Alex, I don't know why you are so focused on the character creation issue in this discussion. The judge makes it clear she is not ruling on who created the characters. The rationale she uses for determining the work Kirby did was for hire would apply regardless of whether Kirby created everything himself, Stan created everything himself, or something in between.

The judge doesn't even appear to completely accept Lee's version of events. In her description of the creation of the FF, she writes that "Lee and Kirby co-created the Fantastic Four. At their first plotting conference, Lee and Kirby discussed ideas for the first issue. Kirby then produced the pencil drawings for the issue." That certainly doesn't gibe with Lee's version of events... if anything, it sounds more like Evanier's scenario.