Stan Lee

There are plenty of people I want to see or meet at the New York Comic Con. I already have a ticket to see Neil Gaiman do a reading. Frank Miller is going to be signing stuff and I'm tempted to bring something from here to get him to sign. And there are a dozen or more artists I can already think of that I'd love to get sketches from.

But oddly, the news that Stan Lee is going to be at the con is something that gets me excited, in a thoroughly geeky way.

It's not like Lee has really written anything worth reading, well, almost since I was born, really. And lord knows there are plenty of anecdotal stories about how Lee treated some of the artists at Marvel, especially Jack Kirby. And there is the issue of how much credit he deserves in creating some of the biggest comic book characters in the world - like Spider-Man, the Hulk, the Fantastic Four and others. People claim he's exaggerated his importance. But he did play a role. And a fairly major one. And let's face it, the characters he created or co-created have been some of my favourites growing up. All right, all right, some of my favourites to this day.

Plus, he's 85 years old. I might have another chance to meet Miller and Gaiman, but realistically, the number of chances to meet Lee are getting more and more remote. So it would be nice to meet him and say thanks.

I'll have to see where he's going to be at the con and what he's going to be doing. It might be enough to just say I got to see him. But if he's doing a signing, well, I'm going to have to find something for him to sign. Probably the Fantastic Four Omnibus I've been eying forever.

I used to make fun of people who tried to get autographs of famous people. It was something that I didn't really understand. Who cares if I got George Clooney's signature on a scrap of paper. Apparently, all it took for me was the proper geeky motivation.

Last Five
1. I'm just happy to dance with you - The Beatles
2. This little light (live) - Neko Case*
3. Alternative to love - Brandon Benson
4. All the trees are here - Hawksley Workman
5. Ways and means - Snow Patrol