At the start of any Batman book or at the end of any TV show/movie Bob Kane is always credited as the sole creator of Batman, this is not true, so why is it so?

I honestly don't know. Its a cruel world dude

@batshrine: @FiguredOut95:

William "Bill" Finger, (February 8, 1914 – January 18, 1974) was an American comic strip and comic book writer best known as the uncredited co-creator, with Bob Kane, of the DC Comics character Batman, as well as the co-architect of the series' development. In later years, Kane acknowledged Finger as "a contributing force" in the character's creation, and comics historian Ron Goulart has referred to Batman as the "creation of artist Bob Kane and writer Bill Finger". A DC Comics press release in 2007 stated that, "Kane, along with writer Bill Finger, had just created Batman for DC predecessor National Comics." According to George Roussos, "Bob Kane had [the] ideas while Bill sort of organized them". He also wrote many of the original 1940s Green Lantern stories and would go on to contribute to the development of numerous comic book series.

Finger was posthumously inducted into the comic book industry's Jack Kirby Hall of Fame in 1994 and the Will Eisner Comic Book Hall of Fame in 1999. His name provided the basis for the Bill Finger Award, founded by Jerry Robinson and presented annually at Comic-Con International to honor lifetime achievements by comic book writers insufficiently honored for their work in the medium

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I believe it was part of the contract when they sold the rights to Batman. Kane demanded that he be credited in any future Batman media, Finger did not. There's more to it than that, but that's the basic gist of it.

@roboadmiral: cheers

Finger was a ghost writer who wasn't revealed until the 70's. Why isn't he credited? Good question.

good question....yes.

It's not a simple matter of just writing his name,that's easy but if DC does that they'll have to start paying his family royalties,so it all comes down to money.

Mind you I think he deserves more credit than Kane,Kane only created the name "Batman",Finger created everything else.

@entropy_aegis: Yeah I heard Kane hardly did nothing either, Kane's ideas came close to ripping off the shadow, I also heard he was a real a$$ hole to everyone working at DC, but I did not know him personally (obviously) so I shouldn't judge.

@FiguredOut95 said:

@entropy_aegis: Yeah I heard Kane hardly did nothing either, Kane's ideas came close to ripping off the shadow, I also heard he was a real a$$ hole to everyone working at DC, but I did not know him personally (obviously) so I shouldn't judge.

Kane created Catwoman but Finger co created Joker and created both Deadshot and Hugo Strange,mind you all these characters have undergone the evolution process and are hardly reminiscent to the originals.Still I have seen Kane's original Batman sketch and it's nothing like Batman.

@entropy_aegis said:

It's not a simple matter of just writing his name,that's easy but if DC does that they'll have to start paying his family royalties,so it all comes down to money.

Mind you I think he deserves more credit than Kane,Kane only created the name "Batman",Finger created everything else.

I agree.

Kane was a businessman. Finger was not.

bob kane was a more marketable name

Kane was everything, but not a real artist, sorry to say but is the truth.

I think it's unfair! it's like not crediting steve ditko for spiderman

@consolemaster001 said:

I think it's unfair! it's like not crediting steve ditko for spiderman

i agree man

@entropy_aegis said:

It's not a simple matter of just writing his name,that's easy but if DC does that they'll have to start paying his family royalties,so it all comes down to money.

Mind you I think he deserves more credit than Kane,Kane only created the name "Batman",Finger created everything else.

I read this somewhere where Kane drew Batman but DC wanted a story to go with it and so Kane went to Finger for story and basically Finger created the whole "Batman". There are many more uncredited people that helped create Batman.

@FiguredOut95 said:

@entropy_aegis: Yeah I heard Kane hardly did nothing either, Kane's ideas came close to ripping off the shadow, I also heard he was a real a$$ hole to everyone working at DC, but I did not know him personally (obviously) so I shouldn't judge.

I wouldn't say ripping off but the idea of Batman came from The Shadow and I think Kane himself mentioned that in an interview as far as I remember.

@consolemaster001: Sad but true... and just imagine the scale of how many others are not credited for their work on other characters as well.

It really sucks

I don't know about the technicalities, but it saddens me that the man never gets any recognition for his contribution to one of pop culture's greatest characters. If I recall, Erik Larsen once wrote that being 'Bill Fingered' means not getting the credit you deserve in the comic-book industry.

Reminds me of the lack of recognition for Jack Kirby or Steve Ditko, in some respects.

Most people never give any credit to the artist.......

This is the same with the Stan Lee mania, the guy has to be the biggest name on comic book industry, but still he only created like 25% of Marvel cool characters, not all of them and not alone.

I mean Spiderman was created by Stan Lee, Steve Ditko and some people say Jack Kirby, even Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko had a real life feud because Kirby says he helped to create him and Ditko said he did the first sketch but the character is nothing like Kirby wanted and his design wasnt the inspiration he used for Spiderman.

Still 99% belive Stan Lee alone created Spiderman and some insane people belive he created Wolverine.

And i belive Bill Finger should gets his name too, i mean even Bob Kane talked about this:

In his 1989 autobiography, Kane detailed Finger's contributions to Batman's creation:

One day I called Bill and said, 'I have a new character called the Bat-Man and I've made some crude, elementary sketches I'd like you to look at'. He came over and I showed him the drawings. At the time, I only had a small domino mask, like the one Robin later wore, on Batman's face. Bill said, 'Why not make him look more like a bat and put a hood on him, and take the eyeballs out and just put slits for eyes to make him look more mysterious?' At this point, the Bat-Man wore a red union suit; the wings, trunks, and mask were black. I thought that red and black would be a good combination. Bill said that the costume was too bright: 'Color it dark gray to make it look more ominous'. The cape looked like two stiff bat wings attached to his arms. As Bill and I talked, we realized that these wings would get cumbersome when Bat-Man was in action, and changed them into a cape, scalloped to look like bat wings when he was fighting or swinging down on a rope. Also, he didn't have any gloves on, and we added them so that he wouldn't leave fingerprints.

In 1989, Kane revisited Finger's situation, recalling in an interview,

In those days it was like, one artist and he had his name over it [the comic strip] — the policy of DC in the comic books was, if you can't write it, obtain other writers, but their names would never appear on the comic book in the finished version. So Bill never asked me for it [the byline] and I never volunteered — I guess my ego at that time. And I felt badly, really, when he [Finger] died.

The same reason Jack Kirby is never credited for creating Marvel.

It's a pretty sad fact that after Bill Finger was told by DC that he "wasn't required" any more he then went on to work on the Batman TV series and the entire time he was there nobody even knew he was the man that actually created the character in the first place

One of the worst thinks about comic book industry, artists don't get any recognition like the writers do. Jack Kirby was far greater creater than Stan Lee IMO but he never got the recognition he deserved. And Bill Finger is definitely at the top in the list of under-credited creaters. He still doesn't get what he deserves.

@figuredout95: oh come on he was a friend of stan lee's he couldent have been that bad...

Stan Lee tells the story once some one ask him for his sign, Bob Kane said, what about me? i created the Batman and give the guy a sign that he never asked for, thats nuts, besides many good people is friend with bad people or not so good people.

Besides it loos Kane was alright unti Finger died and then he start having problem with the fact he take all the glory for himself.

Kane did not want to share the glory