Comics have been a burgeoning underground scene for decades, but with the advent of licensed merchandise and then the Marvel and DC comic book movie franchises, these books are now big business. It’s estimated that the industry is now worth a staggering $800 million a year. Although it can be a low-paying profession, as freelancers are paid per page and few have rights to their work, the best writers and creators can earn a surprising salary through licensing deals, advertising, and smart business decisions.
We’ve compiled a list of the highest-earning comic book writers and artists. Check it out.
1. David Choe 300 – 500 million US dollars
Choe is a graffiti artist and comic book writer. His best known work is the graphic novel “Slow Jams,” which often sells for around $200. But that wouldn’t be nearly enough to put him on the list of top earners. No, he wisely accepted company stock as payment for painting murals in the home of then-Facebook President Sean Parker in the early 2000s. It was a risky decision, but when Choe woke up on the morning of Facebook’s IPO in 2012, he was an overnight millionaire.
2. Tom McFarlane $300 million
McFarlane made his name during the comic book industry’s commercial boom in the 1990s. From humble beginnings as an artist on Batman and The Incredible Hulk comics, he found his niche working on Marvel’s Amazing Spider-Man.
His depictions of the webslinger were so popular with fans that he got his own series in 1990, which sold over 2.5 million copies. A cover by McFarlane recently sold for $71,000. But after a disagreement with his publisher, McFarlane went out on his own and founded Image Comics with a collective of other artists.
His vision with Image was to create a company where the author and illustrator retained the copyright to their characters. His most popular work for Image was the Spawn series, a huge hit in the 1990s, with the first issue selling 1.7 million copies – a record for an independent comic.
McFarlane Entertainment is the enterprising comic book writer’s other company, which produces toys, animated films and video games, making him the richest comic book writer.
3. Stan Lee 50 – 80 million dollars
With a net worth estimated at between $50 and $80 million, Stan Lee is not only the most famous comic book writer, but also one of the richest. This man who created and owned the rights to the Marvel franchise gave us legends like Iron Man and Spider-Man.
4. Akira Toriyama 45 million dollars
Akira Toriyama is a Japanese manga author best known for his work on Dr. Slump, which sold 35 million copies in Japan. He later created Dragon Ball, the second best-selling manga of all time, which sold 350 million copies worldwide. The anime adaptations were even more successful, especially in the West, where they introduced the art form to new audiences.
5. Frank Miller $45 million
He is best known for his brutal comic book adaptations Sin City and 300, which were huge successes in 2005 and 2007 respectively. Both films were very close and respectful to the original and even used some images from the comic as storyboards. They also made their creator very rich.
Miller’s career began in the late ’70s when he wrote for Marvel’s Daredevil series, but perhaps his most significant contribution to the comic book industry was his 1986 creation A Dark Night Returns. The increasingly brutal and dark, dystopian atmosphere of his work ushered in a new era in comics that was a huge hit with fans in the ’90s.
6. Naoko Takeuchi 33 million dollars
Naoko Takeuchi is the only woman on our list and is best known for her series Sailor Moon. In 1993, she won the prestigious Kodansha Manga Award for the comic, which became one of the most popular manga series of all time. The success of Sailor Moon led to two anime adaptations, three animated films, a live-action film, video games, and a huge range of merchandise.
7. Mark Millar $25 million
Millar is a Scottish writer whose love of comics dates back to the day he drew Spider-Man’s famous web on his face in permanent marker just hours before his first communion. He has written for both major comic book publishers, including work on big names like Superman and X-Men, but he is perhaps best known for the two big-screen adaptations of his original graphic novels. Wanted and Kick-Ass were both box office hits that rode the wave of the comic book revival of recent years.
8. Robert Kirkman $20 million
Kirkman is the creator of the zombie apocalypse comic series “The Walking Dead” and has also made several film and television appearances.
9. Kevin Eastman $20 million Peter Laird $20 million
Eastman and Laird are best known for creating the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles series. Laird used his experience as a newspaper clerk to put together a press kit that was sent to television and radio stations to generate interest. By the second issue, there were 15,000 pre-orders, five times the original print run of the first issue. From there, the phenomenon took off, and licensing deals allowed the two creators to achieve great financial success with the series.
10. Joe Quesada $10 million
Although he began his career as a writer and comic book artist for DC and Marvel, Quesada retired in 2011 as the longest-serving Marvel editor-in-chief alongside Stan Lee, landing him at number 10 on our list.
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(By Sally Fox)
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