Someone I used to know but lost touch with nearly four decades ago came to my attention on Facebook recently. They had moved to the States and become radicalized, and after they shared an offspring’s post canonizing Charlie Kirk, I blocked them. I am at a loss to know what journey took them to that point, but since as I understand it they were once trained in how to recognize cults, they would be deeply offended at the suggestion that Charlie Kirk idolatry is indicative of one.
In a Facebook group comment regarding my last blog post, I was taken to task for refusing to “look past often incremental differences of opinion.” The commenter went on to bemoan the “bias” in the Marvel Method group and the fact that he was “thrown off”: he had misrepresented what was said in a posted article in order to take issue with it. The article in question was by Elana Levin, and the accusation was that the claim was made, either in the article or in the post about it, that Glorious Gotfried [sic] was Donald Trump. (It wasn’t.)
The commenter’s misconceptions are that Marvel Method is a discussion group, and that the physical evidence is subject to opinion. Patrick Ford created the group as a place to park any evidence he came across, with the intention of opening it to NO participants, only readers. In other groups, discussions are hijacked by Lee proponents to create the idea that there are two sides to the story, Kirby’s and Lee’s. The evidence itself is not debatable, but the goal is to make enough noise that the “discussion” is seen as having two valid points of view.
Kirby’s history is evidence-based, and his own account agrees with it. There’s no room for “incremental differences of opinion” like those held by Roy Thomas. Thomas can’t win based on the evidence so he ignores it and spins bullshit to be accepted based on his credentials of having worked with Stan Lee. The purpose of those “incremental differences” is to introduce the idea that facts and evidence can have an element of uncertainty. Stan Lee was solely and exclusively the liar, but the goal is to create uncertainty among casual readers who will walk away saying, “yeah, they both lied.” The Cult of Lee is alive and well where debating the evidence is permitted.
The cult of Stan Lee is alive and well
I’m probably Jack’s biggest fan.1
The first edition of my second book received a single Canadian review. The reviewer began with his credentials, that is, his fitness to have an opinion about Jack Kirby (always a bad sign). He wrote that he has been a Kirby fan for over 50 years, the sort of claim which generally means the next words out of his mouth will be designed to shit all over Jack Kirby. This technique was coined by the leader of the cult himself, Stan Lee, who would declare himself Jack’s Biggest Fan before taking away Kirby’s achievements. He did this while convincing his followers, who are easily misled, that he was praising Kirby. Some of Lee’s biggest fans pose as “Jack’s biggest fan” in order to perform the same maneuver.
My Canadian reviewer concluded that I was angry, and that I’m “biased and a Stan Lee hater.” It is beyond some people’s imagination that the truth could be written about Lee clinically rather than out of anger. They believe that Kirby would only reveal his personal experience with Lee out of bitterness. It’s not necessary to hate Stan Lee to understand who he was, and the idea that I or Jack Kirby could only tell the truth out of hatred comes from people with the propensity to hate.
Protect yourselves
Facebook is that fabulous place where you can catch up with people you knew decades ago, before you both moved away. It also has a useful feature called blocking for when you find out they grew up to be cultists. I didn’t know my commenter but I wasted no time blocking him, and for the same reason. He believes that if facts are open to debate, then any argument, even if rooted in Lee’s falsehoods, will be treated as a valid “side.” The same principle is applied by today’s mainstream media when they treat both sides of any discussion as though they are equally valid.
No, when we start from scratch with the evidence, everything shows that Kirby told the truth and what Lee said was almost entirely false. There is no truth on both sides. We only need to listen to the freelancers who were silenced by Lee’s preemptive strikes and his threat to deny them work.
Jack Kirby had something to say about cults
The Sect: Masked, Darkseid and Desaad infiltrate a secret society in The Forever People #8. Kirby’s dialogue speaks for itself.
Glorious Godfrey and the Justifiers from The Forever People #3.
Mark Evanier was the source of the information that Glorious Godfrey was based on Arthur Godfrey and Billy Graham. A photo of Graham exists that is close enough to one of the above Godfrey panels that it could have been used by Kirby as a photo reference.
What turned Kirby’s attention to Billy Graham? The caricature may have been triggered by an interview response from Stan Lee the year before.
Aaron Noble posted this in 2023: 2
I don’t think Funky Flashman was Jack’s first commentary on Stan in the Fourth World books. Glorious Godfrey preaches faith to true believers, but is himself a skeptic on the existence of the Anti-Life Equation. In Forever People 3, he says to Darkseid, “I believe in Anti-Life…but it can only be induced in others by means of inventive selling!”
Darkseid responds: “I like you Glorious Godfrey! You’re a shallow, precious child—the revelationist, happy with the sweeping sound of words!”
This was cover dated July, 1971. One year earlier, Stan himself had said this: “I love the rhythm of words. I’ve always been in love with the way words sound. Sometimes I’ll use words just because of the sound of one playing upon the other.” 3
And later in the same interview, astonishingly: “I may become the Billy Graham of comics.”
I would love to pick Bob Beerbohm’s brain right about now regarding his unofficial history of the term Marvel zombies.
Like Jasper Sitwell five years earlier, the Roy Thomas analogue puts in an appearance here.
That very issue of The Forever People contained this letter.
Eleven years after The Forever People #3, Stephen King may have held out some hope for us 40+ years in the future in his foreword to Ellison’s Stalking the Nightmare.
If the cult of celebrity sucks, it sucks because it’s as disposable a a Handi-wipe or a Glad Bag or the latest record by the latest Group of the Moment… You don’t make it over the long haul on the basis of your personality.
In 2025, King was called bitter by the Kirk idolaters when he pointed out that Kirk advocated for gays to be stoned to death.
Of course Glorious Godfrey was not Donald Trump; in her article, Elana Levin was simply noting Kirby’s remarkable prescience. What’s indisputable is that Desaad is a member of the current administration, although Kirby drew him with a toupée.
Footnotes
back 1 Stan Lee to Ted White, 1966, printed in Castle of Frankenstein #12, 1968.
back 2 Marvel Method, 4 June 2023.
back 3 Stan Lee: The Marvel Bard, An Interview with Mike Bourne, Changes v2#4, 15 April 1970, courtesy of Tom Brevoort’s blog.
accordingtokirby 