Pat Lee
Encyclopedia
Patrick "Pat" C.K. Lee is a Canadian
comic book artist
, publisher, former President and co-founder of the now defunct Dreamwave Productions
.
and DC
editors. It took nearly a year before he finally caught the attention of Image co-founder Rob Liefeld
at a Toronto convention in 1994. Four months later, he was hired by Image Comics
and went off to train at Extreme Studios. There, he learned an invaluable skill: speed. In an interview with Wizard he states:
Lee worked on various titles such as Bloodpool
, Extreme Sacrifice, Black Flag, House of M: Iron Man
, Glory
, Darkchylde
, Avengeblade, Extreme Prelude, and Prophet. Soon after, he was hired in Wildstorm Productions to work on Jim Lee
's WildC.A.T.S., Allegra and Whilce Portacio
's Wetworks
. His career in comic books led him to work in Marvel Comics with a Wolverine
/Punisher
mini-series entitled Revelation.
Lee has illustrated cards for the Magic: The Gathering
collectible card game.
. They began to publish their first mini-series Darkminds followed by other titles like Transformers, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
, Warlands, Fate of the Blade, NecroWar, Sandscape and other graphic novels. Dreamwave filed for bankruptcy in January 2005.
/Fantastic Four
mini-series and an arc on the Superman/Batman
series for DC. He also contributed to a relaunch of Cyberforce
for Top Cow Productions
, another Image studio. Most of the new projects with Dream Engine failed to bring Lee the high profile acclaim of his Transformers work, with the Washington Times in particular criticizing his ability to draw humans versus the larger than life robots from Transformers.
, Transformers writers Adam Patyk and James McDonough stated they had been laid off before the Dreamwave bankruptcy following a controversy about their payment, and had subsequently filed a lawsuit against Dreamwave for lack of payment. In another interview, Transformers writer Simon Furman
claimed that Lee had "looked me square in the eye and said everything’s hunky-dory" a mere month before the bankruptcy. Comic book journalist Rich Johnston
repeatedly reported controversial details concerning Pat Lee, including the allegation that Dreamwave's assets and employees were shifted over to the new company Dream Engine, started by Pat Lee's brother Roger Lee, in January 2005, even before Dreamwave declared bankruptcy, the allegation that Lee had transferred ownership of a company-owned Porsche
to himself prior to the Dreamwave bankruptcy, the allegation that Lee had bought an apartment for half a million Canadian dollars before the bankruptcy, a list of Dreamwave's debt and creditors, and the allegation that artist Alex Milne
had been working as a ghost artist for Lee on Top Cow's
Cyberforce
title without being credited, with Lee eventually stopping to pay Milne when Top Cow had asked for confirmation that Lee was indeed the sole artist of the book and Milne refused to comply.
In December 2010, Pat Lee gave Johnston an interview, in which Johnston reiterated all of the above claims. While Lee admitted that "many artists had delays in payment" even before the bankruptcy and "regret[s] not being able to speak to everyone" beforehand, he also claimed that "most creators at Dreamwave were aware that we were going through financial difficulties. We didn’t announce it, but people were not being paid in full, and it was pretty obvious." He also claimed that "I barely paid myself at Dreamwave, and didn’t pay myself for extended periods so that the company could pay other bills." Regarding the Porsche, Lee claimed that it "was leased by Dreamwave and I was personally responsible for the vehicle at the end", whereas the apartment was a "small apartment in Toronto that I paid a mortgage on". Regarding Alex Milne's work as a ghost artist on Cyberforce, Lee claimed that he "forgot to adjust the credits at the end of the job", which was "definitely my error", and offered Milne to "provide me the appropriate documentation and evidence" that "Dream Engine owed him money". He also claimed that "I don’t recall firing Alex", and that he "expressed to him via email in May 2007 that I understood he was paid in full". Other allegations brought up by Johnston in the interview, namely that Top Cow had told him [Johnston] that Lee had specifically assured them that he was doing all the work on Cyberforce himself, and that Marvel had told him [Johnston] that they were "asked to stop paying money to Dreamwave [for outsourced projects such as the X-Men
/Fantastic Four
limited series] but send it to Dream Engine instead", were not addressed by Lee at all. Lee also did not respond to the specific request to offer evidence to counter the claim that he was trying to "siphon money from big gigs away from Dreamwave to Dream Engine in the months before the bankruptcy". However, Lee announced plans to set up a "Creative Refund Movement" with the specific intention to "raise funds to pay former Dreamwave artists who were financially affected by the bankruptcy".
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
comic book artist
Comic Book Artist
Comic Book Artist was an American magazine founded by Jon B. Cooke devoted to anecdotal histories of American comic books, with emphasis on comics published since the 1960s...
, publisher, former President and co-founder of the now defunct Dreamwave Productions
Dreamwave Productions
Dreamwave Productions was a Canadian art design studio and comic book publisher founded in 1996 and is best known for their multiple Transformers comic book series...
.
Biography
At an early age of 16, Lee began his career in the comic book industry right after graduating in high school by sending over 150 pages of sample artworks to uninterested MarvelMarvel Comics
Marvel Worldwide, Inc., commonly referred to as Marvel Comics and formerly Marvel Publishing, Inc. and Marvel Comics Group, is an American company that publishes comic books and related media...
and DC
DC Comics
DC Comics, Inc. is one of the largest and most successful companies operating in the market for American comic books and related media. It is the publishing unit of DC Entertainment a company of Warner Bros. Entertainment, which itself is owned by Time Warner...
editors. It took nearly a year before he finally caught the attention of Image co-founder Rob Liefeld
Rob Liefeld
Rob Liefeld is an American comic book writer, illustrator, and publisher. A prominent artist in the 1990s, he has since become a controversial figure in the medium....
at a Toronto convention in 1994. Four months later, he was hired by Image Comics
Image Comics
Image Comics is a United States comic book publisher. It was founded in 1992 by high-profile illustrators as a venue where creators could publish their material without giving up the copyrights to the characters they created, as creator-owned properties. It was immediately successful, and remains...
and went off to train at Extreme Studios. There, he learned an invaluable skill: speed. In an interview with Wizard he states:
Lee worked on various titles such as Bloodpool
Bloodpool (comics)
Bloodpool is a fictional group of superheroes and a comic book series created by Rob Liefeld. The series was published by Image Comics in 1996 under Liefeld's Extreme Studios. The team's roster includes Rubble, Task, Seoul, Psilence, Wylder, and Fusion...
, Extreme Sacrifice, Black Flag, House of M: Iron Man
Iron Man
Iron Man is a fictional character, a superhero in the . The character was created by writer-editor Stan Lee, developed by scripter Larry Lieber, and designed by artists Don Heck and Jack Kirby, first appearing in Tales of Suspense #39 .A billionaire playboy, industrialist and ingenious engineer,...
, Glory
Glory (comics)
Glory is a fictional character originally from Image Comics, and later on from the Awesome Comics comic book series created by Rob Liefeld. The character's full name is Gloriana Demeter, a half-Amazonian, half-Demon warrior.- Rob Liefeld's Glory :...
, Darkchylde
Darkchylde
Darkchylde is an American comic book character created in 1996 by Randy Queen. It was originally published by Maximum Press, and later by Image Comics, through Homage Comics, a publishing imprint of Wildstorm...
, Avengeblade, Extreme Prelude, and Prophet. Soon after, he was hired in Wildstorm Productions to work on Jim Lee
Jim Lee
Jim Lee is a Korean-American comic book artist, writer, editor and publisher. He first broke into the industry in 1987 as an artist for Marvel Comics, illustrating titles such as Alpha Flight and Punisher War Journal, before gaining a great deal of popularity on The Uncanny X-Men...
's WildC.A.T.S., Allegra and Whilce Portacio
Whilce Portacio
William "Whilce" Portacio is a Filipino-American comic book writer and artist. Noted for his work on such titles as The Punisher, X-Factor, and the Uncanny X-Men. Portacio was also one of the seven co-founders of Image Comics, though he did not become a partner in the company.-Early life:Portacio...
's Wetworks
Wetworks
Wetworks is an American comic book series created by comic book artist Whilce Portacio and writer Brandon Choi. It ran for four years before ending in 1998...
. His career in comic books led him to work in Marvel Comics with a Wolverine
Wolverine (comics)
Wolverine is a fictional character, a superhero that appears in comic books published by Marvel Comics. Born as James Howlett and commonly known as Logan, Wolverine is a mutant, possessing animal-keen senses, enhanced physical capabilities, three retracting bone claws on each hand and a healing...
/Punisher
Punisher
The Punisher is a fictional character, an anti-hero appearing in comic books based in the . Created by writer Gerry Conway and artists John Romita, Sr., and Ross Andru, the character made its first appearance in The Amazing Spider-Man #129 .The Punisher is a vigilante who employs murder,...
mini-series entitled Revelation.
Lee has illustrated cards for the Magic: The Gathering
Magic: The Gathering
Magic: The Gathering , also known as Magic, is the first collectible trading card game created by mathematics professor Richard Garfield and introduced in 1993 by Wizards of the Coast. Magic continues to thrive, with approximately twelve million players as of 2011...
collectible card game.
Dreamwave
A year later, he and his brother Roger Lee founded Dreamwave ProductionsDreamwave Productions
Dreamwave Productions was a Canadian art design studio and comic book publisher founded in 1996 and is best known for their multiple Transformers comic book series...
. They began to publish their first mini-series Darkminds followed by other titles like Transformers, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are a fictional team of four teenage anthropomorphic turtles, who were trained by their anthropomorphic rat sensei in the art of ninjutsu and named after four Renaissance artists...
, Warlands, Fate of the Blade, NecroWar, Sandscape and other graphic novels. Dreamwave filed for bankruptcy in January 2005.
Work for Hire
When Dreamwave Productions closed, Lee formed a new production company known as Dream Engine and parlayed his work on the Transformers franchise to land a string of jobs for Marvel and DC, most notably a X-MenX-Men
The X-Men are a superhero team in the . They were created by writer Stan Lee and artist Jack Kirby, and first appeared in The X-Men #1...
/Fantastic Four
Fantastic Four
The Fantastic Four is a fictional superhero team appearing in comic books published by Marvel Comics. The group debuted in The Fantastic Four #1 , which helped to usher in a new level of realism in the medium...
mini-series and an arc on the Superman/Batman
Superman/Batman
Superman/Batman was a monthly comic book series published by DC Comics that features the publisher's two most popular characters: Batman and Superman...
series for DC. He also contributed to a relaunch of Cyberforce
Cyberforce
Cyberforce is an Image Comics super-hero team created by artist Marc Silvestri and writer Eric Silvestri in 1992. Silvestri would begin performing both the plotting and pencilling chores, but the series was subsequently drawn by other artists, including David Finch...
for Top Cow Productions
Top Cow Productions
Top Cow Productions is an American comics publisher, a partner studio of Image Comics founded by Marc Silvestri in 1992.-History:...
, another Image studio. Most of the new projects with Dream Engine failed to bring Lee the high profile acclaim of his Transformers work, with the Washington Times in particular criticizing his ability to draw humans versus the larger than life robots from Transformers.
Controversy
Since the closure of Dreamwave, Pat Lee has been criticized for his business practices. In an interview with NewsaramaNewsarama
Newsarama is an American website that publishes news, interviews and essays about the American comic book industry.-History:Newsarama began in Summer 1995 as a series of Internet forum postings on the Prodigy comic-book message boards by fan Mike Doran. In these short messages. Doran shared...
, Transformers writers Adam Patyk and James McDonough stated they had been laid off before the Dreamwave bankruptcy following a controversy about their payment, and had subsequently filed a lawsuit against Dreamwave for lack of payment. In another interview, Transformers writer Simon Furman
Simon Furman
Simon Christopher Francis Furman is a comic book writer, particularly associated with of a number of notable Transformers comics for Marvel UK, Marvel US, Dreamwave, and most recently, IDW...
claimed that Lee had "looked me square in the eye and said everything’s hunky-dory" a mere month before the bankruptcy. Comic book journalist Rich Johnston
Rich Johnston
Rich Johnston is a writer who writes about the comic book industry.-Early life:Johnston grew up in Pontefract, West Yorkshire, studied politics at University of Newcastle upon Tyne, and was an advertising copywriter until 2009; he currently lives in Kingston Vale, London, with his wife, Janice...
repeatedly reported controversial details concerning Pat Lee, including the allegation that Dreamwave's assets and employees were shifted over to the new company Dream Engine, started by Pat Lee's brother Roger Lee, in January 2005, even before Dreamwave declared bankruptcy, the allegation that Lee had transferred ownership of a company-owned Porsche
Porsche
Porsche Automobil Holding SE, usually shortened to Porsche SE a Societas Europaea or European Public Company, is a German based holding company with investments in the automotive industry....
to himself prior to the Dreamwave bankruptcy, the allegation that Lee had bought an apartment for half a million Canadian dollars before the bankruptcy, a list of Dreamwave's debt and creditors, and the allegation that artist Alex Milne
Alex Milne
Alex Milne is a Canadian comic book artist, best known for his work on various Transformers comic books.-Career:Graduating from Sheridan College, Milne debuted on the comics scene after being hired by Dreamwave Productions to pencil their Transformers: Energon series...
had been working as a ghost artist for Lee on Top Cow's
Top Cow Productions
Top Cow Productions is an American comics publisher, a partner studio of Image Comics founded by Marc Silvestri in 1992.-History:...
Cyberforce
Cyberforce
Cyberforce is an Image Comics super-hero team created by artist Marc Silvestri and writer Eric Silvestri in 1992. Silvestri would begin performing both the plotting and pencilling chores, but the series was subsequently drawn by other artists, including David Finch...
title without being credited, with Lee eventually stopping to pay Milne when Top Cow had asked for confirmation that Lee was indeed the sole artist of the book and Milne refused to comply.
In December 2010, Pat Lee gave Johnston an interview, in which Johnston reiterated all of the above claims. While Lee admitted that "many artists had delays in payment" even before the bankruptcy and "regret[s] not being able to speak to everyone" beforehand, he also claimed that "most creators at Dreamwave were aware that we were going through financial difficulties. We didn’t announce it, but people were not being paid in full, and it was pretty obvious." He also claimed that "I barely paid myself at Dreamwave, and didn’t pay myself for extended periods so that the company could pay other bills." Regarding the Porsche, Lee claimed that it "was leased by Dreamwave and I was personally responsible for the vehicle at the end", whereas the apartment was a "small apartment in Toronto that I paid a mortgage on". Regarding Alex Milne's work as a ghost artist on Cyberforce, Lee claimed that he "forgot to adjust the credits at the end of the job", which was "definitely my error", and offered Milne to "provide me the appropriate documentation and evidence" that "Dream Engine owed him money". He also claimed that "I don’t recall firing Alex", and that he "expressed to him via email in May 2007 that I understood he was paid in full". Other allegations brought up by Johnston in the interview, namely that Top Cow had told him [Johnston] that Lee had specifically assured them that he was doing all the work on Cyberforce himself, and that Marvel had told him [Johnston] that they were "asked to stop paying money to Dreamwave [for outsourced projects such as the X-Men
X-Men
The X-Men are a superhero team in the . They were created by writer Stan Lee and artist Jack Kirby, and first appeared in The X-Men #1...
/Fantastic Four
Fantastic Four
The Fantastic Four is a fictional superhero team appearing in comic books published by Marvel Comics. The group debuted in The Fantastic Four #1 , which helped to usher in a new level of realism in the medium...
limited series] but send it to Dream Engine instead", were not addressed by Lee at all. Lee also did not respond to the specific request to offer evidence to counter the claim that he was trying to "siphon money from big gigs away from Dreamwave to Dream Engine in the months before the bankruptcy". However, Lee announced plans to set up a "Creative Refund Movement" with the specific intention to "raise funds to pay former Dreamwave artists who were financially affected by the bankruptcy".
External links
- Pat Lee - Pat Lee's old personal site
- Pat Lee art blog
- Pat Lee Productions blog
- Pat Lee's page on Transformers Wiki