Spider-Man

: Spider-Man is a Marvel Comics character. For other uses see Spider-Man (disambiguation).

Creation of character

Various accounts of the character's creation have been given.

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Speaking in the 1980s, Stan Lee said the idea for the series sprang out of the apparent increased teenage interest in the new Marvel characters, so he wanted to create a character that could cater to them specifically. One of the influences for the character came from the pulp magazine The Spider and perhaps from an minor spider-themed character, the Tarantula from DC Comics. In the Spider-Man movie DVD extras, Stan Lee's Mutants, Monsters and Marvels and elsewhere, Lee said he was inspired by seeing a fly climb up a wall. (When discussing this on documentaries, he often comments "I've told this story so many times, it may actually be true.") Originally, Lee assigned Jack Kirby to illustrate the story, but after seeing his designs, decided that Jack's style was "too 'larger than life'" for what he wanted. Lee turned to artist Steve Ditko, who found the concept particularly appealing and developed a visual motif that Lee found satisfactory.

Related Topics:
1980s - Pulp magazine - The Spider - Tarantula - DC Comics - Jack Kirby

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Another version comes from Joe Simon and Steve Ditko, who say that the creation of Spider-Man was based on Simon's Silver Spider. They say that Lee got the original Simon sketches from Kirby and presented them to Ditko, who recognized Simon's work and used it as the basis for Spider-Man (Comic Book Artist/Alter Ego, Winter, 1999). Kirby stated in an interview in Will Eisner's Spirit Magazine that Lee had minimal involvement in the creation of the character.

Related Topics:
Joe Simon - 1999 - Will Eisner

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When Martin Goodman was presented with the concept, he was resistant to the unorthodox ideas of a teenage hero with a troubled personal life, but allowed the character to be used as a cover story for a dying anthology title, Amazing Fantasy, since content mattered little for a title slated to be cancelled. The story was released in issue #15, and months later, the sales figures indicated that the cover story was unexpectedly popular. Goodman called for a regular series for the character to capitalize on this success.

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A further version was theorized by Will Murray in Comic Book Marketplace #44. Noting the pattern of the launches of several Marvel characters at the time, including Thor, Ant-Man and a solo Human Torch feature, and also the production numbers for individual strips, he speculated that Spider-Man was originally conceived for the series Tales of Suspense (since this title, unlike the other anthologies, did not get a superhero feature until early 1963 and in the interim saw a series of fill-in issues), which was drawn by Kirby. However Goodman's skepticism about the feature and the attempt to revitalize Amazing Fantasy led to Spider-Man appearing there drawn by Ditko. Although another issue of Amazing Fantasy was in production, the title was cancelled to clear a space in the distribution schedule for another, non-fantasy, series.

Related Topics:
Will Murray - Comic Book Marketplace - Thor - Ant-Man - Human Torch - Tales of Suspense - 1963 - Amazing Fantasy

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