5min chapter

#643: Todd McFarlane, Iconic Comic Book Artist — Lessons from Stan Lee, How to Make Art that Outlives You, How to Compete with Corporate Giants and Win (While Having Fun), Dealmaking Strategies, War Stories from Wall Street and Lawyer Land, Taking Responsibility for Your Life, and Why Creators Need to Smash Limits

The Tim Ferriss Show

notes

CHAPTER

Is Stan Really Your Superpower?

Todd VanDerWerff: Stan was very generous in terms of encouraging us, even though he knew that our books were going to be in direct competition with Marvel. He would make people feel important, special and unique in that 20 seconds. "I just kept becoming more and more aware of this is how you treat the public," says Van derWerff. 'Without them, without the fans, we have no careers'

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Transcript

Episode notes

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Todd McFarlane (@Todd_McFarlane) is an Emmy- and Grammy-winning director/producer and creator of one of the world’s best-selling comic books, Spawn. He is best known to many comic book fans for his work as the artist on The Amazing Spider-Man, for which he co-created Marvel’s top villain, Venom.

Todd is the CEO of Todd McFarlane Productions, McFarlane Toys (one of the US’s top action-figure manufacturers), and McFarlane Films. He is also a co-founder of Image Comics, which debuted Spawn in 1992, selling 1.7 million copies of the first issue. In 1997, Spawn was made into an Emmy Award-winning animated series on HBO and a live-action feature film that grossed over $100 million. In 2019, Todd made history with Spawn #301, earning the Guinness World Record for longest-running creator-owned superhero comic book series.

Please enjoy!

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[05:58] The wit, wisdom, and work ethic of Stan Lee.

[29:50] Todd’s four corners: video games, TV, movies, and toys.

[41:46] Learning the art of toycrafting and beating the industry at its own game.

[49:11] Dumb luck at Toy Fair.

[1:03:31] Toy marketing and distribution circa 1994.

[1:10:51] The play Todd made with a $3 million baseball.

[1:18:08] Todd gets in a hockey fight.

[1:24:12] Bringing Spawn to TV.

[1:27:57] Being the dumbest guy in the room can win you Emmy awards.

[1:31:17] Cancellation.

[1:32:38] Todd is bilingual — in art and business.

[1:38:50] How Todd finds time to create while managing his businesses.