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CLEVELAND, Ohio – This is the news that comic fans were afraid to hear, but they knew it would happen: Stan Lee left.
The creator, or co-creator, of Spider-Man, Avengers, Fantastic Four and thousands of other cartoon characters, television and film, died Monday at the age of 95 at Cedars -Sinai Medical Center Los Angeles.
And unlike his characters who manage to escape death, this superhero of the comic industry will not come back.
I grew up reading Superman and Batman from DC Comics, stories where heroes were beautiful, women beautiful and stories that could be told in 10 pages, usually with a happy ending. The bad guys were diabolical – but not in a scary and threatening way – and everyone wore a jacket and tie even while they were robbing banks. At that time, Marvel was mostly talking about monsters and cowboys, not superheroes.
Then writer Stan Lee and artist Jack Kirby presented "Fantastic Four" No. 1 at the end of 1961.
What kind of cartoon was this? Heroes argue with each other. One of them is a monster and the bad guy is a really ugly guy with very bad intentions. And people died in these books, are really dead.
The characters spoke like people I knew and the stories did not always end well.
Lee envisioned the Marvel universe as an imperfect place, which forever changed comics. Lee congratulated his late wife, Joan, for encouraging him to tell stories as he wished, without imitating DC. The Fantastic Four were quickly followed by The Hulk, Spider-Man, the Avengers and literally thousands of other characters. All have at least been co-created by Lee.
Lee joined Marvel Comes (at the time Timely Comics) in 1939 at the age of 17 as a boyfriend. In 1941, he eventually wrote Captain America and other superhero books, while Marvel competed with DC and other superhero companies. After the Second World War, sales of little dynamic comics resulted in the cancellation of his line of superheroes.
Lee remained a writer and publisher. An unenthusiastic relaunch of superhero titles in 1953 failed in a few years. Lee was one of his last employees when he was allowed to publish a 1961 superhero book to compete with DC's prestigious Justice League of America.
Even though the Fantastic Four did not make an overnight sensation, they sold enough to keep going. Soon readers were asking for the new kind of comics that Marvel created. Finally, even DC would relax and mimic Marvel's bold style.
In Lee's world, Spider-Man was a teenager who had money problems and worried about girls! Hulk was a brilliant scientist who would turn into an uncontrollable monster. Iron Man was an ammunition manufacturer who learned the hard way that his bombs ended up.
Lee and Kirby upset the way comics were created. In DC, the writer would describe a page with panel-by-panel ventilation, which he provided to the artist who conscientiously drew what he had been told in the form of a rigid grid. There were no signs or strange-shaped characters talking to the reader.
Lee and Kirby had an unconventional symbiosis. There are famous stories of Lee jumping into Marvel's offices playing scenes that he has written. Kirby then drew the pages as he saw them and Stan filled the word balloons and legends. But their ego was as big as their talents. Kirby felt that his role was more than a co-author, or even a solo author of the books. Of course, Stan did not agree and the relationship collapsed. Kirby left Marvel and went to work at DC.
For most of the 10 years that followed "Fantastic Four" No. 1, Lee wrote himself most of Marvel's titles – even westerns and teen books such as "Millie the Model" with works by Kirby and others. His exit was superhuman.
He then became an editor and then a goodwill ambassador for the company until his death. He moved to California to try to bring Marvel's works to television and movies.
Marvel Comics has built a cinematic mastodon on the foundation of Lee's characters and fans can spot Lee's cameos in almost every Marvel movie. There are at least three already done for future movies.
Tony Isabella, the man who created Black Lightning for DC, made his debut at Marvel Comics, where he learned from Lee.
"All the cartoonists who followed him have a debt to Stan," he said. "One of the things I've learned from him about writing, is that every character has good and bad in him, even the bad ones." It made the stories a lot more interesting. "
Gary Guzzo was hired by Marvel in 1991 to manage advertising for the fan market. He said the best part if his job was to accompany Lee during his appearances at colleges and comic book stores across the country.
"Stan was always grateful to his fans and he wanted them to know it," Guzzo said. "While fans queued to sign a comic book, Stan told them" something wonderful. "He said his famous slogan" Excelsior "(Latin for" always up ") to one and" Hello the true believer " to the other.He said that he wanted the fan to have the impression of talking to him directly, so he always waited until the fan was out of earshot before he started saying greetings again. "
"I can say that he really liked what he did and that he was proud of what the cartoon could have become," added Guzzo.
Excelsior.
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