Excelsior

Age of the Geek Column: I had just finished my column last week when I saw the news.
I thought it was a little strange when a friend of mine seemed to randomly post a highlight video of Stan Lee cameos on social media, but I didn't think much of it. It wasn't until later that I understood why.
Stan "The Man" Lee had died at the age of 95.
It's hard to fully express the impact that Stan has had on popular culture. Short of Shakespeare and Disney, you'd be hard pressed to find a single individual whose work has been so wildly influential. He didn't invent the costumed super hero, but he pioneered Silver Age storytelling and had a hand in creating a greater number of iconic characters than anybody else ever has or likely will again.
Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster created Superman. Bob Kane is legally credited with the creation of Batman.
But Stan Lee can claim credit for the Fantastic Four, Ant-Man, the Hulk, Thor, Spider-Man, Iron Man, the X-Men, and so many more. The library of characters that owe their creation to Stan is so large that he spent his last 20 years making cameos in movies from three different film studios.
Of course, no recounting of Stan's career would be complete without the obligatory recognition of his collaborators. He faced never ending criticism for leveraging his role in the creation of these characters into millions of dollars and worldwide fame while his co-creators received neither.
Without Jack Kirby there would be no X-Men. Without Steve Ditko, who died earlier this year with far fewer headlines and far fewer millions in the bank, there would be no Spider-Man. These things are true. But without Stan there would be no Marvel Universe. He was the common denominator and while one can argue that his compensation was disproportionate compared to his collaborators, his contributions are undeniable. More than just a creative personality, his knack for publishing and promotion expanded Marvel Comics into a multimedia powerhouse. He oversaw the company through their greatest era of publishing and guided his characters off the page and into televisions and toy stores.
He was so good at it that, in some ways, he became a character himself. Permanently intertwining his name and likeness with the company even after he retired. Spotting the Stan Lee cameo is a favorite pastime for fans of comic book movies and, according to longtime colleague Roy Thomas, was his own favorite thing to do in his later years.
Even in his 90s he rarely passed up an opportunity to interact with fans in whatever way he could. He once had to postpone an appearance at ComicCon because of emergency dental work. Not cancel. Postpone. He found an open dentist in San Diego and made it back downtown later in the day. That's the kind of man he was.
And then, just like that, we were living in a world without Stan Lee in it.
That's always the way it is with death. The people around us give our lives definition, whether they're close family or celebrities we admire from afar. When we lose those people, the world changes.
Spider-Man stories have had a profound impact on my life. From helping to shape my understanding of morality and responsibility to influencing my interest in journalism. A lot of people contributed to those stories along the way, but it all started with Stan.
That said, I didn't know Stan Lee. We weren't friends. I crossed paths with him a couple times at ComicCon and had my picture taken with him once. It's a memory I'll never forget, but I was just one of hundreds of thousands of people to have a similar experience.
I wouldn't be so presumptuous to mourn his passing, at least not in the way those closest to him have.
What I do mourn is that nobody else will ever have the opportunity to have even the limited interaction that I was privileged to experience.
Stan Lee's legacy will live on far beyond any of us, but from this point forward nobody will ever get to see him in action. There are fans of Spider-Man yet to be born and they may be influenced by the character in the same way I was, but they'll never get the chance to meet The Man himself. He will forever be an unapproachable memory, living on only through his work.
Still, the rest of us should be so lucky. It's said that great artists are never appreciated in their own time. Stan was obviously an exception.
And with that, he has given me one last piece of inspiration.
Now in my mid-30s, I'm starting to feel my age. I'm noticing that the writers, reporters, and people I admire in general are not decades older than me anymore. They're my age or younger.
That's a reality that everybody faces at some point, so it is a great comfort to realize that Stan Lee was 38 when he created the Fantastic Four.
Nuff said.
Travis Fischer is a news writer for Mid-America Publishing and still thinks 95 years just wasn't enough.

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