Superman Lawsuit: Shuster Estate Copyright Case Dismissed and Refiled

The Shuster estate’s Superman lawsuit is a 2025 copyright case in which the estate of co-creator Joseph Shuster sued Warner Bros. Discovery and DC Comics, arguing that Superman’s copyrights had reverted to the estate in ten countries outside the United States and that Warner Bros. could not release the new James Gunn film there without paying the estate. A federal judge threw the case out on jurisdictional grounds in April 2025, and a New York state court refused to block the film’s international release in June 2025.

What the Estate Claimed

The suit rested on a concept called reversionary rights, drawn from the United Kingdom’s Copyright Act of 1911. Section 5(2) of that statute, sometimes called the “Dickens provision,” provides that any copyright assignment made by an author expires 25 years after the author’s death, and the rights revert to the estate regardless of what the original contract said.¹ Joseph Shuster died on July 30, 1992. On that theory, the estate said, his share of Superman reverted to it on July 30, 2017, in countries that inherited the 1911 Act’s framework.²

The complaint listed ten “Foreign Reversionary Territories”: the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, India, Hong Kong, Israel, Singapore, and South Africa.² Canada was different from the others. Its statute ties reversion to the death of the last surviving co-author, and because Jerry Siegel died in 1996, the Canadian reversion date was January 28, 2021.³

Because Superman is a joint work, the estate claimed a 50% undivided interest in those foreign copyrights and argued Warner Bros. could not exploit the character in the ten territories without consent. It sought damages, a share of profits from Justice League, Black Adam, and Shazam!, and an injunction to stop the international release of the new Superman film.⁴

Why the Estate Thought It Could Sue Despite the 1992 Agreement

After Shuster died in 1992, his sister Jean Shuster Peavy and brother Frank signed an agreement with DC Comics. Jean would receive $25,000 per year for life; in exchange, the family released all claims and granted DC all of Shuster’s Superman rights.³⁵⁶

The 2025 suit tried to work around that ruling on two fronts. First, the estate argued Jean Peavy signed the 1992 agreement in her personal capacity, years before the estate was formally probated and an executor appointed in 2003, so she lacked authority to bind the estate at all. Second, and more central to the case, the estate said the 1992 agreement, whatever its effect on U.S. rights, could not extinguish reversionary rights that vested automatically under foreign law.³

Attorney Marc Toberoff, representing Shuster’s nephew and estate executor Mark Warren Peary, argued that the Berne Convention obligates U.S. courts to apply the copyright law of each country where protection is claimed.⁷ He framed the suit as a bid for “just compensation for Joe Shuster’s fundamental contributions.”⁸ Warner Bros., represented by Daniel Petrocelli of O’Melveny & Myers, responded that the Berne Convention is unenforceable in federal court and that the copyright issues had already been litigated to conclusion.⁹

The estate also leaned on a July 2024 federal ruling from Louisiana, Vetter v. Resnik, in which a judge broke with prior consensus and held that there are “no distinct foreign rights” and that the termination status of a U.S. work governs globally under the Berne Convention.¹⁰ That decision was itself on appeal to the Fifth Circuit at the time.

The Federal Court Dismissal

The case, Peary v. DC Comics, Inc. (No. 1:25-cv-00910), was filed on January 31, 2025, in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.² On April 24, 2025, U.S. District Judge Jesse Furman dismissed it for lack of jurisdiction.¹¹

Judge Furman held that the Berne Convention is “not a self-executing treaty” and creates no private right of action. He pointed to the Berne Convention Implementation Act, in which Congress declared that the United States’ obligations under the treaty are performed “only pursuant to appropriate domestic law” and that the convention itself creates no additional rights. The court also rejected the argument that the suit raised a “substantial federal question,” calling the issues “fact-bound and situation-specific” rather than pure questions of law.¹¹

Diversity jurisdiction failed too. Under federal law, the legal representative of an estate is treated as a citizen of the same state as the deceased. Shuster was a California citizen, and DC Comics, structured as a partnership, was also deemed a California citizen through one of its partners. With no complete diversity, and no federal question, the case could not stay in federal court. The request for a preliminary injunction was denied as moot.¹¹

The State Court Refiling and Denied Injunction

The next morning, April 25, 2025, Peary filed a nearly identical suit in New York state court, Peary v. DC Comics, Inc., Index No. 155397/2025, again asking for an injunction against the international release of the Superman film, then scheduled for July 11, 2025.¹² State courts are not bound by the subject-matter limits that sank the federal case.

A hearing on the injunction took place on June 4, 2025, before New York Supreme Court Justice Robert R. Reed. The judge questioned why the estate had waited years after the alleged 2017 reversion to bring the claim while Warner Bros. was investing in the film, and he raised concerns about the preclusive effect of the earlier Ninth Circuit rulings.¹³

The court denied the injunction, finding “no likelihood of success on the merits” and no showing of “irreparable harm.”¹⁴ Warner Bros. released the film globally as planned.¹⁵

Where Things Stand

Denial of the injunction did not end the case. Reporting indicates the state court lawsuit itself remained active as of mid-2025.¹⁵ Warner Bros. Discovery has continued to state that “DC controls all rights to Superman.”⁹ The Vetter v. Resnik appeal at the Fifth Circuit, which could have shaped the foreign-rights theory the estate depended on, was terminated in January 2026; the substance of the ruling was not available in the research.¹⁶

One long-term date sits beyond the litigation. Superman’s earliest depiction is scheduled to enter the U.S. public domain on January 1, 2034.¹⁵

1
UK Legislation. Copyright Act 1911, Section 5
2
Courthouse News Service. Shuster Estate Superman Complaint
3
Forbes. Superman Lawsuit Takes Flight
4
Hollywood Reporter. Warner Bros Discovery Beats Lawsuit Superman Rights
5
Authors Guild. End of the Road for Siegel and Shuster Heirs
6
Harvard Journal of Law and Technology. DC Comics Retains Right to Superman Copyrights
7
Variety. Superman Estate Sues DC Comics International Release
8
Reuters. Warner Bros Hit With Superman Copyright Lawsuit Ahead New Movie
9
Deadline. Superman Rights Lawsuit Dismissed Warner Bros Discovery
10
Bloomberg Law. Superman IP Fight Turns on Newly Questioned Foreign Rights Canon
11
Deadline. Peary v. DC Comics, Opinion
12
Variety. Warner Bros Superman Copyright Lawsuit Dismissed
13
American Lawyer Media. Peary v. DC Comics Hearing Transcript
14
Gadgets Gigabytes and Goodwill. Up Up and Litigated: Supermans 87-Year Copyright War
15
The Popverse. Superman Legal UK Canada Ireland Australia Copyright Second Decline Lawsuit
16
CourtListener. Vetter v. Resnik Docket