Knowledge Waits is a feature where I just share some bit of comic book history that interests me. Today, I discuss how the person who has done the most harm to Stan Lee's comic book legacy has been Stan Lee himself.
As I'm sure that you have heard by now, there is a documentary on Disney+ about Stan Lee that is titled, appropriately enough, Stan Lee. The director of the film, David Gelb, used Stan Lee himself to narrate the film, using snippets of various interviews that Lee had given over the years (Lee passed away in 2018). The documentary has drawn the ire of Jack Kirby's son, Neal, who wrote a letter ripping into the documentary based on the fact that it mostly just went along with Lee's take on things, such as Lee's belief that he was the sole creator of the Fantastic Four, Hulk, Thor and the X-Men, something that the Kirby family naturally disputes (and Jack Kirby obviously disputed while he was still alive)..
That's one of the fascinating things about Stan Lee to me, which is that one of the greatest threats to his comic book legacy was, well, Stan Lee. Of course, as I write that, I totally acknowledge that it is a bit of a doubled-edged sword, as on the one hand, the general public only knows who Stan Lee is in the first place BECAUSE he was such a constant performer who was always willing to show up anywhere (talk show, convention, college, you name it) to hype up Marvel Comics and really, comics in general, but on the other hand, his repeated public appearances led to Lee seemingly deciding that the over-inflated credits he received for the creation of Marvel Comics (to be fair, mostly from the public itself, although Lee obviously was willing to go there himself unprompted) was appropriate, and that is what has continually led to controversy around Lee, both in the later years of his life and still to this day. This is particularly odd to me because Lee's resume really doesn't NEED the controversial aspects, as the undisputed facts of Stan Lee's comic book career are still so impressive that anyone would look back on it with a great deal of pride. And yet....
What are some of Stan Lee's undisputed achievements?
This seems so weird for me to even state, due to the fact that, again, Stan Lee is a beloved comic book creator who the whole world knows as "the guy behind Marvel Comics," so arguing FOR his relevance seems so odd, but sure, I'll note some of the impressive things that Lee did over his comic book career. One of the first things that comes to mind is the simple fact that we might not have even HAD a Marvel Comics without Lee, as he was practically the only employee the comic book company that became Marvel had for a while there in the 1950s when Martin Goodman's disastrous decision to stop distributing his comic books himself and instead sign with a big distributor that promptly went out of business left the company on the verges of financial ruin.
Similarly, even before that point, Lee took over as the Editor-in-Chief of the company when he was just 18 years old (which sounds insane, right? Of course, Stan had to overreach and say "16 years old" in his tellings of the story) and kept it one of the more successful comic book companies for the next 16-17 years (missing only a few years when he was in the Army during World War II), then kept it afloat before the company's return to prominence with the hiring of Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko in the late 1950s.
Lee did not invent the letters column, but he was so into the idea that it became a major part of the success of Marvel Comics, as Lee used letters columns and later his Bullpen Bulletins to communicate directly with the readers. In addition, Lee's decision to allow for essentially classified ads in Marvel Comics (you know, people selling back issues, etc.) helped drive fandom's interest in Marvel, as well. Then, of course, Lee famously promoted Marvel and defended the importance of comic books for decades. That was helpful for the comic book industry, although, naturally, it was also very helpful for Lee himself as a brand. Still, the fact that it helped him, as well, doesn't mean that it wasn't still very helpful.
Notably, Lee was a notable critic of Fredric Werham AT THE TIME that Wertham was getting the public roused up against comic books, when it was a lot riskier for a comic book Editor-in-Chief to do so. Granted, he would later make up some stories of debating Wertham on the radio, but suffice it to say that Lee talked the talk when it came to defending comics against Wertham back in the late 1940s/early 1950s. Lee then famously did a non-Comics Code approved Spider-Man comic book. These were all positions that Lee clearly took at the time that he can look back at fondly in later years.
When it came to the comic book characters themselves, Lee clearly co-created Spider-Man with Steve Ditko (we could likely loop Jack Kirby and Joe Simon into the creation, as well). Ditko has been explicit that Lee was very involved in the early plotting of Spider-Man. That right there is already an amazing legacy, as, well, you know, Spider-Man is kind of a big deal. The origin of Spider-Man is one of the greatest origins in the history of comic books, and Lee was heavily involved in it. Similarly, Lee clearly had a major say in the plotting of Doctor Strange's origin, which is very similar to Spider-Man's origin, and is also a real humdinger (compare the first two Doctor Strange stories to the third one, which was Strange's origins, and you can plainly see that there was someone else involved in the plotting of the third story, so that clearly was Lee's influence).
Then, when Ditko left Amazing Spider-Man, Lee not only kept the book from falling apart with incoming artist, John Romita, taking over, but the book got MORE popular, as it turned out that Lee's concepts of the characters (and Romita's depictions of them) resonated with the fan base even more than Ditko's (whether it was actually better is obviously a debatable premise). Romita obviously took over a heavier hand in plotting over time, but initially, Lee was heavily involved in the transition, with a number of Lee's takes on the characters differing from Ditko, and Lee's take (namely making Peter Parker and his gang of friends more of an actual group of college friends rather than Peter being a loner) proved popular (and, of course, Romita drew the heck out of characters like Gwen Stacy and the newly introduced Mary Jane Watson).
Similarly, there were a number of Marvel comic book series circa 1963-65 where Lee worked with artists who were not as used to the "Plot First" method, and while Lee clearly tried to put a lot of the plotting duties on to these artists, since they were not as used to it meant that Lee likely had more of a plot involvement in a number of acclaimed series, like Daredevil with John Romita and Gene Colan and Avengers with Don Heck.
In addition, while it is debatable whether Lee even came up with the idea of having the Marvel characters all share a universe (it just as easily could have been a Kirby concept), Lee, due to the fact that he was working on all of these other series, was the one who truly implemented it, and the Marvel Universe itself was something that Lee had a major hand in creating and maintaining as the Editor-in-Chief of the company.
Then we get to the Jack Kirby titles. There obviously will always be disputes over who did what, but even if you wanted to give Kirby the lion's share of the credit, it is clear that, early on, Lee and Kirby DID talk about these books. There IS a plot synopsis for Fantastic Four #8 that suggests Lee's direct involvement in the plot (there's also the controversial Fantastic Four #1 write-up, but while that one has been disputed, this #8 one has never been disputed as far as I know)...
That sure fits with the idea that Lee and Kirby discussed the plot in detail with each other, right? So even if Kirby was driving the train, Lee was clearly directing things, as well. Lee obviously pulled back as time went by, and the later plots and characters were almost all Kirby, with Lee then adding dialogue (which, again, is important still. I'm not going to go into a whole thing about it, but Lee's dialogue WAS important). In any event, Lee was almost certainly involved enough to be dubbed the CO-creator of all of the early 1960s characters like the Fantastic Four, the Hulk, Thor, Iron Man, Ant-Man, the X-Men, etc. So it's a major legacy.
And yet, it wasn't enough.
How Stan Lee made it hard for Stan Lee
This is quite simple, the biggest controversy surrounding Lee's legacy was due to the fact that he constantly claimed he was the sole creator of Spider-Man, Fantastic Four, Hulk, Thor, Iron Man, X-Men, etc. That however good Jack Kirby was (and Lee has CONSTANTLY praised Kirby's talents over the years), Lee saw it as him creating the characters and then Kirby (or Ditko or whoever) then drawing his ideas, and whoever came up with the IDEA was the one who created the character.
This is especially problematic in the instances where it's highly unlikely that Lee even WAS the one who came up with the idea (forgetting every other character, it appears pretty obvious that, at the very least, Thor was Jack Kirby's idea. Kirby had done Thor in multiple places before Marvel, and it was Kirby, not Lee, that was a huge Norse mythology guy), but even if he did, it just doesn't make sense to claim sole creation of these characters.
And it wasn't like Lee did this as some sort of front, he clearly honestly believed it. He would argue it privately when friends would challenge his theory. And since Lee's position was so PUBLIC-facing, HIS position became THE position, and that led to stuff like Entertainment Weekly still referring to Lee as "Spider-Man's creator" in 2021 (2021, people!).
This had been going on for a long time, too. Over 50 years ago, in Amazing Spider-Man #100, Lee was miffed that Don Thompson had referred to Steve Ditko as Spider-Man's creator, and had Thompson do a correction, which was fair, as Lee deserved credit, too, but Lee specifically wanted to be credited as the SOLE creator of Spider-Man. Lee then added a "Created by" credit soon after to Amazing Spider-Man #100...
These were unforced errors. Lee believed that he was the sole creator of these characters, and he did so many interviews and appearances that his erroneous theory became THE accepted theory, which, of course, in turn has led to a lot of backlash in Lee's later years and still to this day. Stan Lee was always complimentary to Jack Kirby's abilities in interviews, while Kirby was rarely complimentary to Lee in his own interviews (the complimentary ones also tended to be earlier on, like when Kirby returned to Marvel in the mid-1970s and talked fondly about his time working with Lee), but A. Lee did MANY MANY more interviews than Kirby and B. Many of Kirby's interviews were done specifically in response to Lee's claims of sole creation for the work that Kirby and Lee did together. Kirby almost certainly went overboard with claims himself, at times, but it is key to note that these interviews were in RESPONSE to YEARS of Lee interviews and speeches that had become THE story that the public believed.
Stan Lee had so, so many things to be proud of in his comic book career, but by trying to take more credit than he was "owed," he created so much controversy that even a celebration of his life like Disney's Stan Lee simply kicks up more dust. It is a shame, since, again, Stan Lee was undisputedly one of the greatest comic book creators of all-time.
If anyone has suggestions about interesting pieces of comic book history, feel free to drop me a line at brianc@cbr.com.