Stan Lee Lied - Your Handy Guide to Every Lie in the 'Origins of Marvel Comics' 11 11

[comicwiz]

On 10/18/2024 at 1:37 PM, jimjum12 said:

As a fan of literature and the written word, I will often mention theme, tone, voice, and spirit, when comparing one wordsmith to another. As has been said before, NONE of us were there, but I've read that Everett both penciled, plotted AND dialogued the Sub Mariner revival of #33-42. That being said, I have NO problema in recognizing a similar tone, voice, and spirit in DD 1 that parallels Everett's earlier work. One chief characteristic it lacks, as an aside, is San Lee's zany undercurrent that was mostly ALL his own. GOD BLESS...

jimbo(a friend of jesus)

 

Stan loved working with Everett, and I'm sure he would have offered Bill the moon to lure him from his stable and lucrative advertising career, unlike Kirby, who showed up bawling and begging after D.C. had put the foot upside his rump and his wife was, allegedly, packing to go home to mama.

 

Fun fact for today, Everett also lettered much of his Timely and Atlas work, being an early work-at-home freelancer, making it easier for him to get his drink on. 

You're glossing over a couple of important facts. The first is with the analysis provided, it appears the reason Daredevil #1 was late was due to Stan, not because of Everett's "drinking problems." The other is that writing dialogue doesn't constitue deserving credit or pay as writer. 

The euphemisms for Lee being thrown around, to make it seem less cruel and deplorable are that he liked to embellish. He was a showman! Shackled to the brand, doing whatever it took to make Marvel!!

I've already stated my views explicitly on the thought he would try to blame Everett with the "drinking problem" narrative as a blame shifting ploy, a lie which is still being pushed by executives at Marvel.

But for anyone finding that too hard to believe, or that he wouldn't do such a thing, consider what his own brother wrote:

 

Edited Friday at 07:47 PM by comicwiz

[sfcityduck]

On 10/18/2024 at 12:06 PM, Zonker said:

It's also possible that Kirby departed from his usual write-everything-as-I'm drawing-it mode, and that his "blitz" of new characters for Marvel included sample plotlines for the first 4 or 5 issues, just to demonstrate how his ideas could be played out into ongoing series that would have legs. 

You know me well.

Here's how I would put it though: Anything is possible. Arguing that something is hypothetically possible is not evidence. To the contrary, its a logical fallacy called the Appeal to Possibility. Maybe it works if you are discussing the Loki "timelines" plot, but it has no place in a serious discussion of a topic like this.

Which is why the burden of proof in our legal system, at its very lowest, is "the preponderance of the evidence." And you cannot cross even that low bar when you have no evidence at all that the possibility you say "could have been" ever was. 

We are seeing a lot of "What If-ism" and "Appeals to Possibility" on this thread that lack evidence of tying them in any way to the real factual story. An example: The notion that because Kirby could draw a nerdy teen in glasses that meant he created Peter Parker. Almost all comic artists can draw a nerdy teen in glasses, including Steve Ditko. So that "possibility" tells you nothing about what Kirby did and did not create or plot. 

By comparison, Kirby's lack of a claim that he plotted ASM is strong evidence that he did not plot ASM. If Kirby hoped to rebut Ditko's devastating essays establishing Kirby wasn't Spider-Man's creator, he'd have put forward his plotting of ASM issues as a helpful fact. Kirby didn't. Instead, once Ditko set the record straight, Kirby had very little further to say on the matter.

One problem with the historical record here: No one really asked Kirby the hard questions. Groth threw him softballs and leading questions intended to push positions consistent with Groth's political viewpoints. To his credit, Kirby pushed back more than once on Groth's leading questions -- giving answers that defied Groth's hopes. But I don't know of any interviewers who asked Kirby intentionally tough questions -- like about the 1966 declaration -- or who confronted Kirby with contradictory facts. Might also be true for Lee. It sure doesn't help anyone find the truth. As I said up thread, I'd have loved to cross-examine Kirby. True for Stan also. They both went from crediting each other as co-creators for most of the MU in the 1960s to embittered overclaims in the 1970s. 

Fortunately, contrary to what Mitch recalls, I don't know anyone who did not know that Stan Lee had artist co-creators of the Marvel Universe when I started collecting in the 1970s. Frankly, I don't know anyone who ever bought Origins or Son of Origins who read what Stan wrote. I just read the comics.  

 

Edited Friday at 07:46 PM by sfcityduck

[jimjum12]

On 10/18/2024 at 3:25 PM, comicwiz said:

You're glossing over a couple of important facts. The first is with the analysis provided, it appears the reason Daredevil #1 was late was due to Stan, not because of Everett's drinking problems. The other is that writing dialogue doesn't constitue deserving credit or pay as writer. 

The euphemisms for Lee being thrown around, to make it seem less cruel and deplorable are that he liked to embellish. He was a showman! Shackled to the brand, doing whatever it took to make Marvel!!

I've already stated my views explicitly on the thought he would try to blame Everett with the "drinking problem" narrative as a blame shifting ploy, a lie which is still being pushed by executives at Marvel.

I mentioned nothing about any of this.  Not even remotely, just that I agree that Everett wrote it as well. 

Contention for contention's sake seems to be a hallmark of your posts. You've already gotten the thread locked once. Carry on. 

GOD BLESS ...

-jimbo(a friend of jesus)

[sfcityduck]

On 10/18/2024 at 12:25 PM, comicwiz said:

You're glossing over a couple of important facts. The first is .... The other is that writing dialogue doesn't constitue deserving credit or pay as writer. 

 

Says who? 

Under the Marvel method, dialoging is the most time consuming task for the writer and the one where the writer does his/her's most important jobs: Creating the voice and personality of the characters, explaining any ambiguities left by the art, and texture to the story.

What you are calling a "fact" is really a "bald assertion." Stated differently, an assertion that lacks any evidentiary support.

Edited Saturday at 03:01 PM by sfcityduck

[Zonker]

On 10/18/2024 at 3:31 PM, sfcityduck said:

If Kirby hoped to rebut Ditko's devastating essays establishing Kirby wasn't Spider-Man's creator, he'd have put forward his plotting of ASM issues as a helpful fact. Kirby didn't. Instead, once Ditko set the record straight, Kirby had very little further to say on the matter.

Good post above, my only pushback is I'm pretty sure Kirby had passed away well before Ditko shared his recollections in print.  The ones I've seen have all been from after the turn of the most recent century. 

[sfcityduck]

On 10/18/2024 at 1:09 PM, Zonker said:

Good post above, my only pushback is I'm pretty sure Kirby had passed away well before Ditko shared his recollections in print.  The ones I've seen have all been from after the turn of the most recent century. 

Correction the article came out in 1990.

when did Kirby die?

Edited Saturday at 04:32 PM by sfcityduck

[Zonker]

1994 

[jimjum12]

On 10/18/2024 at 4:16 PM, Zonker said:

1994 

He faked his death 

He is, at this minute, in New Haven eating some of the best Pizza on the Planet. I know this because I quit Stan and am now Jack's pool boy ... got a nice raise too. Roz? 

[VintageComics]

On 10/17/2024 at 12:07 PM, Albert Tatlock said:

On 10/17/2024 at 12:01 PM, Ken Aldred said:

During the early Silver Age, Kirby did tend to draw slimmer-looking characters.

That, I think, was often a consequence of Dick Ayers' inking.

I'm not sure but I much prefer his earlier, lithe characters, especially Thor and I'd never thought about it as Ayer's influence. Might be right. 

Kirby's characters certainly did look more bulky mid 60's onward. It's one of the things I didn't like about his work. 

On 10/17/2024 at 12:41 PM, sfcityduck said:

Fact: Kirby was not involved in any plotting sessions for ASM issues.

Fact: Ditko says Kirby's ideas for Spider-Man were "failed ideas" and he had no influence on the version of Spider-Man that appeared in AF 15, including Peter Parker's appearance.

Fact: Ditko says he worked off of Stan's 1.5 page synopsis for AF 15. 

Fact: Ditko who read the synopsis and saw Kirby's OA for the failed attempt at Spider-Man says the only similarities were a kindly Aunt May, the use of Uncle Ben as the name of an overbearing Uncle/former police office in the Thunderbolt Ross mold, and the name.

Fact: Unlike Ditko who created a long-term plan for his characters, Kirby stated he plotted panel by panel and page by page without ever creating any written scripts or plots:

From the 1989 TCJ interview:

GROTH: I think you were drawing much of the time three books a month, and those books must have been about 24 pages — so you were turning out roughly 75 pages a month. Was that a strain?

KIRBY: No, I like working hard. Not only that, but if you look at some of my old pages, notice the expressions on the people — they’re very real expressions. I was totally immersed in the characters. I penciled fast, I wrote fast. Nobody could have written it for me because they couldn’t have understood the situation or what to do.

ROZ KIRBY: He never wrote the story ahead of time, he wrote while he was drawing.

KIRBY: In other words, I’d never planned a story —

GROTH: That’s my next question. When you were doing a story, say, the first Dragon Man story in Fantastic Four that took place on a campus — would you plot that out in your mind?

KIRBY: No, no, I’d take it from the beginning, then say, what would he do? Here he is, he’s a dragon — this guy is in a mess! He’s really a human being, but he’s a dragon— what would a human being trapped in those circumstances do? Then I’d come up with an answer. I didn’t plan out the entire story. I had to do it panel by panel because I had to think for each individual. Sometime even after I thought it out, the story would come out different because on the way something would happen and this guy would have to make other plans.

Fact: Amazing Fantasy 15 covered date 8/62 was a tryout for Spider-Man. Amazing Spider-Man 1 covered dated 3/63 came out SEVEN MONTHS LATER making it highly unlikely that Jack and Stan were having plotting sessions for ASM issues.

Fact: Jack Kirby never claimed to have plotted any issue of ASM or to have created any villains that first appeared in ASM. To the contrary, he just claimed he created Spider-Man and the idea was handed over to Ditko to actually implement. A claim is being made here that even Jack Kirby never put forward.

 

Fact: Jack Kirby could NEVER draw Spider-man properly. I've stated this before on here, but to me Kirby's Spider-man always looked clunky and awkward. Ditko's Spider-man looked like Caravaggio by comparison. 

Stan made the right call by investing Ditko into that character...and ironically, nobody else could have made that call. 

That 5 minute meeting must have been a good one!

 

Edited Friday at 08:29 PM by VintageComics

[sfcityduck]

On 10/18/2024 at 1:26 PM, VintageComics said:

. 

Stan made the right call by investing Ditko into that character...and ironically, nobody else could have made that call. 

That 5 minute meeting must have been a good one!

 

Ditko stated the meetings were longer. And what ultimately made Ditko leave Marvel is he said that Stan would no longer meet with him. Ditko wanted the meetings.

[Ken Aldred]

On 10/18/2024 at 9:26 PM, VintageComics said:

I'm not sure but I much prefer his earlier, lithe characters, especially Thor and I'd never thought about it as Ayer's influence. Might be right. 

Kirby's characters certainly did look more bulky mid 60's onward. It's one of the things I didn't like about his work

I agree. Much prefer his early Silver Age figure work as well.

Edited Friday at 08:37 PM by Ken Aldred

[jimjum12]

On 10/18/2024 at 4:37 PM, Ken Aldred said:

I agree. Much prefer his early Silver Age figure work as well.

Kirby had developed a more utilitarian style in the late 60's, designed for rapid completion and remuneration. From a financial standpoint, perhaps a gain, But the work from his hungry years, beginning with Yellow Claw, COTU, and a few others, were to me, the prime examples of his potential. Some of my favorite pieces, on the other hand, were magazine and portfolio illustrations that featured a synthesis of machine and biology that began with his masterpiece, Galactus. To me that was the crucible point of the Marvel Universe, where Jack truly opened the floodgates for all the rest of his associates and competitors. It was then, I believe, that Stan first realized what he had his hands on. No turning back. Raw power. Still, those exquisite Kirby Wood challengers were a thing of graceful yet dynamic excellence. It's a shame so many egos got in the way, but I think that burning fast and bright was the only way. GOD BLESS ... 

-jimbo(a friend of jesus)

 

 

I wonder sometimes if Jack created Hubble?

 

 

Edited Saturday at 04:44 PM by jimjum12

[Prince Namor]

On 10/18/2024 at 10:12 PM, JollyComics said:

Dear Chaz

I bought it today.

Actually, I used up my Amazon credit.  It's on the way.

Thank you!

[Dr. Haydn]

On 10/18/2024 at 7:25 AM, comicwiz said:

This topic is subject to further analysis in an FB group post from yesterday, particularly in relation to Bill Everett and Daredevil #1

"DAREDEVIL #1 original art has Bill Everett's border notes for Lee but also shows Everett's penciled lettering in the balloon and caption areas.  Odd because if Everett was working from a full script why would Everett include border notes? 

In addition Everett did the inked lettering as evidenced in places where a paste-up lettered by Sam Rosen has fallen off. 
Lee doesn't make any changes to Everett's text in this case. Lee simply has Rosen write out the same words in a different style. 

Everett's border notes, penciled lettering on the page and Everett being the original inked letterer suggests it's not unlikely Everett wrote DAREDEVIL #1. 
Other pages from the published story show considerable evidence of tampering with a number of whole panels having been pasted down over top of artwork which is now hidden beneath the new panel. Page 13 is a good example with five panels having been pasted over with new art."

 

"The fact Everett completed the story including the lettering tells us Lee blaming Everett being late is a lie. We know Everett lettered several of the pages because the paste-overs have fallen off. Since Everett also inked the story and inking is done after lettering that means Everett penciled, lettered, inked and probably wrote a complete story he turned in to Lee. The delay was caused by Lee not Everett. Lee blaming Everett also resulted in numerous fans and "historians" feeling the need to blame the lateness on Everett having a drinking problem.
My assumption is Everett left the title not because he blew a deadline and was replaced but because Lee wanted the writing money."

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My take: I'll leave it for the board members to decide if this reveals more proof that Lee was only doing dialogue and nothing else. 

AND IF TRUE that Everett was unfairly blamed, then that's a pretty heinous thing to have done to blame Everett for being late due to having a drinking problem. Both inexusable, and indefensible IMO.

We learn of Bill Everett's career in the book Fire & Water, but also about Daredevil #1's "lateness" through a post in 2011 by Tom Brevoort

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ESO Network April 13 2011:

"Tom Brevoort, currently Marvel’s senior vice president of publishing, has been answering fan questions over on formspring, and he recently revealed that the whole reason an Avengers comic had to be created was because Daredevil #1 was late."

According to Brevoort:

"Bill Everett, with whom Stan co-created Daredevil, had both a day job and a drinking problem. And so production on Daredevil #1 fell way behind. In those days, you booked print time way ahead of time--and if your book wasn't ready, you paid for the printing time anyway. So it was vital to get something to press on time. But Bill Everett was a favorite of Martin Goodman, stemming back to the 40s when he created the Sub-Mariner."

I argued in favor of Bill Everett's authorship of Daredevil #1 on Tom Brevoort's site a couple of years ago. No reaction. Not even a rebuttal.

We did see a few years later, beginning with Sub-Mariner #50, that Everett was a more than capable writer.

 

[Prince Namor]

On 10/19/2024 at 12:13 AM, jimjum12 said:

Kirby's solo efforts, with little to no humor.

Newsboy Legion? Fighting American?

[jimjum12]

On 10/18/2024 at 6:00 PM, Prince Namor said:

Newsboy Legion? Fighting American?

This will always be a matter of taste, but I always felt those were forced and more slapstick. Like I said, my opinion, which along with a dollar will get me a cup of coffee. Kirby's humor was like the inclusion of Don Rickles. He still actually had a sense of humor. I read Mr A. and some other solo Ditko, and his sense of comedy and humor ... well, your mileage may vary. I got belly laughs out of some, but not all, of Stan's stuff. Again, just my opinion, but Simonson "got" Stan. GOD BLESS ... 

-jimbo(a friend of jesus)

Edited Friday at 10:11 PM by jimjum12

[comicwiz]

On 10/18/2024 at 5:55 PM, Dr. Haydn said:

No reaction. Not even a rebuttal.

Not surprising.

[Prince Namor]

On 10/19/2024 at 2:05 AM, Mmehdy said:

Whatever Stan says...take it with grain of salt. Stan Lee does not exist in the real world, what has been blown up, hyped up( he is hid  #1 cheerleader), and over decades of unanswered origin of marvel comics, son of origin's of Marvel comics myth building, it has been blown down by the "Stan Lee Lied" book. Yes, it has taken a number of persons to resist what was spoon fed to you over the years...that your hero...is not really a hero...but cardboard.

 No credibility here what so ever ....you can nick pic  Jack and Steve and John R all you wants VC...but the bottom line here is that Stan created slowed and probably in his own mind the fact that everything except the Silver Surfer originated from the "house of ideas" himself...Stan the Man....

 Look at it this way: The "house of ideas" implies a collective....but the Origin of Marvel comics.....a big step to tilting everything in his direction. After reading this book, I went back and looked at old Stan Lee interviews....and wow I came away with a much different reaction, especially the interview with young lady......

he was spinning up the spin....a pretty amazing thing.......

 I will say this, he knew probably with the sales number that they were on to something big.. very early on, before Jack and Steve had a clue how big this was gonna get .and what does he do....he puts his name on everything...even the Spiderman issues he had nothing to with.

 Here is my challenge to everyone on this board....Read the book, and go back for yourself and rewatch 3/4 over the years of his last interviews......you are gonna have a feeling of being let down, or lied to....but at least you can understand the truth.......

 

People forget what a hardcore Lee fan you were and how you EXPERIENCED the Marvel explosion when it actually happened. But you've SEEN with your own eyes in that year-by-year thread the PROOF. 

Most Lee sympathizers refuse to look at Lee's lack of creativity pre-Silver Age because it's ASTONISHINGLY obvious. 

There are still Lee sympathizers who think he WROTE most of Atlas' books - because that's what Lee (and Houseroy) have led them to believe (he wrote about 3% of it). (Most of them have no idea who Al Sulman is.)

That's why I posted all of those issues in my year-by-year thread - not only for others to see - but for MYSELF. 

There's no way that anyone with zero bias comes in and reads that material and thinks he was responsible for the explosion of creativity in the Silver Age. 

Was his humor important to its success? Of course. Was his ballyhoo important to its success? Yep. Was his fan interaction important to its success? Without a doubt. 

He tried all of those things in the 50's without any success. He didn't have a Jack Kirby.

And after Kirby left, sales numbers went down throughout the 70's while Lee still employed those tactics. If not for Star Wars, which had to GIVE the deal away for Lee to even take it - Marvel might've gone into bankruptcy in 1978.

Under Stan Lee. Why didn't it work then?

What saved it?

Lo and behold, true believer... it was an influx of CREATIVE talent - Miller, Byrne, Claremont, Simonson, etc - something the company suddenly lacked without Kirby, yet still under... under Stan Lee.

But there was something else that saved it... Lee was always positioning himself as the ringmaster - Marvel was a MESS structurally. Jim Shooter is the one who structured it and got it on course so that the creative TALENT could grow the business bigger than it EVER was. 

Lee deserves credit for SOMEHOW keeping Kirby as long as he did. Kirby is what SAVED Marvel - his Ideas (And Ditko's) were what it was built upon - and then held it up, long enough for Marvel to limp across the finish line in 1978 when Shooter took over and made it a REAL powerhouse, a REAL company - not just a Wizard of Oz facade that Lee had convinced people of.

The Marvel Silver Age would've never been the same without Stan Lee's involvement.

But it would've never existed without Jack Kirby. 

The issue of creativity and who it was... is only held up by the uninformed or the indoctrinated. 

[Prince Namor]

On 10/18/2024 at 11:06 PM, Silver Surfer said:

The book might be spot on, who knows, but the way the writer viewpoint was presented here makes me not want to buy the book. Just sayin. 

That's ok. This book will long outlive me with its importance. 

[Prince Namor]

On 10/19/2024 at 3:09 AM, Zonker said:

Good post above, my only pushback is I'm pretty sure Kirby had passed away well before Ditko shared his recollections in print.  The ones I've seen have all been from after the turn of the most recent century. 

I think people here forget WHY Ditko finally came out publicly for the first time since the 60's... it was because Stan Lee... LIED. 

In 1998, Lee said in an Interview how he came up with the lifting scene in ASM #33, I guess figuring Ditko hadn't been heard from in decades, used one of his old ploys - giving the artist credit for the DRAWING, but NOT the writing they actually did as well - taking that for himself. 

 

"I didn't write detailed scripts for him [Steve Ditko], I would tell him (as I did Jack [Kirby]) what I thought the story should be and he went home and drew it any way he wanted...There is a very famous scene he did in a Spider-Man story (#33, Feb. 1966] where he was trapped in a subway tunnel and had to lift some heavy weight over his head. I just mentioned the idea but Steve drew it incredibly...devoting, I think, 3 or 4 pages to Spider-Man lifting those weights. I hadn't thought of devoting that many pages to it."

- Stan Lee, in a Comic Book Marketplace interview (#61, July 1998)

 

Well Ditko couldn't let a continuity error like that pass! So he surprisingly responded:

"...at some point before issue #25 (where I am publicly credited with plotting Spider-man and Dr. Strange), Stan chose to break-off communicating with me. That initiated break-off means no Stan Lee synopses, no kind of Stan Lee input, no Stan Lee "ideas" of any kind on anything. And certainly no "lifting idea" for issue #33 (Feb.1966). I'm on my own in providing all the story ideas, story continuity, for Spider-man (Dr. Strange)."

- from Ditko's published essay A MINI-HISTORY 1. "The Green Goblin" © 2001 S. Ditko.