I did think about writing a big, emotional post about what Stan Lee meant and will continue to mean to me. I did think about writing about how much the old Bullpen Bulletins used to make me feel like I was part of a big, exciting club (even in twenty year old back issues I got cheap as a kid). I thought about some words on what he meant to pop culture.
I thought about maybe something on how his public persona was developed over the years, or the early years of Marvel with everyone crammed into tiny offices. I thought about a moving piece on him inspiring me to be a comic book writer (he did, and now I am), and I thought about a done other things tonight since hearing the news.
None of them seemed like the right thing. Here's a moment that all fans of the big guy knew would come eventually but we all dreaded. The inevitability of it was often pushed back by the simple fact that this was Stan Lee we were talking about. He was like Lemmy or David Bowie - we all hoped he was secretly immortal so that there would never be a world without him in it.
The passing of people in the public eye don't usually affect me all that much. I didn't meet these people. I didn't know them. I'm usually saddened, of course, but then these things get filed away in the mental library and the world carries on.
This is different. This is Stan 'The Man' Lee. This is the guy who smiled at me from comics and magazines when smiles were a rarity for me. Here's a guy who created icons even though at the time he was just trying to scrape a living. Here's a guy to came to embody everything that the BullPen Bulletins made him out to be. Here was a guy who lived long enough to see his creations take pop culture by storm, decade after decade. Here's a guy who wouldn't have spent ages ruminating on news like this. Stan would have got typing.
So yeah, if you'll excuse me I have some comics to write.
Rest in peace, Stan Lee. Hero to millions, yet always seeming like a friend. Excelsior.
'Nuff said.
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