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By: Richard Kroon, Director of Engineering, EIDR

Stan Lee (née Stanley Lieber) stood 5′ 11ʺ and was larger than life. He was born in New York on December 28, 1922 and died in Los Angeles, his home since 1981, on November 12, 2018, just a few weeks short of his 96^th birthday. His career in the comic book industry began at the age of 17 working for what was then called Timely Comics (later called Atlas and then Marvel). His writing career began in 1941 with “Captain America Foils the Traitor’s Revenge,” a text-based short story that appeared in Captain America #3. By 1942, he was editor of Timely Comics.
 
He launched the famed “Marvel Age” of comic books in 1961 with The Fantastic Four, co-created with artist Jack Kirby. In this re-imagined comic book universe, superheroes lived among us – in New York instead of Gotham or Metropolis – and were flawed people with real problems – troubled relationships, money issues, serious illness, depression, drug addiction, alcoholism, etc. – rather than two-dimensional hero archetypes who suffer from the occasional kryptonite allergy. Lee’s superheroes also confronted the same issues facing his readers in the real world at the time, including the Vietnam War, racism, and student activism.
 
Prior to Lee and the Marvel Age, comic books were mostly written for a preteen audience. According to comic book historian, Peter Sanderson, “Marvel was pioneering new methods of comics storytelling and characterization, addressing more serious themes, and in the process keeping and attracting readers in their teens and beyond.”
 
Lee’s creative style was very collaborative, and later copied by other comic book publishers as the “Marvel Method.” He worked closely with his artists to create new characters and tell their stories, which is why he is so often credited as a “co-creator.” According to the Marvel Database, Stan Lee created or co-created 1,082 characters in the Marvel Universe, including Spider-Man, Iron Man, the X-Men, Thor, The Hulk, Black Panther, Silver Surfer, Daredevil, Doctor Strange, and the Avengers.
 
Over his long career, Lee received numerous awards, including the American National Medal of the Arts, a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, and the Producers Guild of America Vanguard Award. Along the way, he amassed well over 500 film, television, and game credits covering his career as writer, producer, and actor and his appearances as himself. In his youth, he had aspirations of becoming a novelist (which is why he originally adopted a comic book pen name, reserving his birth name for more “serious” writing at some future date). Eventually, he changed his name legally to Stan Lee and embraced his role as a media and entertainment industry icon:
 
I used to be embarrassed because I was just a comic book writer while other people were building bridges or going on to medical careers. And then I began to realize: Entertainment is one of the most important things in people’s lives. Without it they might go off the deep end. I feel that if you’re able to entertain people, you’re doing a good thing.
 
He did a good thing.
 
Excelsior!