WHAT IF: Stan Lee wasn't working at Marvel/Atlas Comics in 1961? 2 2

[mrmovies]

stan (the man) lee, had he not been such an incredibly talented writer, had an alternative career in meat. steady hands and could slice any ounce size you ask for first try. just an incredibly talented guy

[jimjum12]

It's funny, but I was once in such a multiverse, one where Stan Lee didn't work at Marvel. I was there, looking for my lost shaker of salt, and not having much luck. I stopped an affable looking gentleman on the street to ask if he might have seen it. See, this salt shaker was no ordinary salt shaker. It was the mystical Salt Shaker of Cyttorak, and I needed it to open the gateway home. He said he hadn't seen it, and then politely introduced himself as Stan Lee. I said, "Stan Lee? ... THE Stan Lee, the Maestro of Marvel?". He told me no, but that his Uncle Marty owned Marvel, and that he had helped Stan to open his own office cleaning firm. Stan said that the closest he ever came to a Marvel comic was one morning when Sol Brodsky found Stan, passed out drunk in the lady's room, a regular occurrence for Stan in those days. It seems that Sol had him over a barrel, and would keep quiet if Stan helped him out of a deadline jam. Oddly enough, later that day, I found my salt shaker in that very same lady's room. GOD BLESS ...

-jimbo(a friend of jesus)

Edited February 28 by jimjum12

[Readcomix]

On 2/23/2024 at 5:05 PM, shadroch said:

So it's 1961, and Stan has left Marvel.  Goodman grabs another of his seemingly inter-changeable relations to man a zombie comic division where long-time journeymen like Kirby and Ditko keep putting out six-page schlock.

An all-male Challengers homage attempts to reach the moon and gains powers but the story is quickly forgotten.  As is a cute story about a kid getting bit by a Spider.                          Stan heads to Hollywood, hoping to make it big in movies.  Months later, a young writer named Mel Brooks introduces Stan to his friend Walt, who is looking for new talent. 

Kirby doesn't get along with his new boss and leaves to do covers for Treasure Chest for a decade before failing eyesight makes full-time work hard. 

Ditko keeps doing what he does ,and few notices when he cuts back on his work. 

Jim Shooter sends a script to DC, ending in the circular file.  He ends up playing for the Washington Generals for a few years before opening a coffee shop.

Sterenko ends up a professional magician, Chris Claremont takes a job teaching literature at a women's college, and John Bryne ends up a goalie for a semi-pro team in Kitchener.  Roy Thomas, Berni Wrightson, and Mike Kaluta open a head shop in Brooklyn where a young Phil Seuling discovers an underground comix.  Steve Borock, like most of his generation, outgrows comics at puberty and formed an all-kazoo Dead cover band before settling down in Marin County.

Many fans try to organize early shows but nothing comes of them.  A few years later, a teenager in Denver joins the Air Force and is in Omaha when the world's greatest collection is set out to the curb by the Church family.

You almost had me….no way Chuckles ever joins the military…

And Jeff Jones would have been a partner in that head shop too, but that’s picking nits.

[Gambold Vintage]

>Folks sure like any excuse to insult around here<

Mocking the accomplished is how the unaccomplished abide themselves. 

[jimjum12]

[JollyComics]

I thank to all comic artists and creators to keep the comic books floating until Stan Lee solidified the comic book industry ever since.

I hate to say this...what if thing doesn't apply to anything.  I am happy Stan Lee did it!

Edited February 29 by JollyComics

[KCOComics]

On 2/27/2024 at 11:23 AM, jimjum12 said:

One of my favorite weekends of all, the journey to Baltimore Comicon 2011, with Judy and my pal, Lewis Forro. It's hard to believe this was almost 15 years ago. 

2011 BALTIMORE. A DATE WITH JUDY.

The following picture is from standing in line to get 3 autographs from Stan. A little ahead was a crippled boy meeting Stan and getting the autograph. The guy behind me had the OA for the newspaper strip where Peter marries MJ. We were told no pictures or talking to Stan ... say what? GOD BLESS ... 

-jimbo(a friend of jesus)

Just read through this. 

I never got to meet Stan.  I had opportunity, but always thought the lines were to long and the prices to expensive,  so I never did it.  

 

As a kid growing up in the 90s, I always think of Stan's appearance in Mall Rats. He was hysterical and even in his 70s, was very hip and cool.  I was probably 12 and all the kids on the bus were talking about Stan in that movie.... and that's what Jack and Steve couldn't give to comics. 

I agree with everyone who says Jack and Steve deserved more credit. Jack's contributions to comics stand alone in my opinion.

But I get exhausted by those who seek to give credit to Jack by discrediting or understating Stan. 

[BLUECHIPCOLLECTIBLES]

On 2/21/2024 at 1:33 PM, Unca Ben said:

...and I wrote this praise for Stan without having to character-assassinate Jack Kirby or Steve Ditko!

Imagine!

You may be in the wrong place with this.

[BLUECHIPCOLLECTIBLES]

On 2/23/2024 at 6:25 PM, Prince Namor said:

Were they rejected pages? Did Stan decide Ditko was the right guy for the job? (Even though he clearly WAS). Or did Stan see Kirby's involvement in both the Spider-man idea with Joe Simon, as well as his involvement with Joe Simon on the Fly at Archie as a possible legal issue and THAT was the reason he gave it to Ditko...

From Ditko:

Stan never told me who came up with the idea for SM or for the SM story Kirby was penciling. Stan did tell me SM was a teenager who had a magic ring that transformed him into an adult hero: SM.

I told Stan it sounded like Joe Simon's character, The Fly (1959), that Kirby had some hand in, for Archie Comics. Now here is a Fly/Spider connection. Not in any seeing a fly on a wall but in being told, in hearing, of the connection. And to paraphrase Stan, this connection "may even be the true one" and the other, of seeing a fly on a wall and of someone being transformed from an adult SM (Kirby/? version) into a teenage SM (Lee/Ditko version) and without any magic ring, a falsehood.

Stan called Jack about The Fly. I don't know what was said in that call.

Day(s) later, Stan told me we would be doing SM. I would be pencilling the story panel breakdowns from Stan's synopsis and doing the inking.

Kirby's five pencilled SM story/art pages were rejected. Out went the magic ring, adult SM and whatever legend ideas that SM story would have contained.

Depending on how much you're working backward from a conclusion, Kirby's magic ring boy story means he (and not Lee) created Spider-man, even while the rejection of the magic ring story means Ditko (and not Lee) created Spider-man.  It's okay to embrace those contradictions because both of them work backward from the conclusion that Stan Lee had nothing or at lest very little to do with it.  The fact that Lee mentioned the ultimately rejected magic ring notion in an initial discussion means he could never have changed his mind to create or co-create what it later became.  And Ditko's own recounting that Lee wrote a synopsis must be disregarded as inconsistent with the conclusion that Lee did little to nothing. 

Edited March 1 by BLUECHIPCOLLECTIBLES

[gunsmokin]

I think a more intriguing "what if" might be what the product would have looked like if Lee and Schwartz had switched places in 1960. Granted Schwartz was an editor but how would he have handled the writing/art assignments?

[Zonker]

On 3/5/2024 at 9:15 AM, gunsmokin said:

I think a more intriguing "what if" might be what the product would have looked like if Lee and Schwartz had switched places in 1960. Granted Schwartz was an editor but how would he have handled the writing/art assignments?

That is an interesting premise! 

I'm trying to think of an example of any single creator at DC in the 1940s or 1950s being employed and credited as a full cartoonist (responsible for creating all the words + pictures). I'm drawing a blank.  So I imagine Schwartz wouldn't really know what to do with a Kirby in 1961.  I believe Schwartz would have been of the mindset that you need to have a full script approved by editorial before the artist starts drawing, otherwise how can editorial be sure the artist isn't drawing something the company would not buy and will not publish?   On the other hand, Schwartz was a savvy guy, and looking around at the shoestring operation that was Timely Comics circa 1960, he might also have made a virtue of necessity and just let Kirby & Ditko do their thing.  

Stan Lee would have probably been fine at DC in 1960, being able to draw upon their much deeper bench of comics scripters.  Whether he would have been sufficiently motivated to work with the likes of Bob Haney or Gardner Fox to make their dialogue sound more like how young people actually were speaking in the 1960s is an open question.  I could see him doing that to try to make his books stand out from the crowd, and to establish his own identity within the DC editorial ranks.  But I could also see Stan or his bosses take the opinion that extensively re-writing that amount of dialogue was more than was expected by someone being paid only as an editor.  

 

 

[gunsmokin]

On 3/5/2024 at 10:18 AM, Zonker said:

That is an interesting premise! 

I'm trying to think of an example of any single creator at DC in the 1940s or 1950s being employed and credited as a full cartoonist (responsible for creating all the words + pictures). I'm drawing a blank.  So I imagine Schwartz wouldn't really know what to do with a Kirby in 1961.  I believe Schwartz would have been of the mindset that you need to have a full script approved by editorial before the artist starts drawing, otherwise how can editorial be sure the artist isn't drawing something the company would not buy and will not publish?   On the other hand, Schwartz was a savvy guy, and looking around at the shoestring operation that was Timely Comics circa 1960, he might also have made a virtue of necessity and just let Kirby & Ditko do their thing.  

Stan Lee would have probably been fine at DC in 1960, being able to draw upon their much deeper bench of comics scripters.  Whether he would have been sufficiently motivated to work with the likes of Bob Haney or Gardner Fox to make their dialogue sound more like how young people actually were speaking in the 1960s is an open question.  I could see him doing that to try to make his books stand out from the crowd, and to establish his own identity within the DC editorial ranks.  But I could also see Stan or his bosses take the opinion that extensively re-writing that amount of dialogue was more than was expected by someone being paid only as an editor.  

 

 

I would have been intrigued to see how Stan and Carmine squared off/worked together.

[Zonker]

On 3/5/2024 at 11:31 AM, gunsmokin said:

I would have been intrigued to see how Stan and Carmine squared off/worked together.

Carmine had some storytelling chops.  I recall he was heavily involved in plotting the Deadman and Bat Lash stories (despite not drawing them).  Maybe Stan Lee and Carmine Infantino would have "invented" the Marvel Method at DC?  

[Hepcat]

On 2/21/2024 at 8:07 PM, frozentundraguy said:

It should also be pointed out that Stan was able to weave story lines into multiple books, which had the effect of not only making them more relevant to each other, but also increasing sales for those readers who wanted to follow the full story arc across multiple titles.

This was a key to Marvel's success in the Silver Age, plus the fact that each issue tended to leave unresolved issues dangling and also hinted at even greater menaces lurking in the last panel. Contrast that to DC's, Archie's and Charlton's super hero comics in 1961-64 where each issue was basically a standalone product and thus didn't do very much to induce readers to buy more comics.

That and the way Stan Lee drew 8-12 year old boys into the Marvel Universe by making them feel part of it all by giving the characters real life settings just outside the Marvel offices in New York, by the mentions he gave to his secretary and other co-workers and the direct references to readers (Real Frantic Ones) on the pages of Marvel comics. 

And here I'm speaking as one who was drawn into comics in 1961-62 by the product of the competition. While Marvel comics just looked junky on the newsstands to me in 1962-63, by 1964 I was very much aware that they were a very good read indeed. But when I switched from DC comics in late 1964, it wasn't into Marvel. It was into model kits and "more sophisticated" magazines, specifically Mad, Drag Cartoons and Creepy in short order.

[Hepcat]

On 2/22/2024 at 11:18 AM, shadroch said:

From 1961 to 1972, Marvel rarely missed a deadline.  From 1972 to 1977, Marvel was plagued by missed deadlines and underwent five changes in editor-in-chief.  Maybe Stan did more than steal credit for the work he produced.

'Nuff said right there!

And was Stan Lee actually paid any more at Marvel through the 1950's and 1960's than for being Editor-in-Chief? Was he paid as the writer for all those stories as well?

 

Edited March 5 by Hepcat

[jimjum12]

On 3/5/2024 at 12:42 PM, Hepcat said:

Was he paid as the writer for all those stories as well?

Supposedly he was paid extra for scripting the words that were then lettered. The wordsmith in comics was paid considerably less than the penciler. I look at the dialogue and captions as the "voice" of the comic, and it is most certainly not "nothing". It may be nothing to a consumer who isn't so hot at reading, and mainly just looks at the pretty little pictures. I loved Stan Lee's "voice", as did millions of others. I also*ahem* love the pretty little pictures too. GOD BLESS ...

-jimbo(a friend of jesus)

Edited March 5 by jimjum12

[Hepcat]

On 2/21/2024 at 7:54 PM, Unca Ben said:

I don't know about the measure of success, but Stan did keep Timely /Atlas going throughout the 50's. 

And he doesn't get nearly enough praise for that because that was quite an achievement in and of itself. Out of the dozens and dozens of comic book companies in the late 1940's, the only other ones that survived until 1960 were DC, Dell, Harvey, Archie, Charlton and ACG. Had Stan Lee as Editor-in-Chief not kept Atlas/Marvel going by dint of his own efforts, there would have been no "Marvel Age" of comics in the 1960's for fans to bicker about assigning the credit.

 

Edited March 7 by Hepcat

[Hepcat]

On 2/23/2024 at 6:18 PM, Unca Ben said:

 

Paul McCartney wrote a song about some of the more esoteric Marvel Characters.
“The lyrics refer to the Marvel Comics characters Magneto, Titanium Man, and Crimson Dynamo. Magneto was created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, and the others were by Lee and Don Heck. McCartney discovered the characters in comics bought on a Jamaican holiday in 1975.”

Big deal. Donovan's Sunshine Superman released in July 1966 contains the delightful lyrics "Superman or Green Lantern ain't got nothing on me".

[Hepcat]

On 2/23/2024 at 6:18 PM, Unca Ben said:

I didn’t live near a big city, but I’d bet those of us who grew up in the northeast at the time would tell you that the Comic Conventions starting up were very Marvel-centric, given Marvel’s relatively small market share.  

 

Anybody who was there at the time want to chime in and correct me if I’m wrong?  I would be glad to hear it.  

You're correct. I found that painfully true.

[Hepcat]

On 2/23/2024 at 6:44 PM, Unca Ben said:

They(DC) wrote comic books geared for children as per National's dictate. 

It was Stan Lee who brought relevance to comics that greatly expanded comic book readership to college kids and older. 

I agree. It's Stan Lee we should blame for that whole relevance to college kids thing.

Edited March 7 by Hepcat