By: Carter Caldwell

On 12 November 2018, Marvel Comics’ longtime writer and editor later to become their effective mascot, Stan Lee passed away at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, California.  He was 95.

Lee was rushed to the hospital earlier that day due to an unspecified medical emergency.  He was preceded in death by his wife, Joan Boocock Lee, who died in mid-2017. Lee leaves daughter, JC, and a legacy in the entertainment industry that will likely never fade.  Lee began his career in 1939 at Timely Comics, a part of a pulp magazine run by Lee’s cousin-in-law Martin Goodman.  Timely, as it would turn out, later developed into Marvel Comics, where Lee and his partner Jack Kirby would go on to create the Fantastic Four, the Daredevil, and several Avengers.  Additionally, Lee created Doctor Strange with Steve Ditko and the X-Men with Bill Everett.  Since these creations, Lee went on to help write and edit for Marvel for decades, and as his characters began to appear in theaters, he went with them.

Fans of Marvel’s cinematic dominance over the past few years will happily remember Lee’s numerous cameos alongside our heroes.  Indeed, these films will forever be different without their creator’s presence, but his mark on American culture and, by extension, on the world, is one that can never be erased.