Posted in: Comics, Comics Publishers, Current News, Marvel Comics, Stan Lee | Tagged: fantastic four, jack kirby, Jillian Kirby, Neal Kirby

Neal Kirby Challenges Marvel's Version Of Fantastic Four's Origin

Granddaughter of Jack Kirby, Jillian Kirby posted on behalf of her father Neal Kirby regarding a recent article published by Marvel Comics.

Published Sat, 12 Aug 2023 10:57:08 -0500

by Rich Johnston

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Granddaughter of Jack Kirby, Jillian Kirby posted on behalf of her father Neal Kirby regarding a recent article published by Marvel Comics looking the Fantastic Four, ahead of the 2025 planned Marvel movie. She posted "A statement from my father, Neal Kirby, son of Jack Kirby, disputing an article about the Fantastic Four published 8/8/23" which reads;

An article published 8/8/23 on Marvel.com, by TJ Dietsch, titled "Who Are the Fantastic Four? The Official Marvel Guide" begins with the paragraph, "Where Did the FF Come From?" The author then quotes from Stan Lee's "Origin of Marvel Comics"published in 1974. This "creation" story of the FF is at most outrightly false, if not at least highly disputed. I would invite you all to read my statement of 6/17 published on this Twitter.

The article by TJ Dietsch, a former researcher and assistant editor on Wizard Magazine in its final years, then a writer for CBR and Marvel Entertainment since, asks the question "WHERE DID THE FANTASTIC FOUR COME FROM?" before answering

"As Stan Lee related in 1974's ORIGINS OF MARVEL COMICS, he had grown a bit bored by the simplistic nature of the stories he had been churning out for two decades. According to Lee, two moments occurred around the same time. First, his wife Joan challenged him to focus more fully on making comics he would be proud of. Second, Marvel publisher Martin Goodman inferred that a super heroic team book could be a surefire hit, and that Marvel should get back into the spandex game… Seeing the opportunity to make something completely different, Lee called upon artist Jack Kirby and the pair got to work. Their results introduced the world to Reed Richards, Susan "Sue" Storm, Ben Grimm, and Johnny Storm also known as Mister Fantastic, the Invisible Girl (later the Invisible Woman), the Thing, and the Human Torch."

Back in June, Jillian shared the following statements from Neal Kirby, then in response to the Stan Lee documentary/biography released earlier this year on Disney+.

The 13th-century Islamic poet/scholar Rumi said, "The Ego is a veil between humans and God." In the Disney+ documentary bio of Stan Lee, the veil is lifted. Presented in the first person with Lee's voice providing a running narrative, it is Stan Lee's greatest tribute to himself. The literary expression of ego is the personal pronoun "I." Any decent English or Journalism teacher would admonish their students not to overuse it. So, the challenge is extended to anyone who wishes to count the number of "I's" during the 86-minute running time of Stan Lee.

I (000ps!) understand that, as a "documentary about Stan Lee," most of the narrative is in his voice, literally and figuratively. 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 (my father died in 1994). It should also be noted and is generally accepted that Stan Lee had a limited knowledge of history, mythology, or science.

On the other hand, my father's knowledge of these subjects, to which I and many others can personally attest, was extensive. Einstein summed it up better; "More the knowledge, lesser the ego. Lesser the knowledge, more the ego."

If you were to look at a list and timeline of Marvel's characters from 1960 through 1966, the period in which the vast majority of Marvel's major characters were created during Lee's tenure, you will see Lee's name as a co-creator on every character, with the exception of the Silver Surfer, solely created by my father. Are we to assume Lee had a hand in creating every Marvel character? Are we to assume that the other co-creator never walked into Lee's office and said, "Stan, I have a great idea for a character!" According to Lee, it was always his idea. Lee spends a fair amount of time talking about how and why he created the Fantastic Four, with only one fleeting reference to my father. Indeed, most comics historians recognize that my father based the Fantastic Four on a 1957 comic he created for DC, "Challengers of the Unknown," even naming Ben Grimm (The Thing) after his father Benjamin, and Sue Storm after my older sister Susan.

Though the conflict between Lee and my father concerning creator credit gets glanced over with little mention, there is more attention paid to the strife between Lee and Steve Ditko, with Lee's voice proclaiming, "It was my idea, therefore I created the character," Ditko's rebuttal being that his art and storyline is what brought life to Spiderman. In 1501, the Opera del Duomo commissioned a 26-year-old Michelangelo to sculpt a statue of David for the Cathedral of Florence – their idea, their money. The statue is called Michelangelo's David – his genius, his vision, his creativity.

I was very fortunate. My father worked at home in his Long Island basement studio we referred to as "The Dungeon," usually 14 – 16 hours a day, seven days a week. Most of the artists, writers, inkers, etc. worked at home, not in the Marvel offices as depicted in the program. Through middle and high school, I was able to stand at my father's left shoulder, peer through a cloud of cigar smoke, and witness the Marvel Universe being created. I am by no means a comics historian, but there are few, if any, that have personally seen or experienced what I have, and know the truth with first-hand knowledge.

My father retired from comic books in the early 1980s and of course, passed away in 1994. Lee had over 35 years of uncontested publicity, much naturally, with the backing and blessing of Marvel as he boosted the Marvel brand as a side effect of boosting himself. The decades of Lee's self-promotion culminated with his cameo appearances in over 35 Marvel films starting with "X-Men" in 2000, thus cementing his status as the creator of all things Marvel to an otherwise unknowing movie audience of millions, unfamiliar with the true history of Marvel comics. My father's first screen credit didn't appear until the closing crawl at the end of the film adaptation of Iron Man in 2008, after Stan Lee, Don Heck, and Larry Lieber. The battle for creator's rights has been around since the first inscribed Babylonian tablet. It's way past time to at least get this one chapter of literary/art history right. 'Nuff said.