Stan Lee

[trmoore54]

Hate is perhaps a strong word for it, but there is a certain amount of resentment towards the man for how he's treated his peers. Credit where it's due was never Stan's credo and when in charge at Marvel, he literally followed through on this.

 

He was a creative genius and also the man who put comics into the public eye more than anyone else. However, he could not have done anything without the likes of Kirby and Ditko especially, but to hear him talk sometimes, you wouldn't know that those men existed.

 

Oh, and he's also a dyed-in-the-wool revisionist and if you ever get the same story told the same way twice from Stan, you're one of the fortunate few.

 

He reminds me of my partner for some 20 years...insufferable sonofaperson_without_enough_empathy who took all the credit and stole from his partners...had to stick it out to protect my investment which finally paid off when we sold the firm in Sept 06...but I digress...

[Flemmings]

Hate is perhaps a strong word for it, but there is a certain amount of resentment towards the man for how he's treated his peers. Credit where it's due was never Stan's credo and when in charge at Marvel, he literally followed through on this.

 

He was a creative genius and also the man who put comics into the public eye more than anyone else. However, he could not have done anything without the likes of Kirby and Ditko especially, but to hear him talk sometimes, you wouldn't know that those men existed.

 

Oh, and he's also a dyed-in-the-wool revisionist and if you ever get the same story told the same way twice from Stan, you're one of the fortunate few.

 

He reminds me of my partner for some 20 years...insufferable sonofaperson_without_enough_empathy who took all the credit and stole from his partners...had to stick it out to protect my investment which finally paid off when we sold the firm in Sept 06...but I digress...

 

WOW

[Senormac]

Just trying to play the devil's advocate....sort of.....I think this works both ways. If I want to credit Jack as the co-creator of the FF, then doesn't this make Stan the co-creator of the Surfer as well?

 

Funny you should say that. I have a video tape interview with Jack and he says that while looking for inspiration he turned to The Bible and came to the story of the devil / Satan / the fallen angel to come up with the idea for Silver Surfer. Pretty fantastic really. Banished to earth and all that.....

[MedicAR]

After watching Stan on the Youtube vid, i have to ask who is the actual creator..the one that comes up with the idea or the one who runs with the idea? Stan thought up Spider-man and Ditko drew up a kid in spider tights, but without Stan, Ditko wouldve probably never thought to put that kid in those tights. So I would say that Stan created the idea and Ditko expanded on it, but was not the creator.

 

In the strictest technical sense, you are right. But if Stan had handed off this idea to another artist, say (I'm being extreme here) Salvador Dali, would it be the same? Doubtful, I imagine Dali's Spider-Man to be ten feet tall with thin, spindly black legs.. To me, Stan created the persona of the character, but Steve created the image of that character. The two need each other and the character is made if equal contributions.

[marvelcollector]

As an example, from what I recall, Stan gave Jack the basic outline for FF 48, and Jack figured that Galactus should have scout (or herald), and drew the Silver Surfer. Stan was surprised to see this, Jack explained his reasoning.

So, one could say Jack was the true creator of the Silver Surfer.

 

That's fair, but would he have created him without the character of Galactus having been there first? So didn't Stan have a hand in it?

 

Just trying to play the devil's advocate....sort of.....I think this works both ways. If I want to credit Jack as the co-creator of the FF, then doesn't this make Stan the co-creator of the Surfer as well?

 

Yes, you could fairly call them co-creators. It is after all a collaborative process. (thumbs u

 

And of course, with the case of the Surfer, Stan then had to flesh out the character.

[s-man]

After watching Stan on the Youtube vid, i have to ask who is the actual creator..the one that comes up with the idea or the one who runs with the idea? Stan thought up Spider-man and Ditko drew up a kid in spider tights, but without Stan, Ditko wouldve probably never thought to put that kid in those tights. So I would say that Stan created the idea and Ditko expanded on it, but was not the creator.

 

In the strictest technical sense, you are right. But if Stan had handed off this idea to another artist, say (I'm being extreme here) Salvador Dali, would it be the same? Doubtful, I imagine Dali's Spider-Man to be ten feet tall with thin, spindly black legs.. To me, Stan created the persona of the character, but Steve created the image of that character. The two need each other and the character is made if equal contributions.

 

I guess this is why lawyers get involved with cases such as this! To me if I make something up and say to someone "Here, do something with this." I am the creator and the other person is the collaborator (the person who helps the creation come to life.) But unless that other person is sitting with me brainstorming out the original idea, then they are not a co-creator of that idea.

[thehumantorch]

Isn't that mostly just one side of the story. Yes, Jack could have gotten more credit, but isn't that partly Jack's fault. Stan went from writer to editor to the driving force behind Marvel comics for a very long time. Basically, Jack was an artist. I don't know why he didn't rise in the ranks, perhaps it is because he really couldn't do anything but draw, as evidenced by the total garbage he produced for DC in the 1970s. Anything he tried to do storywise, failed miserably.

 

Don't get me wrong, Jack was great and the sheer amount of art he produced was phenomenal. Even though he is not my favorite artist, I still have a ton of respect for him. But in almost every situation, there is one person who rises to a position of preeminence, there are people that are on the lower rungs who felt they were just as deserving.

 

I also don't have any doubts that Stan is a master of self promotion, but I don't fault him for that. I personally have never read anything he ever said about Jack or Steve which was negative.

 

Carmine Infantino was just an artist too, no writer, but he went on to be publisher of DC. And lots of non-writers have moved to editing and management positions at Marvel over the years. I don't really know why Kirby didn't advance at Marvel, but I don't think it's cuz he couldn't do anything but draw. He's often considered the greatest comic artist of them all, so that doesn't seem like such a limitation.

 

I think it had to do with the rumored conflicts between Stan and Jack. Stan was in charge and if he didn't want Jack to move up, he wouldn't. Jack went on to DC to work and was less successful, without a proven track record at DC, they wouldn't let him move up there either.

 

Just imagine if he had though.....a whole generation of artists being guided directly by Jack Kirby.........

 

 

Kirby was too valuable as an artist to move up to art director or editor. He could draw pages and covers far faster than any other artist and his dynamic artwork made you want to buy the comic.

 

I do know that Marvel would often ask artists to draw in the Kirby style and that Stan would ask Kirby to do layouts to teach new artists to draw like Kirby.

[Flemmings]

Reading over this thread again. I amazed at how we judge creator and co-creator. I see how easily arguements can get started and friendships end.

[BillBreck]

Hate is perhaps a strong word for it, but there is a certain amount of resentment towards the man for how he's treated his peers. Credit where it's due was never Stan's credo and when in charge at Marvel, he literally followed through on this.

 

He was a creative genius and also the man who put comics into the public eye more than anyone else. However, he could not have done anything without the likes of Kirby and Ditko especially, but to hear him talk sometimes, you wouldn't know that those men existed.

 

Oh, and he's also a dyed-in-the-wool revisionist and if you ever get the same story told the same way twice from Stan, you're one of the fortunate few.

 

That's because Stan has "the world's worst memory".

[Flemmings]

Hate is perhaps a strong word for it, but there is a certain amount of resentment towards the man for how he's treated his peers. Credit where it's due was never Stan's credo and when in charge at Marvel, he literally followed through on this.

 

He was a creative genius and also the man who put comics into the public eye more than anyone else. However, he could not have done anything without the likes of Kirby and Ditko especially, but to hear him talk sometimes, you wouldn't know that those men existed.

 

Oh, and he's also a dyed-in-the-wool revisionist and if you ever get the same story told the same way twice from Stan, you're one of the fortunate few.

 

That's because Stan has "the world's worst memory".

 

I was going to write, what I wrote earlier about memory. However I was laughing to hard at what you wrote.

 

[Hillbill]

does he have a contract to stick his

Gauntly mug in every Marvel movie?

 

[nmtg9]

Stan is seen in a bad light because of his relentless self-promotion.

 

48 years after FF#1, Kriby has died penniless after fighting with Marvel over his artwork and Ditko is penniless. Meanwhile Lee is a multi-millionaire on the big screen every few months.

 

If he had an ounce of deceny he could have changed things for Jack and Steve, but instead he walked over them for his own benefit. Why should he have done this you ask? Compassion and Recognition.

 

Without them Marvel simply would not be to the extent it is now, and nor would he.

[HeyMoe]

Stan is seen in a bad light because of his relentless self-promotion.

 

48 years after FF#1, Kriby has died penniless after fighting with Marvel over his artwork and Ditko is penniless. Meanwhile Lee is a multi-millionaire on the big screen every few months.

 

If he had an ounce of deceny he could have changed things for Jack and Steve, but instead he walked over them for his own benefit. Why should he have done this you ask? Compassion and Recognition.

 

Without them Marvel simply would not be to the extent it is now, and nor would he.

 

IF Ditko is penniless (and I'm not saying he is) it would be of his own choosing.

His philosophy (Randian?) keeps him from the public eye and therefore from the accolades and riches he deserves.

[JohnT]

Hate is perhaps a strong word for it, but there is a certain amount of resentment towards the man for how he's treated his peers. Credit where it's due was never Stan's credo and when in charge at Marvel, he literally followed through on this.

 

He was a creative genius and also the man who put comics into the public eye more than anyone else. However, he could not have done anything without the likes of Kirby and Ditko especially, but to hear him talk sometimes, you wouldn't know that those men existed.

 

Oh, and he's also a dyed-in-the-wool revisionist and if you ever get the same story told the same way twice from Stan, you're one of the fortunate few.

 

If you go back to what was actually happening in Marvel comic books--as opposed to the occasional comment attributed to Stan--he was over-the-top in giving credit to his collaborators. Just read the early letters pages or Bullpen reports and to hear Stan talk about it everyone at Marvel was a genius, and he even talked about the fact that he sometimes just came up with the idea and others fleshed them out.

 

I think where he got into trouble was in later years (1970s in particular) when he stepped back from the creative aspects of the business and was only doing promotion. At times Marvel promotion seemed more like Stan promotion. But a lot of that was media driven.

 

I do agree that in that mode he became increasingly uncareful about who did what, or even what actually happened (the revisionist thing).

 

But overall I think he's been more than willing to give credit where credit was due.

 

On the Kirby thing, I think Kirby got carried away and sometimes exaggerated his role. Yes, he was a great artist, and yes, he was a great idea man, but it was Stan who controlled the characterization and dialogue in the Marvel Age, and that was what made Marvel great.

[MagnetoWasRight]

I think Stan is the man...I love him.

[mica]

I like Stan. But I would sure like to see less of him and hear less from him.

 

That probably doesn't make sense to some of you that worship "anything and everything" that comes out of the comics industry, but opinions are merely opinions.

[comics-rock]

I heard he likes to kill six week old kittens with a cheese grater....terrible individual...

[AtlasFan]

The debate of "who was the driving force at Marvel" is as old as the hills...

 

I think the answer is clearly Stan. Jack had been producing heros for at least 2 decades before he came back to Marvel in the late 50s. None of those heros..Fighting American, Bulls-Eye, Boy Commandos, Stuntman, Private Strong (his own rip-off of Cap), The Challengers, etc. never "got wings" and took off...

 

Once Jack came to Marvel (Altas, aka: Zenith, aka: the "company with no name", whatever...) he was doing those nasty little monster/fantasy stories -- nothing really ground breaking on the surface. Legend has it that Stan then told Jack to create a super-team (using the old Atlas fomula to crank out more of whatever is currently popular in the maket) to ride on the coat-tails of the JLA.

 

But, something different happened with the FF. Although clearly inspired by the Challengers (right down to the purple jumpsuits in FF#1), the FF were not the Challs! They argued, bickered, and acted pig-headed or selfishly (or in the case of Sue...fickle)... A fight could break out a any moment between the male members and the female member could willingly run off with one of their arch-villans at any moment!

 

Jack could have -- and probably did -- create the names and character design for the FF, but without Stan's influence on the characters personalities...these heros would most likley have easily been added to Jack's long list of lackluster heros.

 

This idea of "what would real folks do if they had super-powers" was something new. It was never used by Jack in any of his stories as a continuing plot point. It worked so well, that Stan carried it over to Spider-man...where Marvel had its greatest success.

 

My 12 cents...

Bill

 

 

[Mutant Manatee]

The debate of "who was the driving force at Marvel" is as old as the hills...

 

I think the answer is clearly Stan. Jack had been producing heros for at least 2 decades before he came back to Marvel in the late 50s. None of those heros..Fighting American, Bulls-Eye, Boy Commandos, Stuntman, Private Strong (his own rip-off of Cap), The Challengers, etc. never "got wings" and took off...

 

Once Jack came to Marvel (Altas, aka: Zenith, aka: the "company with no name", whatever...) he was doing those nasty little monster/fantasy stories -- nothing really ground breaking on the surface. Legend has it that Stan then told Jack to create a super-team (using the old Atlas fomula to crank out more of whatever is currently popular in the maket) to ride on the coat-tails of the JLA.

 

But, something different happened with the FF. Although clearly inspired by the Challengers (right down to the purple jumpsuits in FF#1), the FF were not the Challs! They argued, bickered, and acted pig-headed or selfishly (or in the case of Sue...fickle)... A fight could break out a any moment between the male members and the female member could willingly run off with one of their arch-villans at any moment!

 

Jack could have -- and probably did -- create the names and character design for the FF, but without Stan's influence on the characters personalities...these heros would most likley have easily been added to Jack's long list of lackluster heros.

 

This idea of "what would real folks do if they had super-powers" was something new. It was never used by Jack in any of his stories as a continuing plot point. It worked so well, that Stan carried it over to Spider-man...where Marvel had its greatest success.

 

My 12 cents...

Bill

 

 

Bravo! Excellent points! (thumbs u

[herc2000]

Could we say the camera man on a film is as much the creator as the director then?