IN DEFENSE OF STAN THE MAN

By  Barry Dutter

I never thought I would writing an article defending Stan Lee. Since I was 10 years old, Stan has been my idol. My hero. The man whose career I have most tried to emulate. (I even wrote the Bullpen Bulletins for about 5 years in the 90s -- just like Stan!)
One would think such a legendary figure in the comics world would not need defending from anyone.
But there are a number of Jack Kirby tribute groups on the Internet that spend a considerable amount of time denigrating the work of Jack’s frequent collaborator, the esteemed Mr. Lee.
The general theme of the posts on these sites is along the lines of, “Stan didn’t really write those stories. Kirby and Ditko really wrote the stories. Stan was just the scripter. And even then, he just took the dialogue that guys like Kirby wrote in the margins and polished it up a little bit.”
Now, let’s put things in perspective. When Marvel launched an all-new line of  superhero comics in 1961, Stan was the primary writer, and he did type up plots for the stories.
There exists a plot to Fantastic Four #1, written by Stan. You can read it online. It’s incredibly loose and leaves a lot to the artist’s imagination, (and was presumably based on discussions Stan had with Jack beforehand). But clearly, at least in the beginning, Stan was writing plots for the Marvel books that his artists would work from.
There came a time when Marvel started publishing so many books, it became physically impossible for Stan to plot and script all of them, so he began to delegate the plotting duties to his trusted artists like Kirby, Ditko, Wally Wood and Gene Colan. Reportedly Stan would sometimes give the artist a one-line description of the plot, like “Daredevil helps the FF fight Dr. Doom” -- and the artist would flesh out that idea into a full story.
Stan would then add the dialogue and captions later, and he did so with such flair and such panache that generations of writers who came later imitate his

style to this day.
As time went on, Stan was often too busy to even give his artists that one line description. (Steve Ditko is credited as “Plotter” of his final Spider-Man issues.)
But there seems to be no argument that the actual scripts for all those early Marvels were written by Stan. He wrote every word of every page of the first 100 issues of Spider-Man (plus annuals), the first 100+ issues of FANTASTIC FOUR, and countless stories of the Hulk, Sub-Mariner, X-Men, the Avengers, Dr. Strange, etc.
To those who say that Stan was just a glorified typist on those books, consider this: both Kirby and Ditko went on to write the bulk of their own work after they stopped working with Stan. None of the work that Kirby and Ditko did on their own was ever as well-written as the work they did with Stan. Kirby, in particular, had a real tin ear for dialogue. His dialogue always sounded so stiff and unnatural.
In the early 1960s, Stan Lee revolutionized the comics medium by writing dialogue that was smart, loose, and felt “real.” No one had ever heard comic book characters sound like that before. His work was smart, snappy and sarcastic. Stan wrote characters who talked the same way you or I do.
And no one has ever accused Kirby or Ditko of writing dialogue that sounded like the way real people speak.
But Stan didn't just write thousand of pages of great stories. His was the voice of Marvel. He wrote the letters pages and the Bullpen Bulletins pages, too.
He created a house style that was so friendly, so inviting, it made each reader feel like he was part of the Marvel family. Stan made each Marvelite feel like he was a member of a private club with its own secret language. (Hang Loose! Face Front! ‘Nuff said! Etc. )
There are those who will point to the work that Kirby did after he left Marvel -- THE NEW GODS, THE FOREVER PEOPLE, KAMANDI, MISTER MIRACLE, JIMMY OLSEN -- and say it was as imaginative and as great as any of the work he did at Marvel.
To this I will reply: have you actually tried to read any of those books? Honestly, they are mostly unreadable. Just try to make it through any issue of any one of those mags. You may have enjoyed them as a kid, but trust me when I say, they do not hold up.
Now go back and read any issue of AMAZING SPIDER-MAN or FANTASTIC FOUR that Stan wrote in the 60s. Some of them may seem a  little corny, a little old-fashioned, but you know what? They all have a certain charm. They all hold up today.
Stan was the first comic book writer that wrote comics that could be enjoyed by children, college students, and adults -- all at the same time. He told stories that were clear and fun, populated by characters who all spoke with different voices (a skill that seems to have been forgotten by most modern writers).

When you read stories written by Kirby and Ditko, all the heart, humanity and humor of the Stan Lee stories simply isn't there. Ditko and Kirby were incredibly imaginative artists whose work has been highly influential -- but writing has never been their strong suit.
Both men needed the work of a true craftsman to take their ideas and mold them into great stories.
“But Jack Kirby created hundreds and hundreds of characters after he stopped working with Stan,” you say. “And Stan hasn’t created any worthwhile characters in decades!”
Well, let’s break this down. Out of all the characters that Jack Kirby created since the dissolution of the Lee/Kirby team in 1971, how many of those characters have been as popular and beloved as the ones he created with Stan?
You can point to the Demon, the Forever People, the New Gods. Maybe OMAC, or Kamandi… but can you honestly say that any of those characters have caught on with the American public in the same manner as the Hulk? The Silver Surfer? The X-Men? The Avengers?
Not even close.
And as much as you might have enjoyed Ditko's creations, The Creeper and Shade the Changing Man, you must admit that neither of those characters has exactly set the comics world on fire.
The characters that Stan and Jack (and Steve Ditko) created together form the foundation of the Marvel Universe. Without those heroes, there would in all likelihood be no Marvel Comics today.
“But Kirby’s concepts are constantly being revived,” you say. “The Demon gets a new series every couple of years. So do the New Gods.”
This is true, and both of those series have their cult audiences. But neither has truly captivated the comics-buying public the same way those early Lee/Kirby characters did.
In fact, I can only name one character that Kirby created after 1971 that has truly won the hearts of comics fans, and that’s Darkseid. He has transcended his New Gods roots to become one of the top villains in the DC Universe. He has gone on to challenge Superman, the Legion of Super Heroes and the Justice League, and he has appeared in countless cartoons and seems destined for big-screen stardom.
As for Stan?  I would argue that Stan also has one notable character he created after 1971: the She-Hulk in 1980.
The She-Hulk came about not because of creative reasons but for copyright reasons only. Marvel had to publish a female version of the Hulk that they would own the rights to because if they didn’t, Universal, which was then producing the Hulk TV show, could do a TV movie starring a female version of the Hulk that they would own the rights to.
She-Hulk was not welcomed into the Marvel Universe with open arms, but over time, fans came to embrace her as a member of the Avengers and the FF, and in several long-running series of her own.
It can safely be said that She-Hulk has earned a place alongside the classic Marvel heroes. She bears little resemblance to the savage bruiser created by Stan in 1980, but still, the initial spark of the character was there from the start.
So there you go: I will give Stan and Jack one character each since 1971: Darkseid and She-Hulk. The others are all pretty forgettable.
“But Stan takes credit for characters he didn’t even create, like the Silver Surfer, who was entirely a Kirby creation. Stan hadn’t even written the Surfer into the plot!” Stan has always credited Kirby for coming up with the concept and the visual for the Surfer. But it was Stan’s words that brought the Surfer to life. Kirby created the vessel, but Lee gave him a soul.
“But the quality of Stan’s work has declined considerably since 1970,”  you say. To which I reply, name me a comic writer whose work hasn’t declined as they got older! Most comic book writers do their best work when they are in their 20s and 30s. Stan created the FF when he was 38, Spider-Man and the most of the rest of the Marvel Universe when he was 39. The real miracle is that he had his most creative peak from ages 40 to 50. That’s almost unheard of in comics.

And one could also that the quality of Kirby and Ditko’s work also declined as they got older. But again, this is a pretty normal occurrence. It’s called aging. It happens to all of us!
It’s worth noting that Kirby was 44 when he co-created the Fantastic Four, and his mid-to late 40s were perhaps the most creative streak ever seen by any artist in the history of  comics.
Why were Lee and Kirby both inspired to do the best work of their careers in their forties? And why did very little of the work they did before (or since) show that same level of greatness?

Steve Ditko, self-portrait

The answer is that Stan & Jack needed each other. Just as Captain America needed Bucky… just as Mr. Fantastic needed the Invisible Girl… just as Peter Parker needed… um… his Aunt May, I guess… so were Stan and Jack (and Steve) codependent on each other.
Lee and Kirby were an unbeatable team. Separately, neither man ever did any work that was as good as what they did together. Theirs was a mythic pairing that truly changed the world of comics for the better.
So the next time you see someone trashing Stan’s writing, remind them that Ditko and Kirby simply could not have done it without him.
That was the magic of the early Marvel Universe. And no amount of revisionist history can ever change that. I know that sometimes in the media, Stan is given too much credit for “single-handedly” creating the Marvel Universe. But to deny him any credit at all seems insulting to his legacy.
Truly Stan Lee was the greatest superhero writer (and in my eyes, the best comic book writer) of all time.
There’s only one possible word that can end this article, and every true Marvelite knows what it is: Excelsior!