People to meet: Marvel Entertainment’s VP animation development & production

Cort Lane was upped to VP animation development & production at Marvel last year, placing him in charge of development of all animated series at the now Disney-owned company.

Lane has recently worked on coproductions of Iron Man: Armored Adventures and Black Panther as well as supervising The Super Hero Squad and developing the upcoming Ultimate Spider-Man. Prior to Marvel, Lane was at Mattel, producing animated, live-action content across brands including Barbie.

Marvel has over 8,000 characters, so which does Lane want to bring to life from their comic book origins?

“Its the picking and choosing that is the biggest challenge for me,” he says.”We are all aligned around a select assortment of characters that have the strongest ability to appeal to both kids and adults – and drive cross-platform content and consumer products. Animation is unique as the front line in educating kids about these characters. We start by seeding them as guest-stars in several shows.”

Lane will be at NATPE, talking on the ‘In Conversation with Kids Biz: Building the Brand From the Ground Up’ panel, alongside Hasbro’s Stephen J. Davis and Saban Brands’ Elie Dekel.