Stan, Jack, and Steve - The 1960's (1963) Butting Heads, Unexpected Success and Not Expected Failures! 3 3

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS FEBRUARY 1963

Fantastic Four #14 - Part FIVE:

It's interesting how, even though the chapter breaks are gone, the story still seems to flow as 5-5-3-5-5 (actually 4 here, this is a 22 page story)

Edited February 27, 2023 by Prince Namor

[Prince Namor]

On 2/26/2023 at 6:20 PM, Prince Namor said:

ON NEWSSTANDS JANUARY 1963

Fantastic Four #14 - some of Stan's not-so-subtle sexism.

Daniel Greenberg from Facebook: 

Sue was on the same mission to the moon as the rest of them, and she was the one who beat the Red Ghost and saved the other three from his deadly trap. To enhance her heroism, Kirby shows her as the only one with energy after the tense mission.

Stan Lee undercuts Kirby's depiction of Sue's fortitude by having her wilt into "house cleaning" and by making Reed an insulting, misogynist creep.

Go call Namor, honey.

And in the same issue:

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS FEBRUARY 1963

Fantastic Four #14 - Letters Page

Edited February 27, 2023 by Prince Namor

[Prince Namor]

ALLEY AWARDS

Here's more detailed Alley Award info from the issue itself: 

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS FEBRUARY 1963

Kirby also did the cover to Kid Colt Outlaw #110. D. Ayers inks.

The Statement of Publication in this issue shows us it averaged 145,344 per it's bi-monthly release. 

Edited February 27, 2023 by Prince Namor

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS FEBRUARY 1963

Tales of Suspense #41 - A character named Doctor Strange, two months before Steve Ditko's Doctor Strange would first appear in Strange Tales #110. With only one editor overseeing a small handful of books, you'd think they'd have a better handle on these things...

Kirby cover, possibly inked by himself. The credits tell us it's a Stan Lee plot, with an R. Berns --script (Robert Bernstein, trying to hide from DC I guess), Jack Kirby art - though we know he at the very least added to the story - inked by D. Ayers and lettered by Marty Epp. 

Even an average story like this, with plenty of small Kirby story touches added, and a professional scripted adding dialogue is a much better than what Larry Lieber has done without Kirby. Even Stan can see this (aided by fanboys writing to tell him) and thus, Larry Lieber disappears from superhero writing altogether. 

Edited February 27, 2023 by Prince Namor

[Dr. Haydn]

In this issue, Kirby/Bernstein mention Tony Stark's shrapnel-laced heart and its connection to the Iron Man costume. (They didn't in TOS #40.)

[Mmehdy]

I was thinking maybe Stan wanted writing credit to get two paychecks. That he had no idea how this would blow up...one as editor and one as writer or plotter. The early credit was for bucks, later for the creation of the marvel universe in which Jack and Steve were #1/2 then Stan way back and he wanted some co-credit....just a thought. Jack early on probably wanted the money, then the credit....Steve on the other hand wanted credit more or earlier....interesting

Edited February 28, 2023 by Mmehdy

[Prince Namor]

On 2/28/2023 at 1:16 AM, Mmehdy said:

I was thinking maybe Stan wanted writing credit to get two paychecks. That he had no idea how this would blow up...one as editor and one as writer or plotter. The early credit was for bucks, later for the creation of the marvel universe in which Jack and Steve were #1/2 then Stan way back and he wanted some co-credit....just a thought. Jack early on probably wanted the money, then the credit....Steve on the other hand wanted credit more or earlier....interesting

Yes, Stan's motivation early on was money, especially after marrying his extravagant spending wife Joan, and with the double dip he got it. He really wanted to latch on to something, so he didn't really have to work and could just rake the money in while he and his wife lived the jet set life. It's why he moonlighted so hard to get a newspaper strip. He HAD to latch on to someone because he wasn't really a writer.

Both Bruce Jay Friedman and Mario Puzo moonlighted during their time at Magazine Management - Friedman writing his first few novels and turning it into a career and Puzo writing 'the Godfather' at night. I recently interviewed Friedman's son, Drew, a fantastic artist who used to go visit his dad at work in the mid-60's, where Stan Lee would give him comics - his dad worked there from 1954-1966 in an adjoining office right next to Stan. 

He verified that the word was Goodman wanted to shut down and phase out the comics, and his dad (who very much liked Stan) felt sorry for him, but also proud that Stan hung in there through it all. 

But Stan never wrote his 'Great American Novel', despite plenty of time. Friedman bought some 40 to 60 stories a month and worked as executive editor for Magazine Management, but still managed to not only write some of his first work, but turn it into a career as Magazine Management wound down.

Stan, instead found someone to latch onto that he could sign his name to and the rest is history...

Jack's motivation was that he wanted to tell stories and he wanted to get paid for it. Credit wasn't on his mind per se, but obviously he felt cheated when he began to see what was going on - as early as 1962. He certainly didn't want credit STOLEN from him. Later on as he saw Stan change his story and begin the big lie that was 'Origin of Marvel Comics', he naturally would began to respond. 

For Ditko it was simply a matter of A is A, as he would say. If Steve did the work, he should a) get credit for it and b) be compensated for it fairly. It was really as simple as that for him. 'Fame' wasn't even a consideration. He shunned the adulation. 

By 1966, Ditko was sickened by it all and was gone - Stan was working 2-3 days a week in the office and having Houseroy and John Romita do most of his work (per Thomas) - and Jack would begin his process of pulling back his ideas...

 

It says a lot about how they ended up:

Stan got to where he wanted to be - jet setting around the country, while others ghost wrote his Spider-man newspaper strip - playing celebrity, without really creating or writing anything...

Jack would create new concepts and new ideas right up to the end of his life... he created a whole new Universe for DC Comics in his 4th World books and Kamandi...

Ditko would create up until the day he died as well, self publishing his own vision of the world in his work. 

Writers write. Creators create. 

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS FEBRUARY 1963

Strange Tales #108 - At this point who knows? Maybe Stan was using leverage to make Jack take a Berstein -script and at least try and work from it? 

Kirby cover, inked by D. Ayers. The credits tell us it's a Stan Lee plot, with an R. Berns ---script (Robert Bernstein, again trying to hide from DC I guess), Jack Kirby art - though we know he at the very least added to the story - inked by D. Ayers and lettered by Terry Szenics. 

[Dr. Haydn]

Odd story! It doesn't read like Kirby (other than the villain's surname, Van Vile)--far too verbose! If this is mainly Bernstein, he must have been paid by the word. Lots of convoluted explanations (DC style), out-of-character dialogue, etc. 

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS FEBRUARY 1963

Strange Tales #108 - Larry Lieber also had a story in this issue, both scripted and drawn by him (from a Stan Lee plot, natch!). Inked by Sol Brodsky and lettered by Art Simek. This is from the reprint, hence the appearance of the Daredevil head shot insert on the splash page. Larry was a moderately competent artist, and Stan paid him the least amount of anyone for his work - and Larry didn't complain about having to give up part of the writing pay to the 'plotter'. 

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS FEBRUARY 1963

Strange Tales #108 - Stan Lee and Steve Ditko also had a story in this issue, as Stan sort of revisits the idea of a 'Black Knight'... (again he uses the term '-script', though we know there was no -script.)

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS FEBRUARY 1963

Metal Men #1 - Metal Men would get their own title this month, written by Robert Kanigher, with art by Ross Andru and Mike Esposito. It would be a strong title for DC for the next few years, outselling Marvel's Amazing Spider-man, until 1967 when it would sort of tail off...

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS FEBRUARY 1963

Adventures of the Fly #25 - Regardless of how people remember the early 60's Archie Comics superhero books; the Fly stuck around for a bit and showed decent numbers. Here's its Statement of Publication numbers at 208,276, meaning it was outselling every Marvel title at the time (that we have numbers for)!

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS MARCH 1963

For March, Marvel would release 10 titles to the newsstand. That's 32 for 1963 so far, or 10.66 a month. 

 

Sgt. Fury replaces the Hulk on the schedule - meaning Kirby's lack of work has no bearing at all on his amount of work he COULD be doing. He does however do a 18 page Ant-Man story, featuring the WASP as a new character. 

 

March 5th, 1962

Gunsmoke Western #76 

Journey Into Mystery #92 

Love Romances #105

Sgt. Fury #1

Tales to Astonish #44

 

March 12th, 1962

Fantastic Four #15 

Patsy & Hedy #88

Rawhide Kid #34 

Strange Tales #109

Tales of Suspense #42

 

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS MARCH 1963

Journey Into Mystery #92 - From a Stan Lee plot, a Robert Berstein -script (here as R. Berns), and Joe Sinnott art (lettering by M. Epp). It's most definitely better than a Larry Lieber -script, though it reads more like a DC story...

 

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS MARCH 1963

Journey Into Mystery #92 - a few that made me chuckle...

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS MARCH 1963

Journey Into Mystery #92 - But Larry Lieber was still around to -script this tale (from Stan Lee's plot), with art by Paul Reinman. 

[Dr. Haydn]

Mighty fine calligraphy by Ray Holloway here. His lettering virtually disappears from Marvel once they hired Sam Rosen, though.