UNDER OATH! Stan Lee Was Required To Tell the TRUTH in the Case of JACK KIRBY vs. MARVEL COMICS!
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 16 ก.ย. 2024
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Exquisite timing. I have just finished reading , True Believer:The Rise and Fall of Stan Lee, written by Abraham Reisman. The story plotting conference referred to in Nat Freeland's newspaper article is covered in detail. Detailed in its research about Stan's career and life. It's an engrossing and illuminating
read.
I have pre ordered Hulk: Grand Design at my LCS. Looking forward to reading it after reading Al Ewing's run on Immortal Hulk.
Correction on Stan’s comment about not knowing why Goodman fired Simon & Kirby. The TwoMorrows book, “American Comic Book Chronicles: 1940’s (1941-1945, Kurt F Mitchell)” has the details on this. In summary, the Timely accountant Maurice Coyne showed Simon & Kirby that they were not getting their fair share of royalties off Captain America thanks to some tricky accounting Goodman was doing. SImon & Kirby had been considering a move to DC Comics and started to take it a bit more seriously given this news. Goodman heard they were leaning that way, so he fired them (and this helped him not to have to deal with the royalties issue). Coyne left and is the “M” in MLJ, publishers of Archie.
There’s also sayings that’s it was Stan lee to told Goodwin that Simon and Kirby where planing on moving to dc
I've been working on a writing project involving this matter, and I have done a TON of reading and research about this very subject.
Most parties are pretty clear that Goodman was applying virtually all the costs for the business to the Captain America profits, and in doing so, reducing the percentage Simon & Kirby were to be paid. There's also lots of sources (including Simon's autobiography, IIRC) that make it pretty clear they had started working for National before they had left Timely. They had absolutely valid reasons for jumping ship, but they were also moonlighting in violation of their contract with Goodman.
None of this stuff is as black and white, or as simple, as we'd like it to be. As much as I love Two-Morrows publications, their research is very, very good, but they do have a pretty open bias when it comes to anything involving Kirby.
Maurice was always apart of MLJ, Martin didn’t know that Maurice was Timely’s account while simultaneously at MLJ. Maurice showed Joe that Martin was billing all expenses to Captain America’s title. Being that Joe was the one who had a deal with Goodman. Joe and Jack didn’t go directly to DC, they stopped at Fawcett, MLJ, and was at DC while also at Harvey the same time
Stan and Jack fed each other, and that is why we have Marvel comics. Parsing out who did what, exactly, in every story is virtually impossible, but I do reject the narrative that Stan did nothing. I mean, Stan's narrative voice was literally everywhere in those books. The dialogue, the letter pages, the Bullpen Bulletins, the Soapbox....
As much as I love The Fourth World, you can feel Jack trying to script like Stan in those books, and he just doesn't have the flair for dialogue.
I just don't see why it has to be either or. In my humble opinion, they did their best work together.
To be clear, the legal position of Disney/Marvel is that neither Lee nor Kirby were the creators. The Disney/Marvel position is the one Jim Shooter articulated under oath in Fleischer case (which came up repeatedly in the reading of the testimony): that the creator is Marvel Comics, with some people working on the books as paid staff (Lee) and some as freelancers (Kirby etc.). The credit they received, under this argument, is simply a "courtesy." The books could simply be credited to Disney/Marvel (just like Barks' duck comics were credited to Walt Disney). Lee continued to be paid a handsome salary (n the many millions) till the day he died because he supported this position.
Because without Stan, kirby was still creating. He created Darkseid dude. Stan doesn't matter without jack.
Liar. Lee was an executive and took credit for others work. Kriby, Ditko, Romata, the list goes on and on. He's a liar and a fraud. The only thing Lee was good at was self promotion and fighting against creators rights while increasing the pay of executives like himself.
you are right it does not need to be either or. unfortunately. one dude proposed the narrative that he did it all by himself and was paid million upon millions based on only his word and the creative reworking of title and ownership. while the Kirby family has had to spend millions of dollars to fight for their share of what is rightfully owed to them.
The majority of Jack Kirby’s actual sole creations are mostly about God-related characters. Stan Lee’s characters are about different people with human struggles who are also superheroes.
The interactions between Lee and the artists, especially in the case of Kirby, is further complicated by the production whirlwind which you mentioned here. Add into the mix that neither Lee or Kirby are noted for having great memories. So even if they did have a story conference how much was Kirby intentionally ignoring and how much did he just forget what they talked about? And would Stan even remember if Jack had changed something? Or would he assume that “yeah, this looks pretty much what we talked about.” Or maybe he’d realize Kirby changed something, but the story was better and besides there probably wasn’t time to change it anyway due to the aforementioned production whirlwind. And Lee probably thought he could just tweak it to his own sensibilities anyway when he scripted the book. Mark Evanier has pointed out that you can sometimes see them fighting each other this way on the page. The story Kirby drew wasn’t always the same story that Lee was scripting. And yet, they still more often than not produced some amazing comics.
Also, whatever else you can criticize Stan for I think it’s pretty clear was easily one of the best editors in the history of the medium-probably the most impactful editor ever.
Rip Jack the King Kirby and Stan the man Lee. Nuff said
Nice footnote to my “Jack Kirby: The Epic Life of the King of Comics” book by Tom Scioli . Also loved the David Choe stories!
Tom Scioli’s Kirby book is definitely titled correctly it’s Epic, highest recommendation.
If the kirbys ever get ownership? Say goodbye to marvel lol. Kirby made such a huge percentage of the characters that matter, its insane
What did Stan ever create without Ditko or Kirby doing the heavy lifting?
Stripperella.
Iron Man, Daredevil, Black Widow, Hawkeye, She-Hulk, Mar-Vell, Falcon, Black Knight, Kingpin, Mephisto are some. It seems people are only hating Stan because he is not an artist and lived to see his creations’ huge success.
@@petermj1098 kirby was involved in Iron Man and Daredevil
Well by that same token Bill Everett was quite involved with the concept of Dardevil as well
Love these deposition videos keep em coming. Also you should check out daredevil (247) by Ann Nocenti & kieth Giffen. It's pretty early on in her run, and to be honest the story telling is a bit off in that issue, but the art is so striking. I'd love to hear your takes on it, especially how it breaks away from the house style of the era
Great content here! Glad you could present it so realistically to the transcript from the videographer read on to the Hiring Attorney asking to take a break after an hour and turning off the video record. I will be watching the rest of this series as it comes out. Learning a lot about Stan, Marvel and it's history of printing and hiring standards.
Great video as always guys. But I have to ask because I love the videos we’re we see you guys in the studio. My eyes bounce all over the place. I think many would agree with me that you need to do a video of the studio. Jim did one recently of his home studio and it was very cool!! Please do one of the kayfabe studio. Thanks!!
I knew it wouldn't happen, but I was really hoping Jim would bust out a Stan Lee impression.
Boy, I'm putting down tarps and pulling on the hip waders for this one!
Stanley Underoath isn’t this a oxymoron
The Lee/Kirby debate among fans is very frustrating to me. It always devolves into Stan ripped off Jack but I have never thought it was as clearly defined. Like you said, they were one of the greatest partnerships in comics, there is no Stan the Man without Jack the King and maybe vise versa
Captain America, war, mob romance, & western comics, and the Fourth World say otherwise.
Jack was already the king having created Captain America and thousands of pages since the 40s, before he met Stan. And he was the king after Stan, when he kept creating characters for DC and onwards. It's really no comparision.
Same with Steve ditko
Silver Surfer and Fourth World is what you get without Stan Lee. Ravage 2099 is what you get with out Kirby. Let’s not kid ourselves
Depositions are given under oath.
Also if you're caught telling a lie during the deposition, it can really break bad for you during the trial if there is one. Exactly how it would break bad for you, that I don't know, you would need to talk to an attorney.
Stan Lee has such a strong personality. Even when Jim is reading his parts, every response makes him so likable. He’s such a PR hype man.
A couple of thoughts: There have been contrary reports regarding Stan's supposed faulty memory. This faulty memory trope has been used as a convenient tool. It was more likely selective and, as mentioned by others here, Stan began to believe his own PR as to who created what. Example: The Fantastic Four. Jack Kirby's "Challengers of the Unknown" is the direct precursor for the FF. Only a few years separate these creations and the Challengers have many of the same elements of the FF, including characterization. And the early issues were divided by Kirby's trademark big chapter numbers. That's just two examples. Up to that point in 1961, Stan's main credits were writing... Millie the Model. There's nothing in his track record that would indicate he could ever come up with this kind of science fiction/fantasy idea.
BUT - he certainly knew how to take the ball and run with it. Truly, I enjoyed the dialogue he added to the books more than most any other Marvel writer of the time period of 1961 - 1970. And he was the consummate carnival barker which is not a bad thing. He got people like myself into the tent to see the works of Kirby and Steve Ditko. That may have been his only other contribution. But it was a hugely important factor. I don't think he came up with any of the characters. What did he create after Jack and Steve left? The Kingpin? But, in a funny way, without him, I don't think we'd be discussing any of this today.
Wasn't Marvel using Messenger Services to run things to and from various people? Not just Express Mail?
This is my crack.
Great episode - a small insight on comic publishing. I didn't realize you guys are in my hometown! Here - take a sub and I know I'll be picking up some of your books!
Even without the legal aspect, I could listen for hours to first hand recounting like this of how comics were done. PS I'm expecting an excited "Excelsior!" at some point, just so you know, lol
This was the fastest 53 minutes!
Can’t wait for the next installment
Great choice of material to cover. Fascinating historical details. Good job guys.
At the moment I'm midway through reading True Believer while my husband is listening to the audio book. We've had some great conversations as I'm reading him the early tales of Marvel from borrowed editions of the Omnibus books. I'm also reading Philiip Roth's American Pastoral which complements and dovetails so nicely with the Lee family history and their immigration to the U.S.A. True Believer is a fascinating read. To my mind Reisman does a good job of research. I truly wish he would put up the full interviews on his site as he stated he had so much more that didn't make it into the book.
Am reading Roy Thomas's Hollywood Reporter piece regarding Reisman's work. Thomas has been consistent in pointing to Lee's faulty memory and that typed plot of Fantastic Four in defense of Stan. Thus far, it doesn't read to me as if Reisman is elevating Kirby to the determent of Lee so I'm not clear through what lens Thomas is reading the boo, but obviously he's been triggered and it is a sensitive subject to him. Reisman does a great job of humanizing these men with his careful choice of words. I only wish Thomas would owe up and put his own biases on the table that are influencing his ability to be completely 'objective'. in this instance.
Like each and every human that has ever existed or will we are flawed creatures, some more flawed than others. It was Stan's taking so much of the credit over the years that rubbed me the wrong way. He was in a position of power to an ever growing corporate entity; he had a much bigger bully pulpit that neither from which to spread his 'message' unlike Ditko and Kirby.
Stan Lee was the ultimate in marketer, at some point I believe he truly started to believe all the stories he was telling to crowds and could no longer differentiate truth from fiction . Shades of Andy Griffith and the character of Lonesome Rhodes he played in the film A Face In The Crowd.
Stan could have been following the Edward Bernays' (the father of modern advertising) playbook on how to get himself noticed. For those not familiar with either Edward Bernays or documentarian Adam Curtis watching Curtis's 6-part series 'The Century of Self' which aired on the BBC, but never in the U.S. is a tour de force of showing the influence of marketing had on the public. All episodes are available on TH-cam and you can start here with Part 1.
th-cam.com/video/DnPmg0R1M04/w-d-xo.html
Great and insightful commentary, Philip. A couple of agreements: Roy has a clear bias overlayed with a huge know-it-all attitude which is perplexing since he WASN'T THERE at Marvel in the early 60s and the only version of events he heard when he did start working there was Stan Lee's version. And there have been contrary reports that Stan did not have a faulty memory. This faulty memory trope has been used as a convenient tool by apologists like Thomas. It was more likely selective and, as you mention, Stan began to believe his own PR as to who created what.
Example: The Fantastic Four. Jack Kirby's "Challengers of the Unknown" is the direct precursor for the FF. Only a few years separate these creations and the Challengers have many of the same elements of the FF, including characterization. And the early issues were divided by Kirby's trademark big chapter numbers. That's just two examples. Up to that point of 1961, Stan's main credits were writing... Millie the Model. There's nothing in his track record that would indicate he could ever come up with this kind of science fiction/fantasy idea.
BUT - he certainly knew how to take the ball and run with it. Truly, I enjoyed the dialogue he added to the books more than most any other Marvel writer of the time period. And he was the consummate carnival barker which is not a bad thing. He got people like myself into the tent to see the works of Kirby and Steve Ditko. That may have been his only other contribution. But it was a hugely important factor. I don't think he came up with any of the characters. What did he create after Jack and Steve left? The Kingpin? But, in a funny way, without him, I don't think we'd be discussing any of this today.
Always entertaining, can’t wait for part 2.
That was really cool guys! Can’t wait for part two.
Damn this would actually make a great Aaron Sorkin script
Stan Lee was at Timely/Atlas for 20 years after Jack Kirby Joe Simon left. The publishers at Timely kept asking Stan if he had ideas for heroes to go against DC comics, he had none... All of a sudden when Jack Kirby returns he has all these character ideas, bullshit all of these ideas and creation were from Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko
what?! are you saying that Stanley, the nepo baby / office boy, was an industry hack who just chased industry trends for 20 years and was editing comics like Dippy Duck, The Ringo Kid & Millie the Model until Kirby & Ditko showed up?
and lo the Marvel Universe sprang forth in an instantaneous apotheosis -- aborning from the mighty brow of Stan's unbridled everflowing imagination?!
utterly fantastic -- so amazing... & incredible .... (that anyone would believe that).
Thanks guys. I'm not plugging anything except I demand your fawning worship for the awesomeness that is John Buscema's Vision as my avatar, ("It's that perty pitcher there all the way from heretofore yonder cuz."). • Dang it Darkman, the length of that sentence would make Doctor Doom blush ! • (Darkman PATENT PENDING coming soon to a comic store near you. Please visit your local comic mom & pop shop near you. Good night folks thanks for coming !
Can’t wait for part 2, good job guys 👍
I've already pre-order Hulk Grand Design, but I hope they can qualify for the She-Hulk/Hulk variant - It's beautiful.
I ordered the Redroom sequel as soon as you mentioned it, I hope you do another Kayfabe variant as it got snapped up from my store before I could grab one(I mail order as no comic store within hundreds of kms of me).
Shout out to Mark One comics New Zealand!
The problem that I have with Stan Lee is not the "writing" process or who created what, the problem is him being a company man, a scab who - at least - allowed abuse of the artists, profited from it until the day he died and, even when the zeitgeist around creators and copyright changed, never took a single step in the artists direction. He even went so far as agrandizing his own role and figure every time he could. Maybe it´s not important but to me is infuriating that people outside the comics world talk about what a genius Stan was and never even heard of Kirby.
I think that if Alan Moore or Grant Morrison did something like that they would be equally hated. Maybe less because you can actually defend their writing, but nevertheless.
I work in software and the same thing happens with Steve Jobs. Outsiders have him in a pedestal like he was a genius, but nobody who actually creates stuff would tell you that. They would probably talk about Wozniak. At least there are a couple of movies and documentaries that maybe changed the general public perception about that duo, we need one for Jack and Stan. They could make Jack Kirby The King of Comics the movie.
I think you're over-assuming here. Stan IS a company man, you can't argue that. He stayed when everyone else jumped ship, and what was he supposed to do? "Jack Kirby, the best artist I ever worked with, just went to the Distinguished Competition...go read his stuff with them."
No one's going to do that, and certainly after Perfect Film and Chemical bought Marvel, the company was not going to promote talent they were in competition with. Which is why you get the ORGINS books and the like credited to Stan. Stan absolutely didn't own Marvel, and he had a board and management to answer to.
Stan, repeatedly, got astounding work out of Kirby, Ditko, and everyone else, and while they were with Marvel. he also promoted them unceasingly...along with himself, to be sure. The "Mighty Marvel Bullpen" wasn't just Stan....it was everyone. Heck, the entire public persona, that we now take as a given, of "Jack 'King' Kirby" can be traced to Stan's promotion of him, along with the entire Marvel team.
That ended when they went elsewhere.
I DO think that Kirby got a raw deal over the years (I love Jack, he's the King and deserves every accolade and reward), but so much of this was simply how the industry worked at the time. Hence, his similar problems and experiences while at DC in the 70's. Doesn't make it right, but Jack simply had to be aware of the status quo.
However, I also think Stan, as the last man standing, is far too easy to make into a villain, and takes a whole lot of crap and blame that he doesn't entirely deserve. Like I said elsewhere in these comments, what happened is not simple, easy, or black and white.
Great video,guys! And now we go into the deep end of Marvel comics!
Another great episode. As an adjunct to this, I'd recommend the podcast "Business Movers - Stan Lee: The Mind Behind Marvel"
Don't think this changed my mind on who did what.
The Ship of Theseus thought experiment is also well presented in John Dies at the End.
It also appeared in WandaVision.
You should do court reporter sketches for these things.
Not sure if my memory is correct here, but I believe Bradley Cooper has optioned film rights to a Stan Lee biopic. I could def see this scene included
Wow! This is gold fellas. You went really deep
"and Aaron Sorkin film" XD that so RIGHT!
Almost wish you got someone to do Stan's voice.
Gotta get Scioli's take on this testimony. i think he will dispute a bunch of it
The ultimate Stan Lee interview: "EXCELSIOR!"
It is like saying who was the more important Beatle, Lennon or McCartney.
not at all comparable
@@thewkovacs316why not?
How about reading the 1966 court documents in which Jack Kirby sides with Marvel and against Joe Simon as to creators' rights of Captain America? Or how about reading the interview in which Jack Kirby tries to strip Steve Ditko of any creation of Spider-Man? Or do these facts go against the lame and tired Saint Kirby narrative?
Like I always say, this stuff is not black and white. Your points are correct, and we do have the quite indisputable notion that Stan stayed on working at Marvel while everyone else ran off to greener pastures, and reaped rewards for that.
I can sit here in 2022 and say that Jack should have absolutely gotten his art back, but that wasn't even a concept in 1961, for anyone - including Kirby. Just like how Jack would probably have laughed if somebody told him Iron Man was worth billions in 1963. Virtually all of these claims are in hindsight, and that's always 20/20. Doesn't mean that Disney shouldn't make a fair settlement (and it seems they did), but "Marvel Comics" could easily have been dead and forgotten by 1967. You don't see the Kirby family suing DC for The Boy Commandos, do ya?
Jack Kirby Created Spiderman based on Silver Spider script that was done by Jack Oleck during his partnership with Joe Simon, he pitched 6 pages and Stan Lee didn't like it and gave it to Ditko to redo it
Only by the style of the dialogue I can automatically figure Stan Lee saying those things, but also I noticed a little bit of acting, so is kind of magic the way it feels
Thanks for doing these!!
Wow here's the true Stan!
Stan Lee still a liar under oath.
Garfield would love mondays if he was a subscriber
Superb gentlemen!
Marching Orders are Marches Orders!!
Excellent episode!!!
Oooo this outta be gooood.
Color guides are great cheap pieces of comic art. Or were 10 years ago.could get them for 5 bucks on ebay.
This is just great.
This is awesome!
RN4L!!!
🔥🔥🔥
Stanley sure doesn’t remember much..
i had liked stan, but he is so full of himself, and lies a lot and tries to take credit for everyone elses work. he also changes things to try to make himself more important. guy was a bit of a narcissist.
You guys are awesome
inb4 the comment section blows up.