The move into horror came after the Comics Code adapted to shifting cultural norms after Lee pushed through the Amazing Spider-Man #96 issue that tackled drug use at the behest of the U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare. In 1972, Code regulators officially eliminated restrictions prohibiting horror comics, particularly ones featuring werewolves and vampires.
Cadence executives did not really understand the comic book division, so they had a difficult time comprehending the wildly fluctuating sales numbers or how to stop the decline. Historically, comic books garnered a high pass-through rate, which meant that for every comic purchased, about three to five additional people read it—three to five people who had no reason to buy a copy for themselves. These discouraging numbers forced Cadence officials to tighten down on editorial, including Lee and protégé Roy Thomas, who had become a kind of mini-Lee, both writing original content and editing the other titles in the lineup.
Thomas played an instrumental role in getting Marvel focused and pointed in new directions post-Lee’s editorship. For example, he convinced a skeptical Lee to take a shot on the sword-wielding Conan the Barbarian in late 1970, and the title became a hit.
In late 1972, Lee’s role took on an official strategic component when he became publisher of Marvel Comics. “I was deciding what books we would publish and what to concentrate on,” he explained. “I worked with the editor and oversaw most of what we did.”9 With Thomas as the new editor in chief, they began charting a different path for Marvel, but at a time when the softness in the marketplace became clearer. Thomas pushed the comic book division into new areas, less reliant on traditional superheroes, including Man-Thing, Ghost Rider, and Dracula. The entire 1970s seemed a topsy-turvy mix of innovative new characters trying to survive in a faltering market, while Lee mixed his publisher duties with promoting and marketing Marvel at a time when his personal celebrity skyrocketed but decreasing sales rocked Cadence corporate leaders.
Merchandising and licensing had been a kind of afterthought back when Goodman ran the company. That changed when Cadence took over and caused schisms between the corporate leadership and the comic book creators. Some critics of the new regime argued that Cadence simply wanted to turn Marvel into a marketing machine, ignoring superheroes and comic books unless they had licensing potential. In 1973 and 1974, the marketing work resulted in deals with numerous toy companies and publishers, as well as Columbia Records, Hostess, Mattel, and others.10 The merchandising deals grew in significance as circulation declined. No one expected 1971 to be a trendsetter, but Marvel did not reach that 7.4 million copies per month threshold again until 1987.
As editor, Lee had some distance from licensing, often as bemused as the next person when he saw a Spider-Man or Hulk tchotchke. In his publisher role, though, Lee became a conduit between Marvel and potential advertisers, particularly young salesmen who had grown up reading his comics. Lee’s celebrity status made him an attraction at trade shows and other venues where Cadence hobnobbed with corporate execs. Thus, Lee’s importance actually increased as circulation plummeted and the corporate bosses exerted pressure to squeeze revenues wherever they could find them. Even somewhat meager advertising and licensing money meant something when comic books were priced at twenty cents a copy.
Despite the softness in the marketplace, the exterior Lee, the public face of Marvel, remained as joyful and exuberant as ever. Legions of fans still flocked to see their leader as Lee barnstormed the nation spreading the gospel of comic books. In mid-1975, his fame grew when a reporter at the Chicago Tribune dubbed Lee “the creator of a modern mythology” and, more blatantly, “the Homer of pop culture” (a moniker given to Lee by Princeton students in 1966).11
Giving up the day-to-day editorial duties, he increased lecture time, averaging one a week and expanded his trips to include Europe, Canada, and Latin America.12 In the first two months of 1975, for example, Lee spoke at seven colleges, from Sir George Williams College in Montreal to Augustana College in Rock Island, Illinois. During that stretch, he also conducted numerous radio interviews, spoke to print journalists, appeared on a Canadian television show, and served as featured speaker at Creation Con in New York City.13 As Lee’s celebrity status swelled, his schedule soon had to be booked about a year in advance.
Demographics weren’t the only obstacle for Marvel. Attempting to fill Lee’s shoes as editor-in-chief turned into a nightmare position. Trying to learn on the job and in Lee’s shadow created too much pressure. Adding to the challenge, sales bottomed out and the Cadence management team increasingly meddled in the division. The friction proved too much for a series of editors that began with Thomas (who left Marvel in 1974, contending that he would rather write comics than worry about climbing corporate ladders and managing staffers) and ended with the promotion of Jim Shooter in 1978.
The revolving door of post-Lee editors shook up the creative staff and spooked freelancers. For example, when Archie Goodwin took over in 1976, he came to the role with a great deal of authority, since many people considered him one of the best writers in the business. Yet, Goodwin only lasted until late 1977; the strain of Cadence president Jim Galton’s cutbacks and penny-pinching simply took the joy out of the work for him.
While both Thomas and Goodwin bristled at the business and strategy aspects of Lee’s former role, both were instrumental in pulling the company out of the plummeting sales cycle. Before Thomas left, he met with a little-known filmmaker named George Lucas who had a science fiction movie coming out called Star Wars. Thomas first heard about the film and urged Lee to OK a comic book version. Lee was lukewarm about the film and turned down the request. Thomas, however, continued to pester his editor, telling him that Alec Guinness was one of the film’s stars. When Lee heard about the esteemed actor’s role, he relented.14
Once Thomas got Lee’s approval, they worked out a deal with Lucas that would be mutually beneficial. The director cut a sweetheart deal with Marvel because he wanted to use the illustrated comic book as a lead-in to the film.15
When Star Wars eventually took the world by storm, Marvel basked in the demand for anything related to the surprise blockbuster. Its six-issue adaptation, written by Thomas (even though Goodwin was then editor), sold more than a million copies per issue, the first comics to reach that peak since the 1940s, even taking into account the Batmania that swept the nation in the mid-1960s. When Star Wars became a monthly title, Goodwin took over the writing duties, gladly vacating the editor’s chair that he held so briefly.16 Some company insiders, particularly Jim Shooter, feel that the Star Wars adaptation saved Marvel from certain bankruptcy and maybe even folding.
Although Lee had relinquished his primary writing duties at Marvel, he never really stopped producing. He couldn’t help coming up with new ideas and getting them down on paper. He even carried tiny spiral notepads that fit in his front pocket to jot down thoughts and placed a tape recorder by his bed, in case inspiration struck in the middle of the night.
The publisher title meant that Lee had more control over the non–comic book publications, essentially the stragglers left over from Goodman’s pulp and girlie magazine empire. Whether it was his own feelings of inadequacy or the fear that the superhero craze would end, Lee poured a lot of effort into the magazine work. He always felt like people working on magazines were a step or two above comic book writers and gave them outsized appreciation.
Looking at the magazine landscape, it seems as if Lee had a particularly difficult time with the success and influence of Mad magazine. Perhaps he envied the ability of Mad ’s publisher, William Gaines, to get out of comics after the Wertham mess, or maybe it was that he knew and worked with so many of the writers and artists that gave Mad its unique voice, such as Al Jaffee, Wally Wood, and others. Lee attempted to duplicate the zany humor and satirical wit using basically the same staff that produced Marvel comics, creating his own version, Crazy, which debuted in October 1973. Although it seemed new, Crazy had been one of Goodman’s attempts to mimic Mad in the e
arly 1950s—a venture that failed.
Like Marvel comics, Crazy featured the “Stan Lee presents” banner. Marv Wolf-man, who wrote The Tomb of Dracula comic and later created African American vampire hunter Blade, edited the magazine. Thomas served as executive editor. Crazy featured a mix of black and white illustrations and photographs, the latter captioned with puns and satirical quips. Like Mad, the magazine took on popular culture topics, parodying films and fads, such as the James Bond thriller Live and Let Die, which they changed to Live and Let Spy, featuring Agent 07-11 and a series of scantily clad females. In addition to overseeing the magazine, Lee contributed, often adding puns to campy photos, such as a piece on the campus streaking craze that swept the nation during that era. A photo of two officers carrying a naked man by the shoulders and feet featured Lee’s typical humor: “Wait’ll they find out I’m the Dean!”17 The magazine lampooned everything, taking swipes at race relations, President Richard M. Nixon, and even Marvel, including a recurring feature on the challenges of Teen Hulk.
Growing up, Lee had loved newspaper comic strips, so once he got into comics, he developed ideas. Over the years, he created heartwarming strips such as Mrs. Lyon’s Cubs and Willy Lumpkin, but they never lasted long. In October 1976, Lee teamed up with freelance artist Frank Springer to create The Virtue of Vera Valiant, a campy comic strip for newspaper syndication that satirized the melodrama of television soap operas. The title character earned her moniker because of her role in an odd love triangle—head over heels for a man whose wife fell asleep on their honeymoon and never woke up.
After serving in the Army during World War II and getting an art school education, Springer began his comic book career, but did not start with Marvel until the mid-1960s. Soon, though, like many of Lee’s favored freelancers, the artist worked several different characters, honing each one’s style under Lee’s guidance. Eventually, Springer took over on Spider-Man, drawing the book from the mid-1970s into the 1980s. When he began working with Lee in the mid-1960s, Springer says that the writer had unwavering power, explaining, “At that time, Stan Lee was the guy you talked to about whether you did this book or not and how you did it and whether you did the next one.”18
Vera Valiant featured Lee’s madcap sass and dry wit. The strip opens on a macabre note, when Vera’s brother Herbert botches a suicide attempt. Vera learns that he is flunking out of correspondence school and is distraught. When she turns to Winthrop, the dashing CPA, for comfort, she exclaims, “What will become of Herbert . . . if he’s expelled from correspondence school?” Winthrop deadpans: “We won’t let that happen! The world needs podiatrists!” Later, when the accountant confronts the deadbeat sibling regarding all his sister has given, he explains, “She’s always dreamed of a podiatrist in the family!”19 In three panels per day and eight on Sundays, Lee and Springer presented a zany adventure featuring podiatry, space alien real estate agents, and a wife suffering from “sleeping disease” for fourteen years.
Much closer to his heart, in 1977 Lee debuted a Spider-Man comic strip for syndication. At the time, Spider-Man sold millions of comic books a year, giving Marvel and Lee a great deal of cachet with newspaper editors. Initially appearing in about one hundred newspapers nationwide, the Spider-Man strip—penned by Lee and drawn by John Romita—gave newspapers a shot at attracting a younger readership. By mid-1978, about four hundred newspapers had picked it up, which provided Lee with an entrée to a new demographic of adult readers.
Lee had some difficulty adjusting to the constraints of a daily cartoon strip. No matter how much background and subplot he hoped to put into the effort, he still had a limited number of panels per day. How could a writer used to filling page after page boil a plot down to three frames when, according to Lee, the first box had to recap, the next box moved the story ahead, and the third box left the reader with a cliffhanger?20 Steadily, he adapted to the minimalist style and grew to love the daily strip. The work gave him interaction with readers who wrote detailed letters about plot points, character motivations, and other topics. He explained, “At least I know someone’s out there—someone’s really reading the stuff!”21 For Lee, the excitement readers had for the strip led to a wealth of ideas, so many, in fact, that he had difficulty paring them down.
The popularity of the Spider-Man daily comic led the Tribune syndicate to launch a full frontal assault. The company asked DC to create one for the Justice League of America, dubbed The World’s Greatest Superheroes. Veteran Superman writer Martin Pasko initially authored the strip. George Tuska, who had previously been the writer/artist on the Buck Rogers strip over its last decade (1959–1967), as well as drawing Iron Man and The Hulk for Marvel, penciled the DC comic, and Julius Schwartz edited it. Initially the strip centered on the adventures of all the JLA heroes, including Wonder Woman, Batman, and the Flash, but eventually focused primarily on Superman. The competing cartoon strip also found its way into newspapers nationwide.22
Discussing his creative process for the web-crawler strip, Lee explained: “I first try to come up with a unique human interest angle, or a compelling sub-plot, some problem for Peter that seems virtually unsolvable. And one of the best ways to do that is to say ‘What If?’”23 What Lee liked to do was load his stories up with complicated plots and obstacles that created a momentum to push the story toward a conclusion. At one point, he admitted: “The formula for the Spidey strip should be to treat it almost like a soap opera.”24 Lee faced an inherent challenge—entice younger readers to daily comic strips while simultaneously keeping older readers interested.
Cadence executives had more experience in book publishing than comic books, so naturally they moved in that direction. Lee had always wanted to write a novel and had dabbled in self-publishing earlier in his career, so the idea of writing a series of Marvel books, which were really more like edited collections with brief new introductions and essays, appealed to his vanity and the ever-pressing time constraints.
Working with the venerable New York publishing firm Simon and Schuster, Marvel published a series called “Marvel Fireside Books” that were written or edited by Lee and comprised of short essays and reprints of many superhero and villain origin stories. Between 1974 and the end of 1979, some eleven Fireside Books were published, ranging from the launch of Origins of Marvel Comics (September 1974) to Marvel’s Greatest Superhero Battles (November 1978).
Readers delighted in the Fireside series because it gave them a relatively inexpensive and convenient method for digging into the birth of the Marvel Universe (Origins cost $11.95 in hardcover, while a book on Silver Surfer ran $7.95). Until that time, they had to rely on reprint issues or tracking down old copies. According to a Marvel internal document from May 1978, the series sold well, listing the following sales figures: Origins (one hundred sixty thousand sold), Son of Origins of Marvel Comics (one hundred thousand), Bring on the Bad Guys: Origins of Marvel Comics Villains (seventy thousand), and 1978’s How to Draw Comics the Marvel Way, coauthored with artist John Buscema (twenty thousand hardcover alone).25 Lee worked on these titles in the evenings, after he finished the Spider-Man and Vera Valiant newspaper work and his many other writing commitments.26
In 1977, Lee edited one of the titles in the Fireside series, The Superhero Women, a book of essays and reprints of comics featuring female heroines and villains, including Wasp, Red Sonja, and Medusa. The book addressed the issues regarding women in superhero comics, a mounting concern during the era. Lee explained that Marvel never had a policy about creating books for male versus female readers, instead crafting stories “savored by anyone who loves fantasy and adventure.”27 Yet, over the years, Lee had attempted to build readership for female superheroes and kept a close eye on subsequent sales figures. His interest seemed to go beyond circulation numbers to a genuine concern for attracting female readers.
Although not considered revolutionary when it came to writing and publishing books for female readers, Lee had great success writing Millie the Model and its many offsho
ots, as well as other titles aimed at girls and young women. When he and Kirby brought back superheroes to the Marvel line, he had made the Fantastic Four’s Susan Storm an interesting character with real power, not just a weak sidekick or stereotypical girlfriend figure. Still, female superheroes were not always progressive. Wasp, for example, spent most of her time in early Avengers comics gushing over the dreamy Thor and basically flirting with all the male stars, despite her seemingly serious relationship with Henry Pym.
In response to criticisms about the role of heroines, what Lee might explain is that the comic book industry was almost exclusively driven by sales figures in the 1960s and 1970s. Circulation numbers determined which titles were published and those that stuck around, particularly when Marvel’s primary competitor controlled its entire distribution cycle. Books that didn’t sell could not take up a valuable spot on the limited roster.
The Fireside books were one part of the Cadence strategy in the decade, but it also pursued another lineup of books designed to entice younger readers, such as The Mighty Marvel Superheroes Fun Book (1976) and Marvel Mazes to Drive You Mad (1978). These included a series of coloring books, activity pads, and even a Marvel cookbook, along with a number of calendars that booksellers could use to entice readers to buy more products. Marvel even constructed special sales racks designed specifically for its books and collections. The 1977 display featured a three-sided, color riser card designed by Lee. The launch of the Spider-Man and Hulk books was timed to the release of the live-action television series featuring the Marvel heroes.28
Lee’s writing schedule as publisher juggled the Fireside books along with the daily efforts centered on approving merchandise and advertising copy, as well as the comic books themselves. In addition, he wrote a “Publisher’s Perspective” column each month for Cadence’s Celebrity magazine and continued to author the Soapbox essays. As outside production companies worked on the live-action adaptations, Lee also had a hand in the process as “consulting editor or associate producer,” mainly to “read all those scripts and give opinions.”29
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