PA ImagesAn entire year has passed since the death of comicbook legend Stan Lee, however his legacy lives on through some of the most popular superheroes of all time.
Stan, real name Stanley Lieber, was responsible for the creation of many Marvel characters we know and love today, including Iron Man, Thor, Spider-Man and the X-Men, making his influence even stronger than ever before.
Alongside his Marvel colleagues Jack Kirkby and Steve Ditko, Stan Lee’s legacy – via his iconic characters – will arguably go down in pop culture history alongside the greats like Walt Disney, George Lucas and Steven Spielberg.
GettyStan helped to create and revolutionise the billion-dollar comic empire that is Marvel, catapulting the careers of many of the stars we know today in the process. Not only this, his vision of an interconnected Marvel Cinematic Universe has also completely transformed the way in which Hollywood makes films.
On Sunday, November 10, Robert Downey Jr. took home the award for Male Movie Star of 2019 at the People’s Choice Awards in Los Angeles for his role in Avengers: Endgame, so of course it made sense to dedicate his speech to the ‘late great Stan Lee’.
‘Well look, I just got to come up here and open the show so I’ll just say thank you Disney, thank you Marvel, thank you Russo brothers,’ the actor said during his short but sweet speech.
He then added: ‘And most of all, to the late, great Stan Lee, this is for you, buddy.’
Marvel StudiosAt the time of Stan’s death, 54-year-old Robert took to Instagram to pay tribute to the creator, telling him: ‘I owe it all to you.’
Stan retired from Marvel in the 1990s, but the comicbook icon remained the public face of the company thanks to a number of cameo appearances in films and TV programmes based on Marvel characters.
In addition to his fictional storytelling, Stan also taught valuable life lessons through his characters, which often centred around responsibility.
GettySpider-Man taught us ‘with great power must also come great responsibility’. To add to that, Captain America: Civil War taught us: ‘When you can do the things that I can, but you don’t, and then the bad things happen? They happen because of you’.
Stan used this in his own experience too, using the power and influence he had to address some of the evils in the world.
He once wrote: ‘Bigotry and racism are among the deadliest social ills plaguing the world today.’
A year since his death, his influence is still at present as ever. Rest in peace, Stan.
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Emma Rosemurgey is an NCTJ trained Journalist who started her career by producing The Royal Rosemurgey newspaper in 2004, which kept her family up to date with the goings on of her sleepy north east village. She graduated from the University of Central Lancashire in Preston and started her career in regional newspapers before joining Tyla (formerly Pretty 52) in 2017, and progressing onto UNILAD in 2019.