Face Front, True Believers!: Stan Lee and the Gen X Trinity

Before Whedon, before Lucas, even before Roddenberry, there was Lieber: world-creator, comic huckster, bombastic barker, and unifying voice behind the early Marvel Universe. Stanley Martin Lieber—better known to the world as Stan “The Man” Lee—gets a lot of flak from comic fans nowadays. And maybe some of that is deserved. He takes a lot of credit; he deserves a lot of it. But even if he only created half of what he claims, he’d still be twice as prolific as any mere mortal. Sure, he’s slung the hyperbole a bit thick now and again, and he’s nothing if not selfaggrandizing, but it’s hard to deny the impact of Stan Lee has had on nerd culture.