September 11, 2023
Scioli follows up his graphic biography Jack Kirby: The Epic Life of the King of Comics with another fast-paced, comprehensive history of a comics industry great. Tracing the life of script writer and editor Stan Lee (1922–2018) from a childhood go-getter to the self-promoting figurehead of Marvel Entertainment, Scioli’s clean and uncomplicated designs bring kinetic energy to what is fundamentally a story told by talking heads. The facts are well-documented and nothing here will be much of a surprise to Marvel fans, but Scioli structures his overview with a breakneck pace to match Lee’s bombastic temperament. The panels are filled with cameos by fellow comics bigwigs: Captain America’s Kirby and Joe Simon, Spider-Man’s Steve Ditko, and Lee’s esteemed successor at Marvel, Roy Thomas, among others. Throughout, Scioli highlights his subject’s penchant for revisionist history by juxtaposing Lee’s claims about creating some of Marvel’s most famous heroes with his co-workers’ counterclaims, and the consistently entertaining script doesn’t shy away from Lee’s notorious pettiness or vanity either. It’s an apt memorial to a great creative mind who was his own best publicist.
October 15, 2023
There is no shortage of biographies on Stan Lee, but Scioli provides us with a more impartial look at the comic-book writer known best for his work at Marvel. Scioli's biography spans Lee's life from his youth through his early jobs and time in the military and covering when he eventually landed a job in publishing, where he spent the rest of his career. Scioli provides a well-researched and comprehensive account of Lee's contributions to superhero comics, focusing on his interpersonal relations with (and his disregard for the creative innovations of) fellow comic book legends, such as Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko. Scioli's art is unconventional for the typical graphic novel; pages are comprised of numerous short, page-wide panels with a focus on close-ups of the subject. The colors used evoke old four-color newspaper printing, adding to the nostalgia for early comics publishing. The frames are quite text-heavy, with plenty of sources and notes provided for reference. With so many biographies lauding his contributions, recommend this title to show a more nuanced view of Stan Lee.
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Starred review from June 1, 2023
Biographies of Stan Lee tend to fall into two categories: fawning tributes that portray him as a visionary genius whose work is only comparable to the great epics of antiquity, or searing excoriations accusing him of being a craven, cold-hearted hack whose only joy in life came from denying others credit for their work. How refreshing, then, to discover that Scioli's follow-up to Jack Kirby: The Epic Life of the King of Comics avoids reducing Lee to a one-dimensional caricature by deliberately highlighting his mercurial nature. Through a succession of tightly crafted scenes, none more than a single page long, Scioli depicts Lee as driven by a pure desire to create meaningful art yet totally obsessed with increasing profits; sincerely dedicated to building Marvel Comics into a worldwide success while eagerly pursuing opportunities to leave the company behind; capable of lavishing his collaborators with praise while also downplaying their contributions to the work they created together; and as complicated and sometimes frustratingly contradictory, but ultimately not more so than most people are. VERDICT Scioli has created the most compelling and layered portrait of Lee to date. A brilliant achievement.
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