Every week Comic Culture hosts Chris Owen and Walter Durajlija talk the comic book talk.
So kick back, relax and enjoy this week’s Comic Culture.
Oh, and please make sure you go out and support your local comic book shop.
Comic Culture is written by Walter Durajlija and engineered by Chris Owen.
Enjoy Comic Culture’s November 14th, 2018 Edition:
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I say boys… What a beautiful tribute.
This show about Stan was ok too. I’m just getting caught up 😉
We can get through this, guys x We can celebrate Stan’s life forever…
What a man, What a life.
Excelsior!
I say Danny old boy ! it is truly great to hear from you. Hard to explain but Chris and I get this warm and fuzzy feeling just knowing you are over there, doing well and we hope enjoying the show. Cheers mate!
Great episode.
Hi Walt and Chris. In regards to Stan being so prolific , its easy to be so, when you write a story in “the Marvel method way”
John Rozum.com describes better then I could.
What Lee did instead was to give his artists a very bare bones outline of the plot for each story, often times just the beginning, middle and end. The artists would then figure out the rest, draw the story including subplots with supporting characters and hand the pages of art back to Stan Lee with notes as to what was happening and sometimes suggested dialogue. Lee would then, using the art as a guide, create the dialogue and narrative captions for each panel of the entire story.
For example; for a 22 page issue of Spider-Man Lee could tell his artist over the phone (as he often did) or jot down on a single sheet of paper — Aunt May is sick and the bills are stacking up. Peter is worried about her and feeling frustrated and guilty. His camera was smashed by the Rhino in the previous issue and without it he has no means to continue working as a freelance photographer to get Aunt May the Medicine he needs and to help her with the bills. Without a job, he can’t even earn money to buy a new camera. As Spider-Man, he is determined to catch the Rhino, whom he blames for his unfortunate circumstances, stop his crime wave and bring him to jail.
What this really meant is that the artists ended up doing the bulk of the work while Lee got virtually all of the credit as writer. There is no doubt that this method can work as the Marvel comics that Lee collaborated on with Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko from that era remain some of the finest comic books ever produced.
I think what John describes is accurate. I understand from reading interviews of Kirby and the rare interviews of Ditko, that the writing often was a phone conversation, or as simple as…Lets have the FF meet the Frightful Four again. Stan would dialogue and edit a finished product. I think Stan was co-creator at best in all his projects.
Read Stans “Origins of Marvel Comics” Walt and Chris and it supports this.
respectfully
Dave