My thoughts on Stan Lee -- and I realise that I'm going over ground that has already been discussed in this thread -- is that foremost he was a hell of a marketing guy, with a real vision for the Marvel brand. The former was put to good use in creating the idea of the expanded shared Marvel Universe in the early '60s and in encouraging the idea that Marvel readers were part of an elite club of discerning comic buyers. Both key factors in Marvel's rapid rise in popularity during the 60s and into the 70s.

He could also write some really snappy dialogue. Stan knew exactly how to "write up to" kids and by the mid-60s that included college age kids and even young servicemen. At its best, Lee's dialogue could be both funny and surprisingly philosophical. For example, the often repeated line from Spider-Man, "With great power must come great responsibility" is utterly inspired. That idea can be extrapolated out and into everyone's own life in multiple day to day situations. Hell, you can even extrapolate it out onto a global scale, particularly in our duty of care towards the Earth's environment and animal life, as the planet's dominant species. In fact, I honestly think you could quite easily start a religion based on "with great power must come great responsibility". It's Zen-like in its simplicity and universality. Pretty lofty philosophical stuff for a throwaway kid's comic.

As for the issue of how much or not Lee actually created, everything I've read leads me to believe that Lee was absolutely involved in the creation of many of Marvel's key characters

Let's take Spider-Man for example (because he's a character I know a lot about): the very name Spider-Man was Lee's idea (admittedly, almost certainly inspired by the pulp hero The Spider) and so too was the idea of making him a teenager, rather than an adult, which was more usual for "long underwear characters". Plus, it was Lee's scripting that gave the character his angst ridden personality and his wise-cracking characterisation.

Ditko obviously contributed a ton of design stuff, such as Spidey's costume, web-shooters, spider signal etc, and Jack Kirby also had some input, such as having Peter Parker orphaned and living with an elderly Aunt and Uncle (if memory serves). I think I'm right in saying that Kirby actually drew some pages for the first Spider-Man comic, but Lee rejected them as looking too "superhero-y", which is why Ditko was given the job as the comic's artist.

However, I also kinda suspect that Kirby played up his own involvement in Spider-Man's creation in later decades and somewhat tried to minimise and downplay both Lee and Ditko's involvement. But the fact is that the few interviews with Stan and Steve from the 60s and early 70s, when memories were still fresh, barely mention Kirby at all in connection with Spider-Man's creation.

Irrespective of all that though, it's clear to anyone who cares to read up on and research the character's history that Spider-Man was created by three people and that it was almost certainly Lee and Ditko who did the bulk of the heavy lifting.

So yeah...Lee definitely had a hand in creating many of these characters. Did he sometimes get carried away and take more credit that he should've? Yes, I think that's pretty much unassailable fact at this point. But irrespective of that, Lee was absolutely a co-creator of these characters. The idea that it was all Kirby, Ditko, Romita etc just doesn't hold water for me.

That surprises me. What is it you hate about them specifically?

Yeah, I prefer the original Captain Britain costume too.

I like Daredevil's original yellow and black/red costume an awful lot, but I do think that the all red costume is better.

As a die-hard Beatles fan first and a Silver Age Marvel fan second, I think the whole Beatles analogy is a really, REALLY bad fit for the Stan Lee vs. Kirby/Ditko debate. Every which way you look at it, it just really doesn't fit.

Yeah, I have no idea what its actual grade would be, but its in solid condition, with nice firm staples, no damage to the pages, no creases to the cover etc. I'm very happy with it.




I have issue #12 in my collection already, so it'll be good to be able to read what happened before and after it!

Treated myself to four comics off my Wants List.

Got a couple of Englehart era Doctor Strange issues -- British price variants -- that nudge me just a little closer to completeing his run on the character. Also, picked up Angle & The Ape #5, which again nudges me a step closer to finishing that short, but hard to find (especially here in the UK), run.








Lastly, I picked up Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. #4 for a reasonable price and in not too shabby condition. This comic features one of my very favourite Silver Age covers, so I'm pleased to finally have a copy in my collection (even with a 1 shilling price stamp on it!).

I really wanted to like Omac, it has some great designs and there are some neat ideas in it. But man, Kirby's art is really ugly and that dialogue...