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Superhero legend Stan Lee is dead at 95. The irrepressible comic book writer, editor, and publisher helped create Marvel Comics, and then aided in populating it with characters like Spider-Man, the Hulk, the Fantastic Four, the X-Men, Iron Man, Thor, and Black Panther.
For a career that began in the late 1930s, Lee is largely responsible for the past decade of cinematic popular culture: Avengers: Infinity War, a movie from earlier this year which features Marvel characters, grossed over two billion dollars.
In 1940, Lee, then a young assistant known as Stanley Lieber, met comic artist Jacob Kurtzberg, alias Jack Kirby. Lee was working his way up from the bottom.
“In those days, they dipped the pen in ink,” Lee told the Los Angeles Times, “I had to make sure the inkwells were filled.”
After spending years as a staff writer, Lee was frustrated and about to quit the business. He didn’t like the stories he was told to write, such as they were.
“How about concentrating on story?” Lee once asked his boss. “Forget the story,” he was told, “put a lot of fight scenes on every page.”
“Why don’t you write one the way you want to write it?” Lee’s wife Joan advised. “You’re going to quit anyway, so if he fires you, who cares? But get it out of your system.”
The result was The Fantastic Four, a collaboration with Kirby and a big hit. (Joan, Lee’s wife of 69 years, died in 2017.)
Birth of Spider-man
Kirby and Lee were central to the formation of Marvel Comics in 1961. Kirby’s work was brash and sweeping – as much movie storyboards as comics. Lee made his heroes flawed.
Superman never had an unkind word, unless he was under a villain’s mind control; Lee’s character the Thing came close to murdering the Human Torch out of annoyance more than once. Marvel was an immediate success, while older comic book universes like DC languished.
From heroes, Kirby and Lee went on to create a sympathetic monster in the Hulk. Then, shortly thereafter, Lee told his boss about an idea for a character called Spider-Man.
“You can’t call a hero Spider Man, Stan,” he was told. “People hate spiders!” Lee’s idea of his new hero being a teenager similarly bombed: “Teenagers can only be sidekicks!”
Finally, Lee was advised to not “slow down the stories with personal stuff.” He ignored all of it and redefined the form.
An extraordinary character
In 1966, Lee created Black Panther, the first black superhero. Segregation had only ended two years before. The character was fully empowered.
“He doesn’t live in a regular tribe and so forth,” Lee once said about Black Panther, adding: “He is the prince of a nation…and he is one of the greatest scientists in the world; and his area, his country is more scientifically advanced than any.”
Black Panther, the movie, which opened at the beginning of this year, grossed over $1.3 billion.
In 2009, The Walt Disney Company bought Marvel Entertainment for about $4 billion. Lee famously appeared in cameos in each Marvel film.
“Stan Lee was as extraordinary as the characters he created,” Disney CEO Bob Iger said in a statement.
Even so, after revolutionizing comics and building a multi-media empire, Lee still had nagging doubts.
“The thing is,” he told the Chicago Tribune in 2014, “I used to think what I did was not very important. People are building bridges and engaging in medical research and here I was doing stories about fictional people who do extraordinary, crazy things and wear costumes. But I suppose I have come to realize that entertainment is not easily dismissed. … Without it, lives can be dull.”
