Does Stan Lee work for the New Yorker?

New Yorker cartoonist plagiarizes Jack Kirby, and thus also plagiarizes Stan Lee -- who, up until now, had the market cornered on taking credit for Kirby's work.

Stan Lee's Soapbox: April 1992

Behold: the text of Stan Lee's "Soapbox" column, as it appeared in all Marvel comics cover-dated April 1992, just over ten years before Sam Raimi's Spider-Man was released in theaters. Bold emphasis is mine; caps or italics are all Stan; and I've added hyperlinks to explain the references that only nerds would understand.

Hi, Heroes!

Remember this date -- October '91! It was one of the biggest, most important months in the halcyon history of mighty Marvel! What made it so important? Hey, I thought you'd never ask!

In previous Soapboxes I gave you a number of hints about big things happening out here in Hollywood, big things that I wasn't free to talk about until the contracts were signed and the deals were closed. Well, now it's official! The biggest movie project we've ever planned is now under way -- and if you guessed SPIDER-MAN, then award yourself a twelve-cylinder no-prize with fuel injection!

But here's the most exciting part -- guess who's gonna write, direct, and produce the first ever big-budget, feature film of the world's most famous wall-crawler? Wouldja believe James Cameron?!! That's right, Bunky, the same fabulous, super-fantastic filmmaker who bestowed upon a wildly cheering, wide-eyed world such monster hits as ALIENS, THE ABYSS and the two titanic TERMINATOR thrillers! So you can take this to the bank, Believer -- SPIDER-MAN is destined to be the biggest, boldest, baaaaadest blockbustin' bombshell of a super hero action extravaganza ever to hit the screen!

Now then, before you start bombarding us with letters and phone calls asking who's gonna star in our fabulous forthcoming flick, or who the villain will be, let me advise you that those decisions haven't yet been made. First, the story has to be structured and then a screenplay written. That will probably take months because we're all determined to make it the greatest action thriller of all. But as soon as more info comes through, even faster than you can wiggle your webs you'll get the scoop via the ol' Soapbox column as well as in the various newsletters we'll be sending to all the Wild Agents of Marvel!

And next issue, on this very same page, if Irving Forbush doesn't elope with Aunt May in the next thirty days, I'll bring you some additional exciting news about X-MEN hitting the screen! Who says this isn't the Marvel Age of Awesome Announcements?

Excelsior!

Backstory: I've been looking for this Soapbox for years, because I remembered Stan's empty promise from my misbegotten youth. I just happened across it while reading Iron Man #279, part 13 of the sprawling Operation: Galactic Storm crossover.

Cameron's treatment for his aborted Spider-Man movie was so long that it's popularly called a "scriptment," and apparently it's available online. Apparently the bad guy was Electro (but as a suit-wearing business executive rather than an accident-prone electrician). As I recall, back then they were touting Leonardo DiCaprio as Peter Parker. What a different, darker world this could have been.

X-Men of course didn't come out until July 2000. I've not found the May 1992 Bullpen Bulletin, but I will, Stan. And your lies will be exposed for all the world to see! I will have vengeance, Stan Lee! Yes I will!

I wouldn't worry too much about Captain America

The death of Captain America somehow made national news today. Well, don't shed a tear for Cap just yet. He's already died probably a half-dozen times in the past, and so have all of his fictional friends. Even comic book characters who get killed off "permanently," like Hal Jordan and Norman Osborn, turn out to have not been dead after all, after enough time has passed and writers realize that they can't infuse brand-new characters with any kind of depth or emotional resonance.

Semi-insulting quote from a Marvel spokesman: "This is the end of Steve Rogers, the meat-and-potatoes guy from 1941...But Captain America is a costume, and there are other people who could take it over."

I'm fairly sure Mark Gruenwald already covered the idea that Steve Rogers is the only Captain America, ass.

Hippie Olsen's Hate-In

I recently downloaded all 163 issues of Superman's Pal Jimmy Olsen, a notoriously bizarre comic book that ran for 20 years starting in 1954. Looking for some light reading material just now, but unsure where to start, I used the Random Olsen Generator located at the bottom-left of your Furdell.com main page.

I came up with issue #121, "Jimmy Olsen's Death Trick," in which Jimmy exaggerates a fever in order to convince Superman to reveal his secret idenity privately. Unsure at first what to do, Jimmy overhears Superman telling the president of the Jimmy Olsen Fan Club (yeah, right) that he can be Superman's new pal, and that the Superman-That Guy team will be way better than the Superman-Olsen team. Jimmy at first resolves to reveal Superman's secret identity on television, but convinces himself at the last second that Superman was merely under the effects of red kryptonite and therefore totally delirious when he said someone else would make a better pal. (This was not the case.)

Anyway, as pulse-pounding as that story was, I've discovered that the best part of a Jimmy Olsen comic is the letters page. Sample opening sentence: "'Hippie Olsen's Hate-In' was one of your better stories." Ouch.

Here's my favorite letter, in its entirety. Notice how it starts out as a thoughtful critique of the comic book, and then quickly devolves, not unlike Jimmy Olsen himself in the story in question.

Dear Editor:
In your recent story "The Gorilla Reporter," when Jimmy was in a gorilla's body, Perry White put a sign on him saying he was tame, so no one would panic. Frankly, no such thing would reassure me, because I'm certain there's really no such thing as a tame gorilla. All real gorillas are vicious killers.
-- Brad Ellis, Louisville, Ky.

Look out, Baron Zemo

Body found in glacier believed to be WWII airman

Thanks to RM.

Nerds only

Okay, this is about as nerdy as it gets, but here's a site to behold. This guy made skins for Freedom Force (a fairly lame superhero-themed game) based on a whole lot of really obscure characters from comics and cartoons, including Legion of Superheroes reject Arm-Fall-Off-Boy. Enjoy.

Stan Lee upsets me.

So it seems that Stan Lee, "creator" of every Marvel superhero that matters, is getting 10% of the profits from the Spider-Man movies, per a federal judge's decision.

Never mind that Stan almost certainly co-created Spidey with hermitic artist Steve Ditko, comics being a highly collaborative process. (There are those who believe Ditko had more to do with Spidey's success than Lee.)

And, of course, never mind that as Marvel's editor-in-chief, Lee himself presided over a company that had strict work-for-hire policies. Marvel has a rich history of doing what it will with contributors' creations. (Sure, Stan Lee gets a piece of the Spidey profits, but did Marv Wolfman get a dime from Blade? Answer: no.)

Oh, wait -- I already covered all this. Hmm. And that post was a lot funnier, too. I'd better quit while I'm behind.

Todd McFarlane: Not just artistically bankrupt anymore

Overrated-artist-turned-abysmal-writer Todd McFarlane, formerly of way more wealth than he deserved, is now bankrupt after losing a $15M court battle.

McFarlane's inexplicable popularity in the early 1990s led to an overall decline in quality of comic books as publishers realized they didn't need good stories or art to sell comics, so much as variant covers and the promise of future collectibility. McFarlane's Spawn #1, worth $60 shortly after its initial release, is now less valuable than toilet paper. (And toilet paper is more interesting.)

Furdell.com laughs at Todd McFarlane's pain! Ho ho ho!

Weird Comic Book Update

I think I'm going to declare my internet research finished before it started. The answers I found were basically what I expected, and it all leads to a grand total of "who the hell knows." Here are the facts...

* My comic is the victim of a bindery defect called, predictably, "wrong cover." It is by all accounts a rare occurance.

* Though I have been unable to find evidence of any other comic like mine, it is generally accepted that bindery defects are seldom if ever one-of-a-kind, which makes sense. In the case of this particular comic, since both the insides and the outside feature Spider-Man, it and its sister copies must have slipped under the radar.

* According to some guy who knows a lot about comic book production, comics that are distributed weeks apart could be printed at the same time. That explains how a PPTSSM could have an MTU cover, even though we all know those comics weren't distributed on the same week. (We all knew that, right?)

* As you might expect, very recent comics with bindery defects aren't valuable; they're just oddities. My comic came out in 1976, just on the cusp of the "Modern Age," so it might be just old enough to qualify it as a collectible. There are a handful of famous comic book errors that become valuable collectibles, and they don't have to be all that old. For example, if you were a Fantastic Four collector, you might obsess over the green variant issue of FF #110 from 1971, in which everyone on the cover was colored wrong:

* However, it's important to note that comics like the green FF #110 are well-known amongst comic book geeks, which is why there's a market for them. My comic is unknown and therefore a harder sell.

* My friend Kurt, a law student, is now flaunting the fact that he lies about everything, usually for no reason. Case in point: when he told someone about my comic, he changed "Spectacular Spider-Man #1" to "Amazing Spider-Man #50" and claimed I was now a millionaire. Thanks, Kurt. I can totally see why you had to do that. It's no wonder nobody believes a damned word you say.

In sum...
I could write to people who know things about comic book values, but I can already guess their response: it's worth whatever people will pay for it. That's comic book geek parlance for "damned if I know." So the only sure way to find out my comic's value is to try to sell it, which I may as well do. More on that later.

I have a guess, though. First of all, since the defect is called "wrong cover" and not "wrong pages," it's safe to say that my comic is, in fact, Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man #1 and not some crappy issue of Marvel Team-Up. Its bindery defect is rare, bizarre, and interesting, and best of all it doesn't detract from the comic's appearance or quality (some bindery defects result in a deformed comic, but not this one). That said, I suspect my comic will sell for more than the value of PPTSSM #1, but not much more. I would be very happy with a sale price of over $100, which would of course net me a 3000% profit.

Twice stings the Tarantula!

Greetings from sunny San Diego. This is my first trip to California. Today I visited Los Angeles, which was uncharacteristically rainy. Better luck next time.

But that's not why I'm writing. I've run into something of an anomaly. You see, I brought several newly-aquired comic books on my trip, one of which is a copy of Marvel Team-Up #52, which I purchased for $3.50. Or so I thought.

Well, I mean, I did buy it for $3.50, definitely. But it's not MTU #52! Open it up, and it's a genuine copy of Spectacular Spider-Man #1, released the same month but worth about $40 more. My copy is some kind of printer's error, possibly one-of-a-kind, or possibly not. More internet research will be required.

Is my comic worth untold fortunes? Or just $45? Or was I ripped off at $3.50? Stay tuned to find out, Spider-fans.

Alex Ross paints Bush

Only my brother and I will be interested in this Alex Ross Village Voice cover painting. So, check it out James.

Stan Lee is a Stinking Liar

OK, so just to get this out of the way: Yes, I saw Spider-Man 2, yes, it was awesome, yada yada yada. The movie explanation for why Dr. Octopus goes crazy makes a lot more sense than the comic book explanation (which was basically: "Hey, an explosion! I'm crazy now").

But this post is not about the awesomeness of a movie that you've already seen four times by now. No, this post is about what a stinking liar Spidey co-creator Stan Lee is.

Everybody who follows comics probably already knows Stan is a stinking liar. Take, for example, his tendency to retell the story of how he created Spider-Man...about twelve different ways. Some of which are physically impossible. And we all know the actual creation probably went something like this:

Stan's latest lie? I suppose he didn't expect me to remember when he said: "No, no I don't, I don't think I'm gonna have cameos in the sequels 'cause I think that gets to be a little much." Oh, is that so? Then who was that white-haired man saving someone from falling debris, eh, Mr. Lee? Or should I say...Mr. LIEBER??!?! I rest my case.