This month saw the passing of a legend; an icon. Simply put, this month saw the passing of an industry leader. Stan Lee of Marvel Comics, is gone.
When I was young, and I mean YOUNG, my father was in the military. He was assigned to Yokota Air Base, Japan. I attended elementary school there. Being a minor to a military man, I learned how to make friends quickly. Moving every four years will teach you things like that. However, I arrived in Japan and was in school before I even met anyone else around my age. When lunch arrived, I went to the cafeteria with my sack lunch and stopped in my tracks.
The lunch room was stocked with picnic benches; probably around twenty or so. Each bench was covered in comic books. Heaps and mounds of comic books, from Archie, to DC Superheroes, to Richie Rich...you get the idea.
I sat, I ate, I read comic books. For those of you that don't know much about me...I read voraciously. I mowed through several comics at a lunchtime sitting and I found out something about them that I had no clue about. These people were amazing writers. The Flash, featuring the original Barry Allen. Superman and Batman versus all the bad guys you could throw at them.
But one book cemented itself in my head, about a certain wall-crawling, arachnid-named superhero named Spider-Man. I was overwhelmed. Here was a book about a hero, not unlike any other book on those tables. But this hero was flawed. He had doubts. He was unsure of how he could help. His belief in himself was his greatest power, and greatest limit. The villains he fought were as flawed as the hero was.
Superman was always righteous, indestructible, and everything else, but never unsure.
The mantra the series brought out resonated. "With great power, comes great responsibility."
Other things within the stories began to emerge. Spidey won a majority of his battles with the same strategy. RUN! He would dodge, leap, skid, swing, and loop repeatedly until the bad guy either made a huge mistake, or Spidey found the one thing he needed to defeat his opponent. They came at him in groups, and he'd get them to beat each other. All the while, slinging snarky comments more than his unique webbing.
I devoured those books, branching out into every other Marvel title I could get my hands on. The one true thing out of all of them, was storytelling. The stories were fast-paced, action packed bits, with a subtle thread woven through them, leading to a huge story arc, covering several issues, sometimes up to a year in the writing. It was the craft as I first saw it.
I eventually moved on to books and learned so much more. But the lessons taught to me by Stan Lee and his merry band of ink throwers existed there too! I was hooked, but didn't know it until I had to write. I HAD to.
He was, and still is, an inspiration. He will be missed. I only hope to approach his story-telling skills, but I fear it may take five of his lifetimes to even get close. God speed Stan. Enjoy your rest.
EXCELSIOR!!!