Tag: Stan Lee

Review | Clover Press delivers a swingin’ look at Spider-Man’s newspaper adventures

Clover Press’s first collection of Spider-Man’s classic newspaper strip captures a fun, accessible chapter in the wall-crawler’s history.

Clover Press’s first volume of The Amazing Spider-Man: Classic Newspaper Comics is an engaging artifact of a pivotal period in the character’s history. Produced by the foundational Spidey team of writer Stan Lee and penciller John Romita, the strip debuted almost 50 years ago, on January 3, 1977. Volume one, which covers that calendar year, presents a series of arcs that certainly feel like Spider-Man, just with the format and rhythms of daily installments.

Of course, by the time this strip started, Lee and Romita had both moved on from the Amazing Spider-Man comic book. During 1977, writer Len Wein and penciller Ross Andru headed up ASM (issues #166-178), while penciller Sal Buscema and an assortment of writers were getting its companion title, Peter Parker, The Spectacular Spider-Man, off the ground (issues #4-16).

In hindsight, 1977 was part of a transitional period for the character. Following Gwen Stacy’s death four years earlier, Peter had started seeing Mary Jane Watson regularly, while Spidey faced off in ASM against C- and D-listers like Stegron, Will O’ The Wisp, Rocket Racer, the Molten Man, and a non-Osborn Green Goblin. Things were a little more original over in PPTSSM, which guest-starred the White Tiger and introduced Razorback. Maybe the biggest news was on CBS, where the first Amazing Spider-Man TV movie premiered on September 14.

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Exclusive | Clover Press reveals rewards for Amazing Spider-Man Newspaper Comics Kickstarter

Ahead of the campaign launch, Clover Press reveals two new collectibles accompanying its latest collections of the classic ‘Amazing Spider-Man’ newspaper strips from 1981-1984.

Clover Press is heading back to the newspaper pages of the 1980s again with another Kickstarter campaign collecting more of The Amazing Spider-Man newspaper comic strip.

Following the success of last year’s crowdfunding campaign collecting the strip’s earliest years, Clover Press is continuing its archival reprint program with four new softcover volumes collecting every Amazing Spider-Man newspaper strip published between 1981 and 1984.

“By the early 1980s, Spider-Man was firmly established on the newspaper page,” said Clover Press Publisher Hank Kanalz. “Following the success of our campaign to collect the first four years of The Amazing Spider-Man Newspaper Comic, we are thrilled to continue the line. The strips from 1981 to 1984 feature a more seasoned wall-crawler navigating longer, more intricate storylines that balance action, emotional drama and classic Peter Parker misfortune.”

Written by Stan Lee and drawn by Larry Lieber, Fred Kida and Floro Dery, these strips delivered a unique blend of superhero action, soap-opera drama and offbeat storylines. Peter Parker had encounters with killer robots, Doctor Doom’s flying saucer, the Spider Brigade and even the unforgettable Spidey Jeans craze.

Today, we can exclusively reveal two new campaign extras: the cover to an upcoming pocket book facsimile edition and a brand-new lithograph print available to backers.

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Stan Lee and John Romita’s ‘The Amazing Spider-Man’ newspaper strips return from Clover Press

The campaign is now live on Kickstarter.

Clover Press and The Library of American Comics are teaming up to bring The Amazing Spider-Man Classic Newspaper Comics back into print—this time in an affordable softcover format—and they’re turning to Kickstarter to make it happen.

“The Library of American Comics remastered and collected the strip in a series of hardcover collections—but so many of them are out of print, making the collection highly sought after and almost impossible for your average comics lover to get their hands on,” said Clover Publisher Hank Kanalz. ”Now, Clover Press and The Library of American Comics are bringing the collections back to print in an affordable softcover format! We’re collecting the strip strictly by year, reprinting each installment from Jan. 1 to Dec. 31. We can’t wait to help get these iconic comic strips into the hands of Spidey lovers everywhere!”

The campaign’s first offering will collect the strip from 1977–1980 across four softcover volumes, each measuring 11″ x 8.5″ in a horizontal format, housed in a protective slipcase designed for easy shelving. Backers can pick up all four volumes as a bundle, along with campaign-exclusive extras including a puzzle, stickers, lithographs and more. And today we have your first look at the sticker sheets:

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Jack Kirby’s family issues a statement about the Disney+ Stan Lee documentary

‘It’s not any big secret that there has always been controversy over the parts that were played in the creation and success of Marvel’s characters.’

A documentary about Marvel’s Stan Lee that debuted on Disney+ last week has, no surprise, proven controversial. The family of Jack Kirby, co-creator with Stan Lee of the Fantastic Four, Thor, the Hulk, the X-Men and more, has issued a statement in response to the film.

The heart of the controversy is one that has raged since Stan Lee and Jack Kirby first started working together to create the Marvel universe — while both Kirby and Lee played significant roles in Marvel’s success, their contributions and the extent of their involvement in the creation of these characters has always been a subject of debate. While the conflict between the two is brought up in the documentary, it’s not explored in any great detail.

“… most of the narrative is in his voice, literally and figuratively,” Neal Kirby said in his statement. “It’s not any big secret that there has always been controversy over the parts that were played in the creation and success of Marvel’s characters. Stan Lee had the fortunate circumstance to have access to the corporate megaphone and media, and he used these to create his own mythos as to the creation of the Marvel character pantheon. He made himself the voice of Marvel. So, for several decades he was the ‘only’ man standing, and blessed with a long life, the last man standing.”

According to Marvel, the documentary, which was directed by David Gelb, “weaves together personal recorded footage from Lee, along with recorded recollections of his career never before seen by the public. These are accompanied by archived interview clips, newsreels, and models that immerse viewers in Lee’s world, in addition to hearing from some of his closest friends and collaborators.”

Rolling Stone’s David Fear, in his review, called it a “lame infomercial” and that the documentary feels “like it’s just shy of being nothing but a shill.” Variety was a bit kinder in their assessment.

Jillian Kirby, Jack Kirby’s granddaughter, shared the statement from her father on Twitter:

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Artists redraw early FF issues for comic’s 60th anniversary

Marvel’s ‘Fantastic Four Anniversary Tribute’ #1 will feature artists like Michael Allred and John Romita Jr. redrawing pages of ‘Fantastic Four’ #1 and ‘Fantastic Four Annual’ #3.

Like they did recently with Giant-Size X-Men and Captain America, Marvel is enlisting an impressive list of artists to redraw two key issues of Fantastic Four in celebration of the comic’s 60th birthday.

John Romita Jr., Walt Simonson, Sanford Greene, Daniel Warren Johnson, Paco Medina, Adam Hughes and Michael Allred are just a few of the artists who will each redraw a page of Fantastic Four #1 and Fantastic Four Annual #3, the wedding of Reed Richards and Sue Storm. Both comics were originally created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby.

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What Are You Reading? | ‘Fist of the North Star,’ ‘Atlantis Wasn’t Built for Tourists’ and more

See what the Smash Pages crew has been reading lately.

Welcome to What Are You Reading?, our weekly look at what the Smash Pages crew has been checking off their “to read” list lately — from older stuff like Usagi Yojimbo and Fist of the North Star to newer stuff like Atlantis Wasn’t Built for Tourists and even a balloonless book about Stan Lee you may have heard about.

Let us know what you read this week in the comments or on social media.

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Smash Pages Q&A: Abraham Riesman on ‘True Believer: The Rise and Fall of Stan Lee’

The author and journalist discusses his new book on the life and career of longtime Marvel editor and publisher Stan Lee.

True Believer: The Rise and Fall of Stan Lee is, I would argue, the best book written about the longtime Marvel editor and publisher Stan Lee. It is a thoroughly researched look at Lee’s life, his family history, his business dealings at Marvel and afterwards.

Lee’s defenders have been attacking or dismissing the book since before its publication, because it dents the myth of Stan Lee that he and others built. Unfortunately much of the conversation around the book has been around whether Lee is given too little credit for Marvel’s success in the 1960s instead of seriously addressing a lot of the issues that author Abraham Riesman uncovers and writes about at length.

Abraham Riesman is a journalist best known for his work at New York Magazine’s Vulture. He’s written extensively about the comics industry over the years, but in this book, Riesman writes a story of assimilation, of the fantasy of success and the brutality reality of it, of corporate criminality. Lee was beloved by many; he is a complicated figure at best.

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Comics Lowdown | S. Clay Wilson passes away

Plus: ‘Brzrkr’ orders, ‘Immortal Hulk’ #43, Stan Lee, John Porcellino and more!

Underground cartoonist S. Clay Wilson, creator of the Checkered Demon, Captain Pissgums and his Pervert Pirates, and numerous other transgressive characters, all of whom he wedged into his signature hyper-detailed panels, has died at the age of 79. Wilson grew up in Nebraska and eventually moved to San Francisco, where he was a contributor to Zap Comics and an integral part of the underground comix scene. He suffered a traumatic brain injury in 2008 and the condition worsened in 2010.

Brian Cronin sums up his life and career at CBR, but if you really want to get your heart broken, read this 2010 interview with Wilson’s sister about his early work and how the brain injury affected him. And for a fuller appreciation of his art and thought, here’s a Comics Journal interview that was done shortly before his injury.

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Comics Lowdown is back!

Your roundup of essential comics news is back, with an Angoulême update, cussin’ Stan Lee and more!

Big publishing news: Bertelsmann, the parent company of Penguin Random House, announced the day before Thanksgiving that it will buy Simon & Schuster. This will affect graphic novels and manga in a big way, because PRH and S&S distribute a LOT of graphic novels and manga.

In a series of Tweets, Ed Chavez sketches out what the manga landscape will look like, and why it matters. ICv2 lists all their comics/distribution clients; keep in mind that this is in addition to the graphic novels the companies themselves publish under a variety of imprints: Random House has RH Graphics and Pantheon (which publishes the works of Chris Ware and other literary graphic novels), and S&S has Gallery 13 and, just announced, two new lines of graphic novels for young readers.

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Smash Pages Q&A: Danny Fingeroth

The writer and editor discusses his unauthorized biography of ‘the most famous person in comics.’

Danny Fingeroth has been working in comics for decades. A longtime editor at Marvel, Byron Preiss and Visionary Media, Fingeroth wrote comics like Darkhawk, Dazzler, Venom: Deathtrap – The Vault and Deadly Foes of Spider-Man, and wrote nonfiction books including Superman on the Couch and Disguised as Clark Kent. He’s also known to a lot of convention goers as one of the people who runs a lot of panels — interviewing and celebrating the creators who helped to invent comics at dozens of labels across the country. At the end of 2019 he came out with his biggest book to date, A Marvelous Life: The Amazing Story of Stan Lee. 

The biography of the late Stan Lee is unauthorized but affectionate, and tries to capture the man that Fingeroth got to know later in his life with the young man who has been written about at length. After reading the book, I asked Fingeroth a few questions about the project and how it fits in with his other work, including serving as chair of Will Eisner Week.

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Hot Toys’ out-of-this-world Stan Lee action figure

Watchers not included.

Hot Toys is paying tribute to the late Stan Lee with an action figure that captures one of his most memorable cameos in a Marvel film.

“Marvel legend Stan Lee, makes a cameo in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol.2 just as he’s done in every Marvel Cinematic Universe movie,” Hot Toys posted to Facebook. “In his scene, which takes place on a planetoid called Xander, Stan Lee is surrounded by members of the Watchers, the ancient race who observe everything happening in the universe and who occasionally meddle in it despite a strict non-interference policy.”

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Comics Lowdown: Stan Lee’s former manager’s legal troubles grow

Plus: Stolen comics, cease and desist letters, Ted Talks, Jesus and more.

Legal woes for Stan Lee’s former caretaker and manager, Keya Morgan, continue to grow. He has been arrested and appeared in court in Arizona to face the charge of being a fugitive of justice. And he is also being sued by Joan Celia Lee, Stan Lee’s daughter.

In May, Morgan was charged with felony counts of false imprisonment of an elder adult, theft, embezzlement, and forgery or fraud against an elder adult, according to the Los Angeles Superior Court. The LAPD has revealed some of the details on why they brought charges against him.

“Morgan removed Lee from his Hollywood Hills residence to a secured Beverly Hills condominium during the late night hours of June 8, 2018,” the Los Angeles Police Department said in a statement. “Morgan was using this tactic to further deceive Lee into believing he was in danger and needed to be moved from his home to a more secured condominium where Morgan had more control over Lee.”

The LAPD will eventually extradite Morgan to L.A. to face the charges.

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