Stan Lee's Letter To A Fan Reveals Dr. Strange's Original Name!
We have an example of how awesome Stan Lee is (not that you would need another one), thanks to The Marvel Age of Comics (via Blastr). This lengthy letter from 1963 shows how much he likes fans and reveals some new details about Dr. Strange - like the fact that he did not always have a Ph.D.
The letter was written in response to a letter from fan Dr. Jerry Bails, is dated January 9, 1963, and includes the Madison Avenue mailing address for Lee's office at Marvel. Unfortunately, we don't have Bails' letter, but based on Lee's response, it looks as though he was critical of Marvel's art process. Bail seems to have called out Marvel's chief artist at the time—the great Jack Kirby. Kirby often would start strips and then pass them off to other artists to be finished, which often caused quality issues.
Here is the description from Blastr:
Lee states that Marvel has a 'very small staff—quite unlike the NATIONAL COMICS GROUP' (aka DC Comics).
'The poor guy only has two hands,' Lee wrote, 'and he can only draw with ONE!'
Lee also writes about the Wasp's introduction to Ant-Man stories, his belief that Spider-Man will soon be a very popular character (Spidey had only debuted in Amazing Fantasy #15 about five months earlier) and the creative process he and Kirby used onFantastic Four that has since become known as the 'Marvel Method.'
But perhaps the most interesting tidbit in this lengthy fan response is Lee's revelation that Doctor Strange—who would not debut until later that year—was not always a Doctor.
'Originally decided to call him MR. STRANGE, but thought the MR. a bit too similar to MR. FANTASTIC—now, however, I just remember we had a villain called DR. STRANGE just recently in one of our mags—hope it won't be too confusing! Oh well...'
Things ended up working out just fine for Doctor Strange. He survived the name confusion and went on to be Marvel's resident Sorcerer Supreme, but in the very same letter—six months before the character made his debut in Strange Tales #110—Lee reveals that he didn't have very much love for that first Stephen Strange tale, which was just a '5-page filler.'
'Steve Ditko is gonna draw him. Sort of a black magic theme. The first story is nothing great, but perhaps we can make something of him—'twas Steve's idea, and I figgered we'd give it a chance, although again, we had to rush the first one too much.'
Check out the full letter below and share your thoughts:
