All language subtitles for With great power The Stan Lee story

Multiplexado por: Arya y Aristóteles Arenas
aris.arenas@gmail.com +591 78713043
Potosí - Bolivia

[epic tones]

- [Announcer] The 2008 National
Medal of Arts to Stan Lee,

for his groundbreaking
work as one of America's

most prolific storytellers,

recreating the
American comic book.

His complex plots and
humane superheroes

celebrate courage,
honesty, and the importance

of helping the less-fortunate,

reflecting America's
inherent goodness.

[applause]

[heroic music]

- Stan Lee is a
giant and a giant

like Walt Disney is a giant.

- Lee created
Spider-Man, and the Hulk,

and Fantastic Four,
X-Men, and Iron Man.

- These characters
are larger than life.

- Stan Lee is a pioneer
in the truest sense.

- Without him, there are
no comic books stories,

no Marvel stories
really being told.

- He really put himself
into the comics.

- He hooks into old,
tried and true themes,

but he's done it in a way

that I don't think
anyone else has.

- Stan was really the
first comic book writer

to make the human
being behind the mask

more important than
the mask itself.

- The most famous name in
American comic book history.

- Stan Lee.
- Stan Lee.

- Stan Lee.
- Stan Lee.

- Stan is very hot.

- He's 86?

I look older than he does.

- The man who kinda
changed the face of comics.

- That's Stan Lee.

That's, you know.

I'm like, oh my god.

- It influenced the lives of
like millions and millions.

- He's really become
a major icon himself.

- When I met him on the
set, I saw everybody

crowding around him, it was
like Mick Jagger was there.

[cheering and whistling]

- I've been here for three
days straight for Stan Lee.

[cheering and whistling]

- I just relate to so much

of what Stan Lee writes
in his characters.

[cheering and applause]

- Peter Parker
reminds me of myself.

- I learned to read because
of Spider-Man comics.

- Stan Lee.

[whooping and cheering]

- We love you, Stan.

[orchestral music]

[cheering and applause]

- Stan Lee.

- [Stan] Uh-oh.

- I'm your greatest fan ever.

[cheering and applause]

[epic heroic music]

- Creating comics was never
part of my childhood dream.

I never thought of that at all.

Believe it or not, I
wanted to be an actor.

I'd go to the movies
and I'd think,

gee, I wish I were up
there on the screen.

That must be the most
fun you could have.

I remember my really first
hero was Errol Flynn.

[dramatic music]

[swords clanging]

- Did I upset your plan?

- [Stan] Well, my upbringing
was in the Depression days.

- We lived in the Bronx
on University Avenue.

- That old apartment that we
lived in, wow I hated that.

My mother and father slept
in a couch in the living room

that opened up into a double bed

and I slept in a little
bedroom in a bed.

I still remember
how important it was

to have enough money
for a loaf of bread

or a bottle of milk.

One biggest worry my
mother and father had

that I used to hear them
repeating all the time,

is what will we do if we can't
scrape enough money together

for the rent this month.

And that went on and on.

My father was too worried
about just getting a job.

The poor guy was out of
work most of the time,

which is why I was working
even when I was in school,

I always had part-time jobs.

When I was 16 I worked

at the world's second-largest
trouser manufacturing company,

then I got a job as an usher

in New York at the Rivoli
Theater in Times Square.

I got into comics by
accident when I heard

there was a job open
at Magazine Management,

they wanted me to work
in the comic department.

Some department, it was
two people, Joe and Jack.

And they were the two who were
really running Timely Comics

when I came there to work.

Jack was the artist and he
did some of the writing, also.

Joe was the writer, mainly,
but he was also the editor.

So he was the one I
had most to do with.

He'd send me down for sandwiches

or ask me to fill an inkwell.

I mean, I did a lot of real
journalistic things with them.

- I remember the first
day he came here,

he came to the office,
he had a little flute

and he'd sit in a corner
and play his flute

and drive Jack Kirby crazy.

[laughing]

I never thought when he came
to the office he would make it.

- There was a time when they
needed a two page filler.

- Each comic book had to
have two pages of prose

to be accepted for second-class
mailing privileges.

And that was our contention.

Nobody ever read that stuff.

So I started Stan on
writing these two pages.

- And I thought, wow,
my first assignment.

So I wrote one called, I think,

Captain America: The
Traitor's Revenge.

- Stan treated the thing
with great respect.

He was now a
professional writer.

- My name at the time was
Stanley Martin Lieber.

I took my first name,
Stanley, and cut it in half.

I didn't wanna use the
name Stanley Martin Lieber,

'cause I was saving that
for the great American novel

which I never wrote.

- After about 10 issues
of Captain America,

less than a year, Joe Simon
and Jack Kirby suddenly left

the entire company
and all of a sudden

we didn't have an editor.

Captain America was
left in the lurch

without its main
writer and artist.

- I looked around to
see who'd replace them,

and I realized there was nobody.

I was the only guy there.

So the publisher,
Martin Goodman,

he said, "Do you think
you can hold down the job

"of editor and art
director and head writer

"until I get a real person?"

I was about, I don't know, 18.

I said, "Sure, I can do it."

- It's more that he was there.

He was writing.

He was even a relative.

But the main thing was he
also would've recognized

that Stan was a bright
kid, he's working cheap.

You know, so why not
put him in charge?

- I wrote a lot of the
Captain America stories,

but then, eventually, a
lot of other writers did,

'cause there wasn't time
for me to write everything.

[heroic music]

[planes roaring]

[bombs whistling]

- America went to war
and the superheroes

went to war along with them.

What could be more of an
ultimate super-villain

than the Nazis?

- Simon and Kirby
were the first two

to really play Hitler up as
the world's worst villain.

If you'd look at
almost any issue

of a Marvel comic, which was
then a Timely comic, I guess,

you'd see Sub-Mariner,
or the Human Torch,

or Captain America
battling some really ugly,

gruesome, fiendish-looking
Nazi or Japanese villain.

- Comic books were selling.

We were living our mythology.

We were living our folklore
and we were winning the war

through our superheroes and
our real heroes overseas.

[patriotic music]

- And, I guess, I
myself got so caught up

in all of that, that
the next thing I knew,

I had enlisted in the Army.

[military music]

I felt our nation
was really in danger,

and I couldn't have
lived with myself

if I were a civilian
while other people

were over there fighting.

In the Army, I was
classified as a playwright.

They sent me to different camps

where I wrote training films.

- He even drew a
pamphlet about how not

to get a venereal disease,
which he's very good at.

- [Stan] There were only
nine men in the Army

who were classified
as playwrights,

and I was in great company.

There was William Saroyan,
Carl Laemmle Junior,

Frank Capra, and a guy
named Theodor Geisel,

whom you may know as Dr. Seuss.

- He was evidently so
good, he could always

finish his work so fast,
that then he'd be able

to sit around and goldbrick
for awhile, I guess, you know.

[cheering and applause]

- After the war ended, we
could all get back to normal.

Everybody thought that was
the last war we'd ever have,

now there'd be
peace in the world.

[whistling]

Hello, how are ya?

Good to see ya.

- Did you have a good day?

- Yeah, how are ya?

You look great, but
you always look great.

- What would you like?

- I'd like to put my
bag down for a minute,

I'll be right back.

I don't know how we
ever got married.

- That's the difference
between you and me.

- [Maid] How many years?

- Oh, do you know
how many years?

- 60.

- I'll tell you, 60 years.

- 60 years this year.

- On the 5th of this month.

- And I still don't
think I've got it right.

- Well I may as well tell
you the whole truth, really,

and nothing but the truth.

I crossed over on the old
Mauretania from England

during the last of
the lovely wars,

and I came over as a war bride.

And I became a hat model.

And Stan said to one
of the salesmen there,

"That's the girl
I'm going to marry."

And he said, "Not a chance,
she's married already."

And he said, "No, that's the
girl I'm going to marry."

And six weeks later I was
in Reno, spending his money.

- I can't dance.

- Come on, get up.

- I'm no good.

No, I won't do it, I will not...

People who think I'm
wonderful, I will not...

No, no, please
don't do this to me.

Just go ahead, you're real good.

Should've seen her 60 years ago.

Okay, this is what she hates.

You don't do that.

You don't that in this dance.

- This is how you messed up.

There you go.

♪ Young and gay and
sweet and dancing

- Everything is mutual.

I love her and she
loves me loving her.

- And he loves him, and
I love him loving him.

And that's it.

There we go.

You know how lucky
we are to be able

to move like this at our age?

Sweet Jesus.

- After World War
II, I got married.

My wife and I, we
lived in Long Island.

- We lived in a wonderful,
crazy apartment he had.

96th and Madison.

We had this little penthouse.

We had a lot of
wonderful, crazy friends.

And Stan was with
Timely Comics then.

And he was on Empire
State Building.

I remember how marvelous
it was to go up

in that elevator and
there would be Stan

with these young men,
sketching and doing,

and laughing and talking.

- [Stan] Ladies and gentlemen,
allow me to welcome you

to the home of Marvel
Comics, the Bullpen.

- [Interviewer] Stan, I always
wanted to visit the Bullpen.

What is the Bullpen like?

[chuckling]

- [Stan] Well, there
are very few bulls.

- There was an extensive bullpen

Coming and going in that bullpen

was some of the
giants in the industry

and Stan had them
at his disposal.

- We turn out about one
complete comic magazine

every working day.

When I would describe the
kind of drawings I want,

if somebody was recoiling
in horror at some scene

and the artist would
draw like that,

I'd say, that's okay, but
how about [shrieking]?

How about like that?

- He would jump on the couch.

He would leap across.

He would do Aunt May's voice.

- He would jump up on the desk,

practically, to act out how
he wanted to heroes to do

and that was a major feat
to get up on that desk

with all that junk on it.

- He was a believer in
the silent film approach

to storytelling, don't
do anything mildly.

If somebody is gonna
pound on a desk,

you know, you don't go.

No, you go.

You smash.

That's the way he used to do it.

So he would animate
everything he wanted to do.

He would say, "Have
Doctor Doom do this,"

and he would jump
in front of you

and he would leap and
he'd leap over the couch.

There are stories that
before I was doing

sessions with Stan, that
people down the hall,

they would see Stan doing
these gyrations in his doorway.

One time, he was doing
the old comic stick,

where somebody's strangling you.

He was strangling himself
and pulls himself back in,

and everybody comes
running down there.

They thought somebody was
attacking Stan in his office.

But he was very animated.

- You know, it's a funny thing,

some people somewhere think
that I wrote and drew.

They think that the
strips were just mine,

but they would've been nothing

if not for the artists
that I worked with.

I just put the words
in the people's mouth.

And I may have come up
with the original idea,

but after that, it
was a partnership.

- Stan allowed the
artist to be themselves,

and that, I think, was the key.

- If you take a look at
credits on comic books

back in the 1950's, good luck.

There were rarely any credits.

You didn't know
who the writer was.

You didn't know
who the artist was.

Stan made sure that
everybody got a credit,

and he started building
personality around these people.

- I'm suddenly Jazzy John.

- Gentleman Gene Colan.

- Joltin' Joe.

- Darlin' Dick Ayers.

- Rascally Roy Thomas.

- Jack Kirby became
Jolly Jack Kirby.

- Now you're part of the
bullpen, you were somebody now.

- I wanted our readers to
feel they're part of a group,

an inner circle, and we're
all having a lot of fun

that the rest of the
world doesn't know about.

So I wanted to form a club.

I gave it a silly
name, the M.M.M.S.,

the Merry Marvel
Marching Society.

♪ You belong, you belong,
you belong, you belong

♪ To the Merry Marvel
Marching Society

- [Stan] Hey out there in
Marvel land, face front

This is Stan Lee speaking.

You've probably never heard
a record like this before,

because no one would
be nutty enough

to make one with a bunch
of offbeat artists.

So anything is liable to happen.

- [Jack] Hey, who made
you a disk jockey, Lee?

- [Stan] Well, Jolly Jack Kirby,

say a few words to
the fans, Jackson.

- [Jack] Okay, a few words.

- [Stan] Look, pal, I'll take
care of the humor around here.

- [Jack] You, you've
been using the same gags

over and over for years.

- [Stan] Hey, what's all that
commotion out there, Saul?

- [Steve] Why, it's
Shy Steve Ditko.

He heard you're making a
record and he's got mic fright.

Whoops, there he goes.

- [Stan] Out the window again?

You know, I'm beginning
to think he is Spider-Man.

- [Steve] You mean he isn't?

- [Stan] 'Nuff said.

Now, let's all get back
to work in the bullpen.

And as for you, Marvelous
Merry Marchers, welcome.

- [Bullpen] Wahoo!

[jazzy music]

- In the gay,
halcyon early days,

Jack Kirby developed most of
the Marvel heroes with me.

Jack drew like a movie director.

He couldn't draw anything dull.

- In a very short span of
about five or six years,

Stan Lee and Jack Kirby created
more successful characters

than any person or
two people together

have ever created in
the history of comics.

- I always marveled at the
fact that Jack was able

to design so many
varied characters,

and yet make each one totally
different than the other.

Jack would just put his
pencil down and start drawing.

He drew with such
certainty, he knew

just where every
line was gonna go.

There was no hesitation,
and it worked out perfectly.

It was incredible.

- I'd feel that story first.

I know those people, first.

When I put them down,
they've already lived,

and I put them down as I'd like
them to live on those pages.

- I had worked
with Jack so much,

we did those monster stories,

we did westerns, we did
war, we did everything.

[explosions and gunfire]

I would give 'em the plot.

I told them what I
wanted the story to be.

- I used to hear them
plotting stories,

but I don't remember them
ever agreeing on anything.

Jack had his own idea.

He went home and
did his version.

And Stan, when he got the pages,

said, "Gee, Jack didn't remember
anything we talked about."

Jack did one version, Stan
made it something else,

and that's why
there's a disagreement

between Jack Kirby and Stan
Lee as to whose story it was.

- [Stan] We used to
have disagreements.

I never thought
it got him angry.

I love fighting with people.

Maybe it bothered him when I
always said, "You're wrong."

I don't know.

- A lot of reporters
always thought,

oh, Stan created everything.

They'd come into Stan's office
and Stan would sit there

and he's so charming
and wonderful, you

- Somebody wanted
to interview me

for the Herald Tribune
Magazine section.

And I said, "But look, if
you're gonna interview me,

"I really think you should
interview Jack Kirby

"at the same time, 'cause
he works on it with me."

He came up to the office
and he interviewed us.

Jack told me that he was gonna
stay up late Saturday night

with his wife and
they were gonna go

to the newsstand so
they'd get it right away.

The first five columns
were all about me

and how wonderful I was.

In the sixth column, he
started talking about Jack

in a very unflattering way.

I got a call from
Roz, Jack's wife,

and I hadn't seen the article.

I thought she was calling
me to say how great it was,

how excited they were,
and she was in tears.

She said, "How could
this have happened?"

It was the most
horrible thing, really.

Jack quit, and I really suspect

it might have been
as simple as the fact

that he got tired of
having the credits read

by Stan Lee and Jack
Kirby all the time.

And he may have wanted
to strike out on his own.

As far as I'm concerned,
there's no controversy.

He was the greatest
partner a guy could have.

Eventually, Jack
contacted me and he wanted

to come back again,
which made me happy.

[jazz music]

- Do you think that
there is any danger

in taking young people
and showing them figures

and fantastic apparitions
like some of your superheroes,

Captain America,
Hulk, and so forth.

- Oh no, no more danger
than reading fairy tales

or poetry or the Bible.

- It is my opinion without
any reasonable doubt

and without any reservations,
that comic books

are an important
contributing factor

in many cases of
juvenile delinquency.

- [Stan] Dr. Wertham was the
leading opponent of comics

and the most vocal one.

At the time when he was
having his big harangue

against comics, people were
very concerned about violence

and about sex and
about I guess anything

that Dr. Wertham
wanted to mention.

- He interviewed a hundred
juvenile delinquents,

they all said that at one time

or another they
read comic books.

Therefore, Dr.
Wertham concluded,

comic books cause
juvenile delinquency.

- [Paul] When I was a boy
and played with a gang,

we did a lot of things,
we roasted potatoes

and went on expeditions,
we tipped over

garbage cans now and then,
we wrote nasty remarks

about the teacher
on the sidewalk,

but we never spent an afternoon

sitting around
like this, reading.

They're reading stories
devoted to adultery,

to sexual perversion, to horror,

to the most
despicable of crimes.

- Senators were merciless.

They would say, "You're
in it for the money."

Of course you're in
it for the money.

We're not, you know.

And is it worth the
money if you're gonna

distort youngsters'
aspect of life?

- One of my favorite accusations
that Dr. Wertham made

was that comic
books cause asthma,

because children were
staying indoors to read them

instead of playing
in the fresh air.

- [Stan] The fact that
he was a psychiatrist,

this impressed parents
and they began to think,

golly, what's going
on in these comics?

- Dr. Wertham suddenly gave
parents an easy answer,

don't think you're a bad parent

it's those damn comic books
that are ruining your children,

and people seized on
that and jumped on it.

- See, Americans were
embarrassed about comics.

- Stan and I never used to
say we worked on comics.

I said I was an illustrator,
Stan said he was a writer.

Never mentioned comics.

- Occasionally, some people who
we weren't too familiar with

would come over to me and
say, "And what do you do?"

Oh man, I didn't wanna
admit what I did,

so I'd say something
like, "Oh, I'm a writer,"

and I'd start to walk
away, but he'd follow me.

"What do you write?"

I'd say, "Um, stories
for children."

I'd walk away again,
he'd follow me.

"What kind of stories?"

At some point I had
to say comic books.

At that point he would
turn around and walk away.

The publishers got together
and hired a psychiatrist

or somebody, I think her name
was Trulock, Mrs. Trulock,

to head up an
organization called

the Comic Magazine
Association of America,

and they would be a
self-censorship group.

And they would make sure there
was nothing objectionable

for kids, not too sexy,
not too violent, et cetera.

- You couldn't sell a book
unless it had their seal on it,

approved by the Comics Code.

- The imposition of the Comics
Code created a blandness.

It stifled creativity.

And the extremes that
were built into the code,

if you look at them today,
are almost laughable.

[jazz music]

- No topics shall explicitly
present the unique details

and methods of a crime.

Scenes of excessive violence
shall be prohibited.

Subjective and salacious
illustrations is unacceptable.

- It was an incredibly
frustrating time also.

I would meet somebody somewhere,

hey, you're the guy who
writes Millie the Model.

Gee, I read that, that's great.

Never heard that.

The sales got very bad and
our publisher, Martin Goodman,

had to drop a lot
of comic books.

- It took about two years
when we got to the point

where that's when
we went belly-up.

- And Martin said, "Stan,
I'm going to Miami,

"I'd like you to tell the staff
that we have to let 'em go."

That was always the
thing I had to do,

and that was like one of the
worst moments of my life,

because these
weren't just artists

and writers who worked for me,

these were people who were
like my closest friends.

I knew their wives,
I knew their kids,

I knew all about
them, and I had to,

I'm sorry we won't
have any work for you

for oh, I don't know,
maybe a year or two.

Oh god, it was the worst.

- I didn't get any work.

There was no place I
could get any work.

So, I got a job as a security
guard for General Foods.

- I thought for sure,
in '54, that I would

never be working
in comics again.

- We moved up to
260 Park Avenue.

Stan, he had one little room,
and he was all by himself.

He had no secretary
and no bullpen,

no one to do any corrections.

- [Roy] Stan was virtually
the only employee

in the comics, you know.

- Doing comics was like,
you were on the bottom rung

of the creative totem
pole, so to speak.

Here I am, a grown
man, I was in my 30's,

and I'm doing juvenile things.

Most of my neighbors,
they were stock brokers,

they were bankers,
they were businessmen,

they were doctors,
they were lawyers.

They didn't take me seriously.

What kind of
reference was the fact

that you had been
writing comics?

So I kept staying there,
'cause I had a wife and a baby,

a child, but I didn't
know where else to go.

But finally, I was ready to
quit by about 1960 or '61.

I had been doing it for 20
years and I said to my wife,

"Look, I'm sure there's
something I can do.

"I'll try to write a
novel or something."

And she said, "Stan,
if you wanna quit,

"why don't you first
do one comic book

"the way you'd like to do it
for a slightly older audience.

"Write it the way you
feel like writing it.

"Get it out of your system.

"The worst that can
happen is you'll be fired,

"but you wanna quit anyway."

When Joan finally said,
"Why don't you do one book

"the way you'd like to do it,"

it was like a light bulb
exploded over my head.

I felt, well at last, at least
I'll get it out of my system,

and then I'll quit or be fired.

Martin said to me, "Why
don't you do a book

"with a bunch of heroes?"

So I figured, okay, I'll
get a group of heroes,

but this time, I wanted
to do them my way,

and I wanted to write things
to appeal to older people too.

If I had a superpower,
there's no way

I would wear a mask and not
want people to know who I was.

I'd want everybody
to know, look at me,

I can do things you can't do.

I'm better than you are

and here's my name if
you don't believe it.

[cheering]

It was right there
in that moment,

with Fantastic Four number one,

that the Marvel age
of comics started

and that what Stan Lee
has become started.

- 1961, now there's
a notable year.

John Kennedy became president.

Alan Shepard became the
first American in space.

The bikini became fashionable.

And Marvel Comics
made its debut.

- Just all these
comics that were

unlike anything that
I'd seen before.

The pages rippled with energy.

[glass shattering]

- Comic book superheroes,
up until 1961,

were cardboard characters.

They didn't really
have a sense of humor.

There was no texture to it.

There were no subplots.

- We try to write
stories we would enjoy,

and apparently there are
enough people in the world

who have the same tastes.

I hate to say that,

I'd like to think my
taste is far better,

but apparently
everybody must have

pretty much the same taste

because the books
sell pretty well.

- All of a sudden, Stan's
superheroes were dealing

with angst,
self-torment, anguish.

- This was really the first time

that an added dimension
of personality

had been brought in
to the superhero.

Stan was able to
tap into something

where you became
interested in the character

as opposed to the costume.

- Wait a minute, they're
fighting with each other.

They don't particularly
like each other.

They don't like their powers.

They think it's like a curse,

and not something
good that happened.

- One character,
the Thing, who's one

of the most popular
ones, the first time

he wore a superhero
outfit in the street,

he reacted in a way
I've always felt

a character in a
book should react,

instead of taking
it for granted,

he said, "I feel like a
nut in an outfit like this.

"People are looking at me."

And we've had stories
where they were evicted

from their headquarters
because they had lost a lot

of money in the stock market

and they couldn't
pay their rent.

Things that had never happened
to superheroes before.

See another thing, I
didn't see any reason

for our superheroes, such
as the Fantastic Four,

to live in cities like
Metropolis or Gotham City.

I figured, hell, why can't they
live in New York, you know?

I knew New York, so
I made it New York.

I could write comfortably
about New York.

And when they went
to the movies,

why do they go to
the Beeshoe Theater?

Why don't they go to the
Radio City Music Hall?

And when the Human Torch,
who was a teenager,

Johnny Storm, when he
wanted a sports car,

he wouldn't buy a Whizbang V8,
I got him a Chevy Corvette.

So again, I tried to make
things as realistic as possible,

even though these
were fantasy stories.

- Things exploded
at Marvel so much

when he was doing this
in the early 60's,

that by the late
1960's, the distributor

that owned DC
basically told Marvel,

you're selling so good,
we're making more money

off of you than the
publisher we own,

publish everything you want.

- [Stan] We sell about
60 million copies,

60 million magazines, a year.

I guess that would break
down to five million a month.

- When we passed DC,
I almost flipped.

You know, DC was the
Cadillac of the industry,

I couldn't believe it.

1961 on, with the Fantastic
Four, comics grew exponentially.

It was absolutely a miracle.

- I would say from '60 to '70,

that's when I enjoyed the
comic book business more

than I have ever enjoyed it.

- '61--

- Was the Fantastic Four.

- '62 you had--

- The Hulk.

- Ant-Man and--

- Thor.
- And Spider-Man.

- 1963--

- Sergeant Fury.
- Iron Man.

- Giant-Man.
- Doctor Strange.

- X-Men.
- The Avengers.

- '64--
- Daredevil.

- And 1965--
- Nick Fury.

- 1966--
- The Silver Surfer.

- It was like we were on a
roll and nothing could stop us.

[triumphant music]

- What makes Stan happy?

It's peace and quiet,
and his computer.

- For the past 47 years,
since we've lived here,

everything I've written,
I've written in here.

This is where I work.

It's a functional room,
which has all the things

I need to work in.

I like it because
it's comfortable.

I got my copier there,
my fax machine here,

my computer there, and
a little chair to sit on

if I wanna read a book,
and I have my desk

to write things on and it's
just the way I need it.

My wife hates this
room with a hatred

that defies understanding

because I wouldn't
let her decorate it.

She's not very happy about
those things up there,

my little boxes with supplies.

She hates all the wires
behind this computer.

She hates this room.

- We have good donnybrooks.

Nothing that's ever violent,
but then I'm very bossy

and he's very bossy and
we're always looking

to top each other
off the charts.

- One of the worst
fights we ever had,

I don't remember
what I said or did,

but it got you angry,
and you remember,

I had that beautiful,

Remington noiseless
portable typewriter.

My mother bought it for
me, I had it for years,

I wrote some of my
first stories on it,

that's the typewriter I
wrote the Fantastic Four on

and Spider-Man, and the
Hulk, and the X-Men.

You got mad at me
about something I said.

- Because you were
a camera buff then.

Probably something like, Joan,

how can you stand
there, you idiot,

the sun's in the wrong
position, or something.

- [Stan] Well why would
that get you angry?

- You have no idea.

- Well, anyway, whatever I said,

she lifted that
typewriter up like that,

my heart was in my mouth
and I kept thinking, oh no,

she won't, she
wouldn't, she wouldn't.

And she threw it
down and it shattered

into a million pieces.

[booming]

[rock music]

The 60's was the atomic age
and people started building

bomb shelters in
their backyards.

I remember, we lived in
Long Island at the time,

and there were one or two
people in our neighborhood

who actually got
construction crews

and they built these
shelters, cement-reinforced,

and heavy doors that would
seal shut above the shelter

and they stocked them with water

and all kinds of canned
food and they were

gonna sit it out if
ever any atomic bomb

or missile was launched.

People were really afraid
they'd be either killed

or burned alive or
horribly disfigured,

and everybody was
involved in science

and nuclear fission, so
when I created the Hulk,

I wanted to give it
a scientific basis.

[light rock music]

[explosion roaring]

I had always loved the
movie Frankenstein,

and I really thought that
the monster was the good guy.

He didn't wanna hurt
anybody, he just wanted

to be left alone, but
those idiots with torches

kept chasing him up
and down the hills

and through the countryside
and he always had my sympathy.

I had also always loved
Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.

And I said, "What if my
monster could be a guy

"like Dr. Jekyll, and when
he becomes the monster,

"that's like Mr. Hyde."

So I thought, psychologically,

we could have fun
with that story-wise.

The two entities
of this one person,

and they both hate each other

and would like to
destroy each other.

- The Hulk is a guy that's
kind of a lost soul.

He's had no connection, doesn't
remember where he came from,

and is basically searching
for someone to like him,

to be nice to him,
that he's an okay guy.

- Stan walked in and, in
his take on super-humans,

he paid way more attention
to the human than the super.

He made the characters real.

He made them feel like
people who you knew,

they were your friends,
they were neighbors.

And suddenly, people got
emotionally invested in this

and they cared about it.

- And I think what Stan did

was make really
humanistic super-heroes.

- One of the things that
I've learned from Stan

is what's really important
is not Spider-Man,

it's the guy in the
Spider-Man costume.

It has to be about Peter Parker.

- Peter Parker was
supposed to be every man,

or every young man,
with all the conflicts

and uncertainties and confusions
that any young man has.

- Peter Parker is your
normal kid from Queens

who's a bit socially
awkward, has girl problems,

they have money problems.

- I tried to put him
in the real world

and give him the kind of
things that regular readers

could relate to.

I mean, he'd have
ingrown toenails.

His costume would tear
while he was fighting.

It was very easy for me to
identify with Peter Parker,

'cause all I had to do was
think of a lot of things

that happened when I was young.

For example, I might
have a big date

with a girl that I really liked,

and wouldn't you know,
I'd have an allergy attack

at that night and I'd be
sneezing all over the place.

Or there'd be another
girl that I really wanted

to make an impression on.

I'd take her out to dinner
and then on the way home,

I realized I didn't have
enough money for a cab.

And you could imagine
the great impression

it would make on a date if
you have to take her home

in a crowded subway.

So it was not too
hard for me to come up

with things for Peter Parker.

I just had to think of the
things that happened to me.

- Spider-Man is Stan,
I absolutely feel that.

All of the things that
Stan is, his morality.

Uncle Ben, you know when...

All of that is Stan's
attitude towards mankind.

- You see, I always
felt with superheroes,

why would somebody
spend his whole life

fighting the bad guys?

Why not just get
married and have kids

and lead a normal life?

So I wanted to give Spider-Man
a real motive, a real reason

and let the reader
understand that he always

carried this guilt
feeling with him,

and that was the
reason for that.

With great power, comes
great responsibility.

- It's a great morality tale.

Peter Parker didn't come out
of the gate as a good guy.

He was selfish.

He was like, look,
I got these powers.

You know what, I'm gonna
go make some money.

I'm gonna cashout on this.

And he went for that.

And he made a mistake.

And in a very karmic
way, lets somebody

who should have been
apprehended by him.

And that person ended up
killing his Uncle Ben.

That was a real
important lesson.

- [Stan] My father, he
just always told me,

"Stan, the most important thing
is to do the right thing."

And I used to write, you know,
if you treat other people

the way you'd wanna be treated,

there couldn't be
anything bad in the world.

- So from that came the nature

of the man writing Spider-Man
and the whole thing.

- How I came up with
the idea for Spider-Man.

I have said this so
often at so many places

that for all I know,
it might even be true.

I was trying to think
of a new character,

and obviously one of the
most critical decisions

you make is what superpower
does the character have?

Well, we already had the
strongest man in the world,

someone who could
fly, on and on.

What was left?

And then I saw a fly
on the wall and I go,

wow, wouldn't it be something
if I had a character

who could stick to
walls like an insect?

So I liked that and I
said, "I'm gonna do that."

Then I needed a name.

Names are very important.

So I thought of the first
logical one, Insect-Man.

Somehow it didn't sound
glamorous or dramatic.

I figured, well, Fly-Man?

No, that didn't do it.

Mosquito-Man?

I went down the list.

I got to spider, Spider-Man.

I don't know why, but it
sounded dramatic, frightening.

I would want to read
something called Spider-Man.

- Who wouldn't want to
be able to swing on a web

and stick to walls?

Are you kidding me?

I'm 46, if I could
do that tomorrow,

I'd come in from the top of
this roof into the building

everyday going, yeah,
I'm a Spider-Man.

- I've tried to call
myself the co-creator

of these characters.

On Spider-Man, I came
up with the idea,

and then I first gave the
strip to Jack Kirby to draw,

and Jack drew the
first couple of pages,

and I was looking over
his shoulder and I said,

"Wait a minute, you're still

"making him too
glamorous-looking."

So I said, "Ah, forget it,

"Jack, I'll give it
to someone else."

So it occurred to me to
give it to Steve Ditko,

and Steve brought so
much to the strip,

and I don't think the strip

would have been as
successful without Steve.

I don't know what the universal
conception of creator is.

Steve definitely felt
that he was the co-creator

of Spider-Man, and
that was really,

after he said it and I saw
it meant to a lot to him,

that was fine with me.

So I said, "Fine,
I'll tell everybody

"you're the co-creator."

That didn't quite satisfy
him, so I sent him a letter,

I put it in writing.

To whom it may concern,
this is to state

that I consider Steve
Ditko to be the co-creator

of Spider-Man along with me.

Something like that.

And I sent it to him and I said,

"You can show this to
anybody you want to."

Steve actually still lives
in Manhattan, New York.

And when I was in New York
a few years ago we did meet.

And we did discuss doing
a strip again sometime.

Who knows, maybe we'll
still come up with something

and surprise the public with it.

I would love that.

When is Valentine's Day?

- [Female] 14th of February.

- Why does nobody ever
say, what is your wife

gonna get you for Valentine's?

Why does nobody ever say that?

- Well, she's probably
out shopping right now,

figuring it out.

- Yeah, it's a big
problem for me.

- He's the most romantic
man in the world.

Happy anniversary
to beautiful Joanie.

Wanted to give you the world,
but it wasn't for sale.

Don't know about perfume,
because I'm a male.

Can't buy jewelry, my picks
would just be a waste.

I'm a dunce about clothes,
and you have plenty of those.

So all I can do and all I
can give you is my love.

Sorry, can't go on.

I adore you, to my wife.

- My wife is really the
greatest person in the world.

She's far more
talented than I am.

She sings, dances, had been
an actress, was a model.

It's a funny story, when
I first married her,

she had been acting and singing

and had a great
career ahead of her.

But in those days, guys
tried to be very macho,

and I said to her when
we got married, I said,

"No wife of mine is gonna work."

And she said, "Okay."

And it was the stupidest
thing I ever did.

She could've been supporting
me all these years.

- You know Stan's story told us,

if you wanna be
successful and prolific,

put yourself in debt
and the way to do that

is to marry a wife
who's a spender.

And Joan Lee, he
says, is responsible

for half of his production
because if she didn't

get into so much debt,
he wouldn't have had

all the motivation to
produce his body of work.

So Stan Lee's debt has
made the world richer.

And Joan is
responsible for that.

- My daughter is not
sensible and cautious

and I am not sensible
and cautious.

We just spend his
money gleefully.

- [Interviewer] What's it
like having a father who

is the king of the comic books?

- Well his, um, how do I say it?

He's unbeatable.

I mean, his imagination,
his creativity,

and his brilliance
has not made it easy

for other men that
I've met in many ways.

- Now I'll stop
twisting your arm.

[laughing]

- [Interviewer] How
much did that cost you?

- You see this new outfit?

- [Interviewer] Maybe
this is an actress

he hired to come and do this.

- I have to say, I'm
his greatest fan.

- Now I'll send you
back to Central Casting

and I'll tell my daughter
that everything went well.

[laughing]

- [Guest] That's a great line.

- [Stan] Coming from
you, I appreciate it.

- Out of all the characters
your father's created,

who's your favorite?

- Me.

[laughing]

- That's a better line.

Son of a gun.

[laughing]

Her mother took care of most
of the cultural life, I think,

and she grew up wonderfully.

She's the most beautiful
woman, talented.

She's a jewelry designer,
she's an artist,

been an actress, she's...

We're very proud of her.

We had another daughter
who didn't survive,

but we called her
Jan, which Joan felt

was the closest thing to Stan.

Joan had her room all prepared,

it was so beautifully decorated.

- So she lived about seven days.

And she died.

But we never really discuss
it, it's interesting.

We never really went on a
great discussion about Jan.

I saw her once, I just
insisted that I see her.

And she was small,
smaller than Joan.

A pretty, pretty little baby.

And I'll never forget,
because they were so thrilled.

They kept telling me, oh she
took a little water today.

She took a little of this today.

I was there the eight days
that she was in the incubator.

The nurse that was
there just came

and said the baby then died.

I had had my tubes tied
off, they did that.

And not only did my
doctor tie them off,

because tubes can be
changed, but he cut them,

so they could not
be ever undone.

I tried to adopt,
and I couldn't adopt.

I couldn't adopt a Jewish
baby, because I'm not Jewish.

I couldn't adopt from
a Catholic family,

because I'm Episcopalian.

But in that particular
time, you couldn't do it.

You couldn't adopt into any
mixed marriage at that time.

- All anybody had to do was come

and look at the way we
lived, look at our daughter,

look at my wife with our
daughter, look at me,

and they were investigating
her and talking to her.

She'd come home in tears.

You don't remember how angry
you were when you'd come home

and you said, "I won't put
myself through this anymore,"

about those interviews
you had to go to.

Have you forgotten?

Boy, that was...

And how angry that made me.

- And how would I
bring the child up.

- There seems to be some
quality in human nature

where if everybody
had the same religion

and everybody lived
in the same country,

probably the black-haired
people would hate blondes

and maybe the redheads
would be shunned.

I don't know, it
seems that some people

have to have somebody else

to feel superior
to and to dislike.

- His work was very symbolic
of the era that he lived in.

He really sort of took a lot
of the stuff that was happening

and infused it in
these characters.

- One thing I felt there were
not enough black superheroes,

so I created the Black Panther.

- Stan was right there
at the beginning.

The Falcon, Captain
America's, not sidekick,

Captain America's partner.

It was a whole new thing.

These are amazing,
amazing themes

to be dealing with
in comic books.

- In X-Men, I guess my intention

was to show that the world
never fully tolerates

people who are different.

So here, nobody could
have been more different

than these five or six
mutants that I had created,

and actually we showed
that people feared them,

and then little-by-little
began to hate them

because they were different.

- I think the way X-Men
preaches tolerance

is it comments on
it quite blatantly.

It's all about outcasts
and they talk about it

and they stick together
and they prevail.

Although they are persecuted,
they also are tolerant

of their persecutors, of
humans, or bad mutants.

And in that way, they preach
tolerance even as victims.

- A lot of people feel and have
grown up feeling different.

That's really what
the X-Men universe

is about is in difference.

- Growing up, I felt very
much like an outcast,

although I imagine every
adolescent feels that way.

Perhaps a personal fantasy
that one of my weaknesses

or the things that
make me different

could be what makes me strong.

And that's kind of at the
heart of what X-Men is.

- What makes the X-Men heroic

is not so much
their superpowers,

but their cause and their focus,

which is let's all embrace
each other's individuality

and learn to live
with each other.

- But it was a subtle
underlying theme,

because basically the
main theme was excitement

and adventure and color and
if people got the theme,

fine, and if not we
still, I thought,

had a good adventurer strip.

- There is something that
anyone can take from it.

The things that these
characters can do

will obviously appeal to
young people, especially,

but then there are
these other themes,

these more complex themes which
give substance to the work.

- And as the 60's started
to become the 60's,

where themes of
alienation and acceptance

and feelings against the
military industrial complex

became more and more important
to a growing youth culture,

he really turned everything
on its head once again.

- At that time,
everybody was turned

off with the military
industrial complex.

Just for fun, I thought
I'd make Iron Man,

a symbol of the military
industrial complex,

and I'd make the
readers like him.

- Iron Man has dealt with
a lot of different themes

over the course of his
long, storied career.

Everything from dealing
with the mixed blessing

of a new, wonderful but
dangerous technology.

He's dealt with
alcoholism as well.

- Stan kept addressing
the issues of the day,

the hot topics, and
the personal issues

and angst that teenagers have.

- [Stan] So I decided to
have a column every month

where I would talk
to the readers.

I called it Stan's
Soapbox, and I would talk

about anything that occurred
to me about politics

or about school.

- [John] He was including the
readers in everything we did.

- [Broadcaster] Over the
past few years, Marvel comics

have become some of the
most popular reading matter

on virtually every college
campus in America today.

- [Broadcaster] Ladies and
gentlemen, in the upcoming

segment of the broadcast,
we're going to be talking

about comic strips, I guess.

- [Stan] Years ago, we
realized how much influence

Marvel comics really
do have on people

and our readership
starts at the age of six

and goes up, as I mentioned,
to and beyond college.

I would say that's my
principle objective

to just sort of elevate
comics to the point

where they're a more-respected
medium of communication

and they're not thought of

as merely something
for young children.

[funky music]

- [Broadcaster] The
University of California's

humor magazine, the Pelican,
recently called Marvel Comics

the greatest revolution
in literature on campus

since the foldout news.

- About once a year
we'd get a letter,

somebody would
write, hey, I bought

one of your books and
there's a staple missing,

I want my money back.

[laughing]

You know, I would run
through the office,

waving this letter,
we got a fan letter.

[funky music]

I do a lot of lecturing
on college campuses

all over the country.

In fact, tomorrow morning
I'm going to Las Vegas,

the University of Las Vegas.

I guess there's a certain irony

to the fact that
some of the children

who had comic books
taken away from them

when they were five years old,

when they were in college,

when they were 20
years old or so,

they were inviting me to come
and speak at their college.

- [Attendee] I've got
a question to ask you.

- [Stan] I have
an answer for you.

- [Attendee] How did you
create your new characters?

- [Attendee] Where would
the ideas come from?

- [Attendee] I just wonder how
far ahead you work on these.

- [Stan] Well, I guess we
work, you would consider it

three months ahead.

- [Attendee] Have
you ever had an issue

rejected by the Comics Code?

- Oh yeah, a few times, usually
for non-sensible reasons.

[funky music]

I would talk for,
oh, maybe 20 minutes

or as long as it was,
but then the thing

I loved the best was the
questions and answer period.

I didn't really do
it to increase their

but to increase my own.

Every time I would leave
one of those lectures,

I knew more about what
interested our fans

than I did before I
started the lecture,

and I would try to
take that knowledge

back to the office with me
and try to put it to use.

Little-by-little, I found I
was getting more questions

about the Silver Surfer than
any of our other characters

from the college kids.

And they were saying,
"Stan, were you interested

"in getting a
character who embodied

"the Judeo-Christian
philosophy," and blah blah blah.

Things I hadn't even thought of.

- He took this character
and he sort of altered

into sort of a flying
flower child on a surfboard

who was constantly
giving in to thinking

about the inhumanity
of man to man

and talking about how love
would conquer all and so forth.

And this kind of stuff
spoke to a lot of the youth

and I think they
embraced characters

[rock music]

[shouting]

- Marvel Comics began
to take on a personality

and you began to see
that there was one guy

behind this whole thing.

- He marketed comic books
and superheroes first

to his core audience, second
to the college audience,

convincing them that
these were as mature

and sophisticated as
they thought they were,

and then making sure the
world at large knew about it.

- Our characters became
popular all over the world.

And they'd gone to England
and France and Poland

and Belgium and Spain and
Italy and Japan and China.

And I began not to spend
as much time in the office.

I didn't see the
writers as much.

- He had to have
Thor and Spider-Man

and Fantastic Four
written by other people,

and these were comics
that had never,

well, at least Spider-Man
and Fantastic Four,

had never been written
by anybody else.

- I devoted myself
to just trying

to bring the company
into other fields,

movies and television.

I had come out to
California on business.

I'd stay for a day overnight,

and I thought these
people don't realize

that they're living in paradise.

The weather, the open feeling,

so I steamed, how can I
move out to Los Angeles,

when all of Marvel
is in New York?

So I said to the powers that be,

"You know, why don't we
set up our own studio

"out in Los Angeles
and I will even make

"the supreme sacrifice,
I will uproot my family

"and myself and we
will move out there

"and make sure
everything goes right.

"It's the least I can
do for the company."

Well I don't think there
was a dry eye in the room.

"You would do that
for us, Stan?"

So they sent me out here to
help set up Marvel Productions,

a little animation studio.

Moved out with my
wife and daughter.

We sold everything in New York

and we've been here ever since.

[rock music]

Welcome to Marvel Productions
near Hollywood, California.

This is where we're turning many

of your favorite comic book
heroes into animated TV shows.

- [Spider-Man] Spider-Friends...

- [All] Go for it!

- Very nice, very
nice, we can use that.

- At the animation studio,
Marvel Productions,

I was the creative
head of the studio.

Really, I butted in on all
the things they were doing,

you know, on the
scripts and the artwork

and the direction.

- [Narrator] The company
is currently churning out

250 half hours of
animated series

as well as three
feature-length cartoons.

- I grew up with Stan.

You know, from his
doing his animation

with his voice on Spider-Man
and the Amazing Friends.

- [Stan] Hi, Spidey
fans, this is Stan Lee,

inviting you to the annual
dance at good ole ESU.

But take my advice, don't
get too comfortable,

because we'll be knee-deep
in danger before you know it.

- I knew him from the cartoon.

- I saw the cartoon
on television,

which I became obsessed with.

- Thousands of people
never heard of Spider-Man,

hundreds of thousands
never heard of Spider-Man

till they saw that
animated show.

So they were right,
business-wise it

♪ Wealth and fame, he's ignored

♪ Action is his reward

♪ To him, life is
a great big bang up

♪ Wherever there's a hang up

♪ You'll find the Spider-Man

- My first stop will be
the nearest TV studio.

- The experiment is
sufficient as it stands.

- I'm not satisfied.

- I don't have to satisfy you.

[dramatic music]

- We did do a live action
television series of Spider-Man.

There was no heart
to the series.

A villain would
be doing something

and he'd become Spider-Man
and go chase the villain

and catch him and climb up
a building and that was it.

And after the
first few episodes,

I realized it was
gonna go nowhere.

And I called a meeting,
and we had a meeting

at the network and I
thought these people

were sincere and they really
wanted to hear my opinions

of what I thought was
wrong and how the series

could be improved, and
I said whatever I could.

No changes were made
and the show went on

and it was canceled after
a few more episodes.

Luckily, it didn't ruin the
character for other things.

- Stan put in these
emotions and these flaws

within each of these
characters that made you

wanna turn the page
and keep reading.

And people had been doing that

for decades and
decades in comic books.

It hadn't been translated
to film, necessarily.

There were some films in
the 80's and the early 90's

which were, frankly,
not very good.

Up until then, I do
believe it was just

that surface translation
that had been done

on most of the comic book films.

- It's hard to explain the
frustrations of we have

these great
characters and we knew

how they should be portrayed,

and there were people
who wanted to do them,

but nothing really gelled.

- And fans didn't have
any hope that Marvel

would ever have any good movies.

- Rock and roll.

All right.

Give me four.

[gun firing]

- Get down, get down.

- Hey, what's going on?

[grunting]

- Scare you?

- That was interesting.

I've never done that before.

- After years of lawsuits
and ownership disputes,

Marvel Comics and Sony have
settled their differences,

finally enabling the
superhero, Spider-Man,

to be fully marketed as a
major motion picture failure.

Now, the movie's only
challenge is finding an actor

worthy of the tight
spandex costume

and who, as chance
would have it,

was also born without genitals.

- Finally, one day, a
fellow named Avi Arad

came to our studio and Avi
understood our characters.

- I remember my first meeting
with Stan in the Bel-Air hotel

and he said to me,
"Everybody said they'll make

"movies out of this," but that
seemed a kind of false faith

that this thing could
ever go to the next level.

There were false starts.

Movie-making was
complicated, it's expensive.

What worked for us is there's
a whole new generation

of filmmakers who
really got turned on

to be in the business by comics.

- Geez, not yet, no.

I heard you were
here and I said,

"I don't care what, I've
gotta say hello to that man.

"I love him."

- I love you, I said,
you're like a father.

[cheering]

- Sam Raimi and this guy,
they made Spider-Man.

It couldn't have been what
it was without this guy.

[cheering and applause]

- I had no doubt that
those comic books

would become the most powerful
and exciting entertainment

the world has to offer
today when the technology

got to such a level
that it could portray

that universe in a way that
would work with audiences.

- One of the films
everybody's looking

forward to this summer is X-Men.

Is that in this venue?

- X-Men is, I hope,
gonna be great.

It's the first Marvel character

that's gonna be a
big budget movie.

- A meeting was set up
with the folks at Marvel,

and Stan Lee showed
up at the meeting.

He was so enthusiastic
so I thought,

well, I'm gonna go
figure out how to honor

what he created
in his enthusiasm.

- Everything they were saying

about the first
X-Men was negative.

And you'd read in the
talk back and then go,

well, it's a Marvel movie
so you know it's gonna fail.

And then it wasn't
until the movie came out

people's opinions
changed on that

and launched sort of
the Marvel era of films

that we're in now.

[epic music]

[zapping]

[crashing]

- The trick to the movies
is when they capture

the essence of what
the great comics are.

- And it's ironic
that it took that long

necessarily to realize
that the emotional journey

of who these characters
are and what they expect

is what you start with,
it's what you stay true to.

- If you told us
when we were kids

that the weird, nerdy
stuff would one day

be the biggest
commercial successes,

I would have never
believed that.

- When they realized, oh my god,

this is drama, this is
comedy, this is this,

this is that, and it
became such a phenomenon,

that everybody was in it.

- Stan Lee's decision to
go Hollywood has paid off.

- Spider-Man, the action hero.

- [Reporter] Crawling all
over 3600 movie screens.

- The boss of the box office.

- The most profitable
movie of the year.

- It's bigger than life itself,

when you go into a theater and
with all the special effects

and all, that's oh.

- It's hard to
describe the feeling

of seeing characters that
I had a hand in creating

up there on the big screen,
and especially up there

and looking so good.

- Fantastic Four: Rise of the
Silver Surfer opens this week.

The first Fantastic Four movie

grossed more than $300 million.

- All the things that Stan
injected into his characters

was in those films.

- Here we go, here we go.

- [Photographer] Swing back,
Mrs. Lee, swing back a little.

- I created him, wow.

- [Photographer]
Over by the poster.

- So I am just so...

Oh thank god.

How are ya, John?

Who's got a camera,
who's got a camera?

- My grandmother
had the candy store,

I used to wait for the
comics to come in every week,

open 'em up with her, you know?

And then we'd put
'em on the shelf,

and I would read 'em all.

I was the first guy to read
'em, and they were yours.

- You keep seeing
all your characters

coming to life like this.

Are you just like a kid inside
just jumping up and down?

You're doing it on the outside.

- No, I'm like an old guy

wondering how
successful it's gonna be

and how many more of
these things I can come to

and talk to guys like you.

This is the fun of it, you know?

This is the payoff.

- I'm sorry, I'm
too big for you now.

- You're damn right you are.

[growling]

Eat your heart out, Ed Norton.

[growling]

You know, it's funny,
it's a funny situation.

You do all the work, and I
get so much credit for this,

but I wouldn't have
it any other way.

- We wouldn't be
here without you.

- I know, I keep writing you
all the time to tell you that.

I'm not upstaging
you too much, am I?

- No, no.

- Hey, you know, I hear you
have a bigger role than I do.

All I say is, "Wow."

I've always wanted
to be an actor,

and to be able to have
little part in a movie,

in any movie but
especially a good movie,

it's really a thrill.

Welcome back to the
Baxter, Dr. Richards.

Look out.

Security oughta be
beefed up a lot more.

- Plate invitation, sir.

- I should be on that list.

- [Tony] Hey, Heff.

- You know, I guess one
person can make a difference.

'Nuff said.

A million years ago, when I
was writing these comic books,

I never suspected that
one day I'd be walking

down a green carpet
and being interviewed

and people would say,
"How do you feel?"

Nobody cared how I felt
about anything in those days.

Marvel is gearing up
to do so many more.

We'll have Captain
America, we'll have Thor,

we'll have Shield, we'll have...

It goes on and on.

Ant-Man.

Can you believe Ant-Man?

- You created so many
characters with Jack Kirby,

what would he think
of all of this?

- Oh he'd be thrilled.

He would be thrilled.

I'm so sorry that he
isn't here to see it all.

Jack was one of the nicest,

most talented people
I've ever known.

When Jack Kirby died, it
was almost unbelievable,

because there had
always been a Jack Kirby

and he was always the
king of the comics

as far as everybody
was concerned.

And I couldn't imagine
not having him around,

not having him drawing.

He was certainly one of the
best artists in the business,

if not the best.

- Mr. Kirby, he
created or co-created

such classic comic
book characters

as the Hulk, Captain America,
Thor, and many, many others.

- There was nothing
that Jack didn't do,

couldn't do, and he never
did less than his best.

He was also one of the
nicest, most cooperative,

most helpful, most decent
human beings around.

It was a great loss
when Jack went.

It was hard, because
he meant so much to me

and I knew what we had lost.

[somber music]

Marvel went bankrupt.

It's hard to believe,
because they're so great now,

but a lot of things happened.

- Marvel was
financially bankrupt,

but the characters, the
intellectual properties,

were not bankrupt.

- At one point of
the bankruptcy,

one of the current
heads of the company

said to a group of
bankers, Spider-Man alone

is worth $1 billion.

- And my contract was
invalid as all of them were,

and I didn't wanna stop working.

So we got a company together.

They wanted to call
it Stan Lee Media,

which I found very flattering.

- Stan Lee Media was formed
during the internet bubble,

which was the craze
right around 1999.

- I started in comics when
they were in their infancy.

Now I have an opportunity
to get into the internet

when it is in its infancy,
and it's a far bigger,

more powerful field
than comics ever were.

These are the early
days of what we're doing

and what everybody's
doing on the web.

We're gonna make these things
more and more interactive,

and that's the one thing
they can't do in television.

And we're only starting.

Because I think we're
taking over the world.

[laughing]

- Stan is an idea guy.

Stan is a creative dynamo.

[pleasant rock music]

- We were a
fully-functioning company.

We had stock options,
the company went public.

- Before I knew it, we had a
staff of more than 200 people

and we were going great guns.

I never had so much fun.

[somber rock music]

- Stan is the
consummate creator,

has nothing to do with
business or financial side.

It's possible to get
taken advantage of.

- It was a terrible blow to me,

especially people
had invested in it,

it had my name on it,
it was heartbreaking.

- People started to get laid off

and that's where
it was really hard.

Everyone was sad, you
know, we didn't wanna go.

We wanted to keep working
and being productive.

- [Stan] Hi, Anthony,
this is Stan.

I just wanted to tell
ya how bad I feel

about the way things happened.

I didn't expect that
would happen so soon

or the way it did and oh
man I feel terrible about it

and I wanted to tell you
it was just a pleasure

working with you,
you were great.

- Stan Lee Media
was unfortunate,

but that was just a blip
on the radar screen.

- Even at age 84,
he's still coming up

with ideas for superheroes
for his new company--

- POW! Entertainment,
purveyors of wonder.

For the first time now, I'm
able to do anything I want.

If we wanna do movies,
television shows,

DVDs, we can do them
and we are doing them.

- The new characters that
Stan's creating for POW!

still have a lot of
the original emphasis

and problems and
sincerities that he had

when he created some of
his earlier creations.

But today's world, they're
maybe a little bit edgier.

The culture is a
little different,

and the difference between
heroes and villains

isn't as quite as clear.

- We have three movies
in development at Disney.

I still am concerned with
just writing the stuff

and making sure that
somebody's gonna care about it.

- Stan, you've been
doing this for so long,

you've been so successful.

Some people wonder,
why don't you retire

and live permanently
on exotic vacations?

Why do you keep doing it?

- The word retire
is a dirty word.

You know, most people
when they retire,

they say, "At last,
I'll have a chance to do

"what I've always wanted to do."

But I'm doing what I've
always wanted to do.

I'm working with artists,
with writers, with directors.

I'm working on creative things.

I'm having fun.

Don't punish me by
making me retire.

[heroic music]

Now that the comics
are so successful

and the movies are so
big, they think of it

as overnight success,
I wanna tell ya

it's the longest overnight
that anybody ever could have.

- Despite all his
successes and recognition,

Stan is really a regular guy.

He truly is the guy
that you recognize

behind the mask of
all his characters.

[dramatic music]

- I've done
everything I wanna do.

I've wanted to write
and I've written.

I wanna do more movies.

I wanna do more
television, more DVDs,

more mobisodes, I wanna
do more lecturing.

I wanna do more of
everything I'm doing.

The only problem is time.

I just wish there
were more time.

[heroic music]

- All these wonderful
things that I have,

I could never have them.

- Well you just
bear that in mind

that they come from me--

- Because you are
not extravagant.

- I couldn't afford to
be extravagant with you.

- Now don't look at the camera.

The only extravagant--

- Wait, excuse me, dear, I
was not looking at the camera,

I was looking this way.

Don't ever direct the master.

Now start again, if you wish.

- Now here it goes, now.

Let's get this straight.

In no way at all do you think
that you are the master.

[chuckling]

Me, boss, my word.

All right, come
around here, then,

I wanna show you something
else I'm going to spend.

- I spent 60 years
spoiling this woman.

- [Joan] Trying to impress me.

- [Stan] And I never succeeded.

[exciting heroic music]