24 Hour Comics Reviewing Day, Hour Nine: Stan Lee Meets the Amazing Spider-Man

STAN LEE MEETS THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN: This comic is fun. Yeah, yeah, I know it's not considered cool to be a Stan Lee fan anymore, is it? But I still like the guy a lot: he's the bombastic uncle we all wish we had, and while you can scold him for takin' more credit than he might be entitled to, I got no personal quibbles with Smilin' Stan. That's why this first in a series commemorating Stan's sixty-fifth anniversary writing comics is a goofy, boisterous breath of fresh air: a forgivable horn-tooting homage to the former Mister Lieber. This comic's just about as clear a definition of "fun" as this little stuffed bull can make: a quartet of short stories celebrating Stan's place both in and for the Marvel Universe. The first is a lovely little silly vignette of Spidey himself dropping in on a cookie-bakin' Stan to help cope with a crisis of faith—who better to get you over the web-slinging blues than Stan, who (in a rare moment of modern Marvel tweaking itself) points out that Spider-Man isn't just important as a hero but as a marketable character who's "Single-handedly keeping our economy afloat!" The second story's my favorite: at an interdimensional comic-con we learn that there's really only one (or two) true Stan Lees. (The mock-up covers of comics from a Stan-less universe are worth the price of admission alone: from The Normal Four contemplating an empty pothole that doesn't hold a Mole Man monster at all to the Punisher laying down the line about not making your bed.)The third is a two-piece humor piece by Fred Hembeck and the issue wraps up with a reprint of one of Stan's classic Spider-Man tales (Amazing #87). Sure, it's shameless backpatting and the joke might run thin after three or four more issues of Marvel heroes meeting Stan, but it's done with a light and goofy self-deprecating touch that wouldn't have been outta place in the Golden Age of Stan Lee Marvel cameos. Face front, true believers!