fubarthepanda wrote:
 
My guess is that they decided to go the creator-centric route for the 70's and early 80's Batman and Superman books because of the onerous reprint clauses that were present in the contracts during that period.  Unlike Marvel, DC basically needs to renegotiate their reprint fees with the individual creators (or their estates) involved in order to reprint work from that time period.  Doing it on an artist-by-artist basis is probably more efficient for them, especially given that some of these creators are no longer alive.

Makes sense - I've heard this before, and it may explain why DC is so far behind Marvel re: their collected editions from the '70's & '80's.  Though I have the utmost respect for creators/artists & understand that in many cases they've been %$%^&#$ over the years re: compensation, it's unfortunate that because of issues like this we collectors/fans of this material may not be  getting the reprints we want.

By the same token, I don't like it when a DVD/Blu release of a film/TV series I'm a big fan of has to alter the soundtrack/music because of licensing issues...