Greetings, True Believers!
As surely as mortal man from aeons past regarded their gods with reverence and gratitude for the bounties of life, nerds today have no less an impressive line-up of deities to praise for the parts they’ve played in building our universes and lavishing us with treats. And should we dare scale our modern Mount Olympus for a peek at the legends within, there on the throne once occupied by Zeus, Jupiter and Odin, flanked by an army of supers with a typewriter on his lap, would be perched Stan Lee, born 100 years ago today - December 28, 1922.
The foundations of nerd culture are built on comicbooks and no one in the whole history of geek did more than Stan to build the multiverses we dwell in, and dwell on, today. I’m not saying he did it alone. Jack Kirby, Steve Ditko... I revere them almost equally. But it was Stan who saw comics as they were, imagined how they might be, and through sheer force of will, made that happen. It was Stan’s naturalistic approach that made his characters as human and relatable as titans could possibly be. And it was Stan who welcomed us into his worlds with open arms and awesome alliterations, bringing us into the folds of his marvellous comicbooks, letting us in on the gags and making us one of the gang.
Within a single, spectacular decade, Stan, with Jack, Steve and a handful of others, created so much of what we love today that their achievements are no easier to comprehend than infinite space. For Marvel, their Big Bang was 1961’s The Fantastic Four. Then planet after planet formed in quick succession: The Incredible Hulk. The Mighty Thor. The Amazing Spider-Man. Iron Man. The Avengers. The X-Men. Dr. Strange. Daredevil. The Silver Surfer... Is your mind blown yet?
Back when I interviewed Stan Lee for What's On in London Magazine, I was less a journalist than an awkward, bumbling, wide-eyed fan. But Stan was a sweetheart. Patient, generous and full of enthusiasm for my enthusiasm, he answered all my questions, signed everything I put in front of him and even gave me his business card, which I treasure.
The year was 1991 and Stan was in London promoting Les Daniels' wonderful coffee table tome, Marvel: Five Fabulous Decades of the World's Greatest Comics (Virgin Books). We chatted about Lee's beginnings in the business and his rise to fame as Marvel's mighty frontman. Spider-Man, too, swung into the conversation, which ranged from comicbooks battling illiteracy to Marvel's ongoing failure to successfully transfer onto the big screen.
Bear in mind that this was seven years before Stephen Norrington's Blade (1998), nine years before Bryan Singer's X-Men (2000), 11 years before Sam Raimi's Spider-Man (2002) and 17 years before Jon Favreau's Iron Man (2008) gave birth to the MCU. At this point in time, Stan and James Cameron were conferring with great excitement about a dark Spider-Man movie that sadly never materialised. So it's rather a time capsule, this interview, and the tape it's on was an exciting thing to find while poking around in my loft a while back, looking for something else entirely.
In terms of sound quality, beyond interviewing Stan in a busy cafe, I recorded him on a cassette now three decades old. So actually, I'd say the sound is pretty damn great, considering. A digital capture of an analogue exchange that I've always remembered fondly, and am thrilled, on the centenary of Stan's auspicious birth, to share with you today.
Excelsior!
Do you have a favourite Stan Lee memory? What about a go-to Stan the Man comicbook? Maybe there’s a movie cameo of his that you remember particularly fondly? Whatever your happiest and most positive Stan Lee memory is, I’d love for you to share it with me below.
Happy Hundredth Birthday, Stan Lee!