By: Adam Williams, Jacob Bates, Joseph Watson
Stan Lee’s History
Stan Lee was born (full name Stanley Martin Lieber) on December 28, 1922, in New York City. His parents - Celia and Jack Lieber - were Romanian immigrants. With part of his childhood spent during the Great Depression, Lieber and his younger brother, Larry, watched his parents struggle to make ends meet for their family. Lee was raised in a Jewish household, and in a 2002 interview, he stated when asked if he believed in God, "Well, let me put it this way... No, I'm not going to try to be clever. I really don't know. I just don't know."
In another interview from 2011, when asked about his Romanian origins and his relationship with the country, he said that he had never visited the country and did not know Romanian because his parents never taught it to him. Stan Lee's father (trained as a dress cutter) worked only after the Great Depression when the family moved further uptown to Fort Washington Avenue in Washington Heights, Manhattan. Speaking in 2006, Lee said that as a child he was influenced by books and movies, particularly those with Errol Flynn playing heroic roles.
In September 2012, Lee underwent an operation to insert a pacemaker, which required cancelling planned appearances at conventions. He eventually retired from convention appearances in 2017. On July 6th 2017, Joan Boocock, his wife of 69 years married, died of complications from a stroke - she was 95 years old. Lee died on November 12th 2018 at the age of 95, one month before his 96th birthday.
The Comics and Movies
Stan Lee created the best selling comic book series in history and was a founding member of Marvel. His inspiration for creating his first comic book, Spiderman, was to create a young hero to not be relegated as a sidekick. His reasoning behind making Spider Man completely disguised was so that any child could imagine they are Spider man, regardless of appearance. Stan confirmed this in an interview. Stan gained his inspiration after seeing a classmate with a “knack for extempore writing". Stan recalled years later, “I decided that I wanted to be able to speak that way, to be able to hold the attention of an audience.” Had Stan had a better living condition, it is rumoured he may have moved to Hollywood.
Stan’s parents were facing a difficult life during the Great Depression. This influenced Lee to make comics to help with funding. A small project quickly became a multi media comic book company ruling over the comic and film industry. Stan gained the title of Primary Creative Leader and held this position for over 2 decades. After his retirement in the 1990’s, Stan was still a monarch of the Marvel franchise - making a cameo in every movie until his heartbreaking death. The last movie the legend featured in was the final movie of the Avengers series that we are aware of so far, Avengers: Endgame. He received the NEA's National Medal of Arts in 2000.
Characters Stan Lee Created
Stan Lee created many characters over his many years of life - from super soldiers to aliens, he has truly created an array of characters. Some of his most recognisable characters are superheroes and villains such as Spiderman, Iron man, Captain America and Thanos just to name a few. With the MCU playing a large role in making characters popular in modern day Marvel, there is a large array of mostly unknown characters that have yet to make their live action debut in the ever expanding MCU. Here are a few of these characters: The Fantastic Four, X men, Doctor Doom, Silver Surfer and Galactus. While these characters may have been featured in some movies, they were unjustly received badly by critics and fans alike. In reality, they are fantastic characters.
His first character was named Destroyer who made his first live action debut in Thor (2011) and his first comic debut in Mystic Comics (1941). His first comic book (“Captain America foils the traitor’s plans") was published in May 1941.
Here are some interesting facts about Stan Lee; his wife was a barber, his first major superhero he created was Captain America, and finally, he defied the comics code authority by writing an anti-drug comic in 1971.
Stan was an icon among the film world by creating wonderful films and skits for the fans of marvel to enjoy. It went pretty downhill after his passing as it affected many fans and actors alike, however the marvel team have continued his legacy and made even more movies, TV shows and books enjoyed by marvel fans globally.
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