Marvel icon Stan Lee has passed away - what has he left behind? Photo / Getty Images
Marvel icon Stan Lee has passed away - what has he left behind? Photo / Getty Images
COMMENT:
With the passing of Marvel comic legend Stan Lee earlier this week, news sites and social media timelines have been flooded with admiration for the comic creator.
At a certain point, I was forced to admit an uncomfortable truth: Of course any loss of human life is inherently sad and I feel for those close to Stan Lee, but purely as a fan, I don't think there's any real need to grieve.
That's uncomfortable because if there's one thing we're all taught it's that you don't speak ill of the dead. You especially don't speak ill of a man who changed the face of his industry, revolutionised the film industry, and whose creations were multi-million dollar global phenomena. And you really don't do so right when everyone with an internet connection is praising him as an icon.
Yet Stan Lee leaves behind a complicated legacy - one that made him difficult to love in life.
There has always been debate over how much Lee actually created, and what he simply took credit for. There has also always been rumours of how poorly he treated his staff and collaborators.
Lee is famous for establishing "the Marvel method" of comic-book creation, in which he would simply give the artists an - often vague - idea, they would come up with all the staging, plotting and characters and hand it back over to Lee to add dialogue - apparently often using artists' notes to do so.
Legendary artist Wally Wood once said: "Did I say Stanley had no smarts? Well, he did come up with two sure fire ideas ... the first one was 'Why not let the artists write the stories as well as draw them?' And the second was ... 'Always sign your name on top - big'. And the rest is history."
Then there's the outstanding accusation of sexual assault against Lee; massage therapist Maria Carballo filed a lawsuit in April for sexual assault and battery, accusing Lee of inappropriate touching and misconduct during two sessions last year in Chicago. She claims he fondled himself in front of her and touched her with his genitalia.
However, Lee's lawyer responded: "He is a high-profile public figure and I think it's a shakedown. The guy is 95, I don't think he would do that."
While these controversies have tainted the way I view Lee over the years, we'll probably never know the truth about all of it and besides; that doesn't make his legacy any less notable.
Stan Lee was still the mastermind behind Marvel as we know it - a franchise, a cinematic universe, an institution - spearheading all the marketing and business know-how that took it from nerdy niche to global phenomenon.
Thanks to that legacy, everything I've always loved about Marvel will continue to live on without Stan Lee and therefore, without the controversy, and that's why I'm not so sad. As a fan, I can focus purely on what Stan Lee left behind, and what he built for the future.
I have been a Marvel fan for most of my life. I first encountered the universe via the X-Men cartoon series that aired when I was a kid in the 90s. I followed it through to X-Men Evolution and when I finally got an income of my own, I started buying and devouring whatever comic books I could get my hands on - not too many when you live in a small town on the east coast.
I fell in love with the characters, the themes and power of what it all stood for; this idea that the most ordinary person could be extraordinary, that our differences are what make us powerful, the embracing of the grey area between good and evil and the idea that even good people can do bad things - and vice versa.
I saw tall, muscular women with immense power (I'm ready for my Rogue and She-Hulk movies whenever you are, Marvel), melodramatic love lives and sassy attitudes who stood up for themselves, empowered each other and helped others.
I saw queer characters (I'm also ready for my America Chavez and Wiccan movies), dysfunctional families, people with mental illnesses, people of colour, kids, parents, people from all professions and walks of life, becoming heroes and it inspired me. It still does.
Many of these characters and stories sprang to life without Lee, and many more will continue to live on without him - thanks to him.
And really, if that's not one hell of a legacy, I don't know what is.
