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DC was drowning in debt, while Marvel was soaring high. Enter Bill Sarnoff from Warner Communications, who thought, “Hey, let’s let Marvel take over DC’s characters. They seem to be doing alright with Spider-Man, so why not Superman?”
Here’s the kicker—Marvel’s president, Jim Galton, rejected it. His reason? “Those characters must not be any good” if DC couldn’t make it work. Yep, he wrote off DC’s A-listers as second-rate. But Marvel’s editor, Jim Shooter, wasn’t buying it. He knew these heroes were pure gold and wouldn’t let the chance slide.
Shooter wasn’t playing around. He devised a plan to prove Galton wrong, throwing out seven massive titles: Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern, Teen Titans, Justice League, and Legion of Super-Heroes. His numbers? 39 million copies in two years and $3.5 million in profit. That’s insane cash for comics back then. But Galton? He wasn’t sold—I thought Shooter was way off with those numbers.
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