Stan Lee: The Rise and Fall of The American Comic Book

SpookWarfare writes "To be completely honest I'm good friends with Tom Spurgeon and Jordan Raphael, the authors of Stan Lee: The Rise and Fall of the American Comic Book." So take your grain of salt, and read on below for "an unbiased review of a the most important book ever to be written about the subject of comic books, or any subject for that matter." Stan Lee: The Rise and Fall of The American Comic Book author Jordan Raphael and Tom Spurgeon pages 320 publisher Chicago Review Press rating 8 reviewer Gus Mastrapa ISBN 1556525060 summary Stan Lee

If you don't know who Stan Lee is, you will have little to no interest in this book. But who are we kidding? Any geek worth his or her metal knows Stan "The Man" Lee, the co-creator of Spider-man, The Hulk, The Fantastic Four and countless other beloved Marvel Comics characters. What most people don't really know is the real story behind the creation of these characters. Many have never heard of the artists Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko, who contributed a great deal to the creation and development of these superheroes. In the past years a bit of a rift has formed in comics fandom, the hard-core siding with the late Kirby, claiming that Lee and Marvel did the artist wrong. The other side blithely backs the amiable Lee. Through interviews with artists, family members and Stan Lee himself, Spurgeon and Raphael try to shed some light on the subject.

Anyone who's read Michael Chabon's The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay will notice a great deal of similarities between Stan Lee's origins and the fictionalized settings Chabon created for his book. Both stories start in the time of the pulps, when publishers cranked out fantastic publications by the truck-load. The parallels are fascinating. If you're a comic book fan and you haven't read Chabon's book, you need to read it.

Anyway, the book I'm supposed to be reviewing tracks Stan Lee's star from his position as a lowly writer at Timely Comics, to the editor behind the most famous run of comic books in history; Marvel's Silver Age comics. This is when the Fantastic Four, Spider-man and The Hulk were born. The book doesn't stop there. It follows Lee through the decades detailing his involvement with the Marvel titles all the way. It examines his rocky relationship with Hollywood and decades of attempts to bring Marvel characters to life on television or in the movies. Even more fascinating are the segments of the book that deal with Stan Lee Media and the enormous financial flame-out that occurred when the business went sour.

The book paints Lee in a very humanistic light. It brings his flaws into sharp contrast and at the same time gives him credit for his amazing accomplishments, unceasing drive and wild imagination. Most interesting is the way the book tells the story of all comics in the context of Marvel and Lee's story. As much as underground geniuses such as R. Crumb or Art Spiegelman must hate the association, it's hard to argue that the fates of all comics are influenced by Marvel's gravitational pull.

There's been a mild knee-jerk reaction in the comics community that the book is blatant attack on Lee, being that both Spurgeon and Raphael both worked at The Comics Journal, a publication that has publicly supported Jack Kirby's claims against Lee. To be fair, the authors put an exceptional amount of work into trying to tell the truth, which is reflected in the sheer number of annotated resources they've provided in the book's source notes.

In all seriousness, try to forget for a moment that I'm friends with the authors. As a lifelong comics reader I found the information presented in this book fascinating. It made me want to run to my comics shop and buy reprints of the old issues. Don't take my word for it, though.

There are several excerpts of the book available online. You can read the prologue at the book's official website. Part of Chapter 17, "Stan in Hollywood" is excerpted at The Comic's Journal's website."

You can purchase Stan Lee: The Rise and Fall of The American Comic Book from bn.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.

Comments

A lesson from our Japanese friends...

[Bonker]

Manga tend to last a certain amount of time and then end. They don't frequently switch writers and/or artists. Popular stories are not necessarily stretched and reinvented in order to increase sales. (This point is arguable. There were 37 volums of Ranma 1/2 IIRC.) Artists are treated as talents rather than commodities.

Who reads and sells more comic books than any other nation in the world?

Re:A lesson from our Japanese friends...

[John_Booty]

One thing I like about manga is the price. In Japan they're generally printed on cheap pulpy paper and are disposable. You can read and enjoy them, without having to treat them like treasured investments whose pages you're afraid to turn.

American comics are just too expensive. I haven't been to a comics store in a while but last time I was there most comics were like, four bucks for something I'd finish reading in 15 minutes. The art is generally fantastic these days, insanely detailed and printed on nice paper. But they're way too expensive- I prefer the lengthier stories that manga gives me for the same amount of money, as opposed to the short, pretty, and expensive American comics.

(there are exceptions to those generalizations, of course!)

Killing comics

[Foofoobar]

Between Diamond killing off independents by making them IMPOSSIBLE to get distributed and the basic stigma behind comics books, the only thing that wil truly re-invigorate comics is the internet and reinventing the distribution method.

Jack Kirby, et. al.

[knghtrider]

As Mark Evanier (once Jack Kirby's Assistant) said "Well, it's safe to say Jack did all the pencilling. Beyond that, we run into all sorts of semantic arguments having to do with definitions of the word "writing" and with the fact that Mssrs. Lee and Kirby both have/had notoriously poor memories. You also have the fact that, when two creative talents get together and come up with an idea, each of them might honestly believe that he suggested at least the core of the concept if not the entire thing. This happens in any collaboration anywhere and, ultimately, you usually have to just say that they both had the idea. Ergo, I say that the Lee-Kirby creations are Lee-Kirby creations."

I think that quote says it all--except for the fact that Stan Lee created/inspired a whole generation of HUMANISTIC superheroes--ones with flaws, foibles and problems that were not outweighed by ultra-human abilities. Peter Parker was still somewhat introverted and Geeky, Stephen Strange was still an alcoholic and somewhat arrogant, Ben Grimm had self-esteem problems relating to his appearance. The list is Endless.

Stan Lee and Marvel Comics brought us some of the greatest comics and heroes. Thanks Stan!!

Isn't that a little excessive?

[Wylfing]

the most important book ever to be written about the subject of comic books, or any subject for that matter

Holy crap! I suggest you immediately step away from the computer screen, pack a bag, and move out of your parents' basement.

Comics ... sigh

[YllabianBitPipe]

I really wish comics were more popular than they are in America. The reasons why have been hashed out ad nauseum but I think it boils down to a bad stereotyped image ... that comics are for kids and mostly center around superheroes in spandex, muscles, with a hugely breasted babe on each arm. It's because companies like Marvel and DC saturate the market with their corny superhero escapades, leading people to assume that's all comics can be and all they're about.

There's a lot of great stuff there, but in order to truly break through the aformentioned kiddie / funny / superhero / alienated loser stereotype something more mainstream and substantial needs to come out of the comics world. My primary gripe is not about the art. The art is great and wonderful things are being done every day. It's the subject matter and the writing.

The handful of comics folks I really admire these days are Chris Ware, Posy Simmonds and Dan Clowes. Chris Ware's stuff transcends narrative and writing. Posy Simmonds' "Gemma Bovery" is a re-telling of Madame Bovery with a really complex merging of novel and art. It doesn't look that great at first but there's subtle patterns to when it lapses into comic and back to novel. Dan Clowes I mention because he's done comics that read more like films and his latest 8ball, frankly, blew me away with it's genere hopping and Altmanesque interweaving story lines.

I've been hopeful as of late as finally we got to see Ghost World, American Splendor, heck even Road To Perdition which are great examples of films based on comics that do not have the aforementioned superhero complex. For better or worse, it's hard to tell they in fact were comics to begin with. Now don't get me wrong, I still enjoy X-Men and Hulk, but I don't think these films are doing anything to break down the stereotypes of what comics are.

Frankly, we need more boundry-breaking artists than Stan Lee, who keeps rehashing the same old archetypes. Otherwise we'll just continue with the situation we have now, where comic book stores go under, fewer people can make a living at it, and the comics section is delegated to some far corner of the bookstore near the porno mags...

Stan Lee != American Comic Books

[Nova Express]

While it is always dangerous to assume that a Slashdot reviewer actually knows what they're talking about, the review does present me with several reasons I might not want to read the book:

1. Calling Marvel's Silver Age comics "the most famous run of comic books in history" is a highly subjective and arguably mistaken statement. More famous than the early years of DC, with Batman and Superman? I don't think so.

2. While I have no objection to a book about Stan Lee per se, calling it The Rise and Fall of The American Comic Book suggests a rather serious overreach. The fact is that the decline in the quality of Stan Lee's Marvel stable happened at the same time of perhaps the most impressive ferment in comics and graphic novels in history, i.e. the mid-to-late 1980s, a renaissance lead by a handful of exceptionally influential DC titles (especially Alan Moore's Watchman, Frank Miller's Dark Knight, and Neil Gaiman's Sandman), together with a number of important independent comics (Dave Sims' Cerebus, etc.).

3. The review does not mention it, but the true "Fall of the American Comic Book" occured in the mid-1990s due to largely economic circumstances, i.e. the collapse of the speculator market and a disasterous consolidation of comic distribution companies set in motion by Marvel's decision to make Heroes World their sole distributor. (I published an article by Paul T. Riddell on this very subject in the Fall/Winter 2000 isssue of Nova Express, but there are also several online summaries of those events you can Google.) The fact that the book focuses on Stan Lee, and that the review makes no mention of this (an event quite apart from the Dotcom-like collapse of Stan Lee Media) makes me fear that this book either gives a very distorted view of this economic cataclysm, or no view at all.

That is not to say that it might not be interesting to Stan Lee fans. But Stan Lee != American Comic Books, no matter emblamatic his work may have been in the 1960s.