After Steve Ditko abruptly left Amazing Spider-Man as the main artist in 1966, Marvel editor in chief Stan Lee hired Joh Romita to replace him, and thus a new era of comics art was born. Romita, a longtime veteran of romance and assorted super-hero comics, was reluctant to fill the role, but soon adapted and gave the web-slinger a whole new muscular, fleshed-out look. The result put Amazing Spider-Man, long the number two title behind The Fantastic Four, out in front. It also eventually made Romita the de facto art director of the entire Marvel Comics line, a position that had never really existed before in the company's history.

His work inspired an entire generation of aspiring comics artists, especially a certain young master Ross, who, upon the release of his own Marvels series, got to meet the man himself.

"He gave me the greatest meeting-your-hero experience that I could ever hope for. It was at the first convention I was brought to for Marvels; he approached me in the signing line to greet me. Amazing! He was the art director for Marvel at the time. It was the greatest compliment; his flattery meant the world to me. To my mind he was a pinnacle of artistic achievement."

And what exactly was it about his work that touched you?

"I always perceived the careful precision of John's work as the most iconic version of any of the Marvel characters that he touched. It reminded me of my mother's work--that 1950s idealism. His people were the most beautiful, and his talent was so versatile and dramatic. He evolved from doing romance comics into superheroes in such s seamless and natural way; he had that range, from a lilting swoon to a hypermasculine stance."