bob kane,stan lee,Jerry Siegel,Will Eisner great writers also? or just great creators

[SHAMWOW!]

do fanboys consider..bob kane( Bill Finger is the writer ,although only Kane receives official credit,stan lee,Jerry Siegel Will Eisner,great writers also? or just great creators

compared to the likes of gaiman,alan moore

or does the fact that they created great characters alreadyalone .. ixxo facto make them great writers also.

[sdowner]

First, my understanding is that Bill Finger had as much to do, if not more, with the creation of Batman as Bob Kane.

Writing-wise, you've got to be doing something right to create a book featuring a new character, and have it sell well enough to launch a career spanning decades.
But worth noting is that Jerry Siegel had Joe Shuster, Bob Kane had Bill Finger, and Stan Lee had Kirby, Ditko and others– most of the enduring comics characters seem to have had more than one creator. Eisner's Spirit is an exception.

I think also that the nature of the medium was different enough in the forties and fifties that comparing those guys with Alan Moore and Neil Gaiman is kinda unfair. Comics 50 years ago were considered disposable, cheap entertainment, much more so than today.
The Batman boys got into comic books because they couldn't get work doing newspaper strips. If I remember correctly, the same goes for Siegel and Shuster. The argument could be made that if they were great, they wouldn't have been doing comics.

I don't think Kane or Finger were particularly great writers- the story that launched Batman's career was inarguably plagiarized from a The Shadow novel, after all.

Lee seemed mostly like a dialogue man, at least during the heyday of the House of Ideas. From what I've read, the pencillers did more plotting than they were given credit for.

Jerry Siegel seemed like a competent enough writer. I haven't really read enough of his work to say.

Most of the stories that have really developed the characters and captivated readers have come from writers besides the original creators, though, don't you guys think? Maybe I just say that 'cause I'm young, though...


As compared to Moore and Gaiman, I'd say only Will Eisner was truly great. He was a master of visual storytelling and I suspect he would have thrived as a prose writer too. I love reading the narration for the old Spirit stories...

So that's my two bits. How about you?

[SHAMWOW!]

First, my understanding is that Bill Finger had as much to do, if not more, with the creation of Batman as Bob Kane.

Writing-wise, you've got to be doing something right to create a book featuring a new character, and have it sell well enough to launch a career spanning decades.
But worth noting is that Jerry Siegel had Joe Shuster, Bob Kane had Bill Finger, and Stan Lee had Kirby, Ditko and others– most of the enduring comics characters seem to have had more than one creator. Eisner's Spirit is an exception.

I think also that the nature of the medium was different enough in the forties and fifties that comparing those guys with Alan Moore and Neil Gaiman is kinda unfair. Comics 50 years ago were considered disposable, cheap entertainment, much more so than today.
The Batman boys got into comic books because they couldn't get work doing newspaper strips. If I remember correctly, the same goes for Siegel and Shuster. The argument could be made that if they were great, they wouldn't have been doing comics.

I don't think Kane or Finger were particularly great writers- the story that launched Batman's career was inarguably plagiarized from a The Shadow novel, after all.

Lee seemed mostly like a dialogue man, at least during the heyday of the House of Ideas. From what I've read, the pencillers did more plotting than they were given credit for.

Jerry Siegel seemed like a competent enough writer. I haven't really read enough of his work to say.

Most of the stories that have really developed the characters and captivated readers have come from writers besides the original creators, though, don't you guys think? Maybe I just say that 'cause I'm young, though...


As compared to Moore and Gaiman, I'd say only Will Eisner was truly great. He was a master of visual storytelling and I suspect he would have thrived as a prose writer too. I love reading the narration for the old Spirit stories...

So that's my two bits. How about you?

great observation.. the thought just pondered to me since when people mention best stories of superman,batman, spiderman, etc ...usually the original creators own written stories dont get included in the mix..

[e_t_i]

Let's see. As far as "great creators" side of the question goes

Bill Kane created Batman (with Bill Finger)

Will Eisner created The Spirit

Jerry Siegel created Superman (with Joe Shuster)

Stan Lee created Spider-Man, the Fantastic Four, the X-Men, Iron Man, the Hulk, Thor, Daredevil, Doctor Strange (with Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko), and many more.

[smygba]

do fanboys consider..bob kane( Bill Finger is the writer ,although only Kane receives official credit,stan lee,Jerry Siegel Will Eisner,great writers also? or just great creators

compared to the likes of gaiman,alan moore

or does the fact that they created great characters alreadyalone .. ixxo facto make them great writers also.

Stan Lee is the both the greatest creator and writer.

To be a great writer, you don't have to create new characters but I do think you need to think in a certain way to be a great writer, and most people writing comics don't do that. Most are very superficial in their thinking.

His creations all had a core value or something the book was about. Only maybe Batman really has that kind of underlying ethos, but A lot of Stan Lee's creations had that.

The other reason he's a great writer, he didn't just write self-contained issues, he actually was a master of letting sub plots and other information run over and be left open so that you are compelled to come back. Might not sound so big, but read other "throw away" issues and they all are so plot driven that they all end in one issue. The driving plot of Stan's comics might finish in one spot, but a lot of other stuff ran over. Sorta like a soap opera. As for the claims it was pencillers who did a lot of work and Stan takes credit, I've read a lot of these claims and I'll put it this way, Stan was still writing the issues after those pencillers left, but the direction never radically altered. And one artists claim that he created Spider-man was the biggest BS I ever read it did both Lee and Ditko a disservice.

He's overlooked because the style he writes in is not intended for a mature audience, but the underlying morals and ideas are certainly sophisticated and mature.

I like Will Eisner too, but I consider him different in that he's an Auteur or "Complete Comicbook Creator". Because he could draw, he was able to embed what I call storytelling technologies into his work that you may not have the ability to do as a team.

Gaimen's overhyped, Moore is cool, but sometimes he's too high end that its just not fun to read. Certainly interesting from an analytical point of view but not entertainment.

[TNTales]

I'll have to disagree about Gaiman being overhyped. Sandman and the universe he created for it is amazing and arguably on the level of any other creator (barring Lee/Kirby). Recently he's become more ubiquitous in some questionable areas (his novel American Gods is good but he was a cowriter of the movie version of Beowulf which is not so good) but I don't think that diminishes his previous work.

He's not on a level with Moore, but not many are in terms of his manipulation of the medium, the meta-comic if you will.

Just my perspective.

As to the original comment, it's amazing that most creators make one character where the Marvel guys made FF, Spiderman, etc so many heroes that are still around and valid now.

[smygba]

I just feel that a guy like Gaimen has everything that is superficial about the writings of a guy like Moore, but that's all. He's still miles better than a lot of today's talent, but not in the same league.

[Wild&Uncouth]

Stan Lee and co's target audience was completely different than people like Alan Moore and co.

I don't know if Stan Lee, if asked, could write anything other than a superhero-ish story targeted at a young audience. Gaiman has written childrens books, and adult books.

[dinomaster]

I like Stan Lee's writing back in the older days, and he's quite possibly the greatest creator of all time, but I'm not to fond of his more recent writings.

[NickRocks]

Bob Kane got a writer and an artist and they created batman, and HE took the credit LOL