The Paying Pat Lee for Anyway?” Comic Book Resources, September 11, 2006. Accessed January 9, 2011.
9. ↑ Rich Johnston, “Lying in the Gutters: Another Pat Lee Story,” Comic Book Resources, April 30, 2007. Accessed January 9, 2011.
10. ↑ Rich Johnston, "Pat Lee Talks To Bleeding Cool Via A Dabel Brother," Bleeding Cool, December 20, 2010. Accessed January 9, 2011.