Man Behind Spider-Man Unmasked


May 4, 2002


BOB GARFIELD: Every superhero has a secret origin. Superman came from Krypton; the Incredible Hulk was exposed to gamma rays, and Spider-Man -- as moviegoers are finding out this weekend -- was born when high school student Peter Parker was bitten by a radioactive spider -- or [WHISPERING] that's what they'd like you to believe. In fact, Spider-Man sprang from the imagination of Marvel Comics head Stan Lee. Or [WHISPERING] that's what they'd like you to believe. While Stan Lee is the man who's credited for creating the web-slinger, in truth he had a collaborator -- a brilliant artist named Steve Ditko. After much wrangling, Ditko's name appears in the opening credits of the multi-million dollar action film, which is prompting many moviegoers to ask "Who's Steve Ditko?" To answer that question we're joined now by Blake Bell who runs the Ditko.comics.org web site. Blake, welcome to OTM.

BLAKE BELL: Thank you, sir.

BOB GARFIELD: Now Spider-Man was born in '62--

BLAKE BELL: Yeah.

BOB GARFIELD: -- at the time, I was 7 years old - I probably read every Spider-Man title for the next 6 or 7 years and the name Steve Ditko means absolutely nothing to me. Why is that?

BLAKE BELL: That's the comic book industry for you, and then the comic book industry, when you think about it, is really only 60 years old. It was all work-for-hire at the time. Even in the '40s it was shop work, so-- they just did not respect the people doing the actual work. Steve Ditko was one of the first to fight his way on to the credits of a comic for more than just drawing. In Amazing Spider-Man 25 which would have been about 2 and a half years into the run he actually had his name down as "Plotter" on the book because in those days what Marvel would do is they would give the artist a brief synopsis -- if even that, by that time -- and then the artist would completely do the stories, and then the "Scripter" would come in and lay down the actual words. And Ditko felt that it was not proper that he was only receiving credit for the art work but that he should actually get some kind of plotting credit as well.

BOB GARFIELD: Were there any particular Ditko touches that you believe enhanced Spider-Man's popularity?

BLAKE BELL:Yes. Ditko created a world where the visual laws were so intriguing, it was almost a visual ballet, these characters battling, dancing in the sky. The body movements were very realistic. He had a "cartoony" style compared to some of the super realistic artists like Neal Adams [sp?] that came along later n the '60s, but he somehow was able to create his own visual universe with rules that made it more realistic than any super realist could ever hope to do. Spider-Man was one of the first street level superheroes, because Ditko's landscape was pure New York -- run down buildings, water towers, types of things that artists hadn't really brought to the, to the picture before and you really felt that connection to the streets in a book like Spider-Man.

BOB GARFIELD: So Steve Ditko created or co-created this-- [BOTH SPEAK AT ONCE]

BLAKE BELL: Yes.

BOB GARFIELD: -- phenomenal comic book character, and then after a short while he just up and left. Why?

BLAKE BELL:Well he'd gotten into Ayn Rand's philosophy of Objectivism -- value for value is a very important issue -- credit for what you had done was certainly an important issue, and receiving financial compensation for that was an important issue. And on I guess a financial and an artistic level he felt he was being asked to compromise, and so he pulled a John Galt and said you're not going to get out of me what you want; I'm going to do this on my own time, and I will just do what I have to do to get by and survive -- and disappeared.

BOB GARFIELD: Just for clarity -- John Galt the protagonist of Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged.

BLAKE BELL:Yes. He was the one who disappeared and then tried to take all of the, the great minds of the world with him to, to show the world that, you know, we are the creators and we deserve a little respect.

BOB GARFIELD: Was Peter Parker or Spider-Man an objectivist?

BLAKE BELL:He grew to be one by the end. As Ditko's philosophy became more entrenched, you can see Peter Parker becoming much more of a confident individual, much more like a Howard Roarke, the protagonist of The Fountainhead where no longer is he concerned like he was in the first story of Amazing Fantasy 15 -- Spider-Man's first appearance -- no longer is he concerned as much what the, the mainstream crowd thinks.

BOB GARFIELD:With all due respect, we're speaking to you, a Steve Ditko expert, because we couldn't find Steve Ditko himself. He never gives interviews.

BLAKE BELL: Yes.

BOB GARFIELD: The Los Angeles Times called him "The J.D. Salinger of Comic Books."

BLAKE BELL: Yes.

BOB GARFIELD: But Salinger went into seclusion and as far as anyone knows never wrote again. What about Ditko?

BLAKE BELL: He co-publishes his own work. He is perceived as this J.D. Salinger because, you know, people only know what is out there in the mainstream, and he rarely contributes to that facet because they want too much control; they - he refuses to give up control of the characters that he does. He gave up control of the character he co-created, Spider-Man, and-- he figured that was enough of that, and now he owns whatever he creates, and he's willing to pay the price in terms of low distribution and lower financial reward.

BOB GARFIELD: Blake, thank you very much.

BLAKE BELL: Thank you, sir.

BOB GARFIELD: Blake Bell runs the web site Ditko.comics.org. He's also writing a book about the wives of comic book artists.

BROOKE GLADSTONE: Coming up, pay cuts, big bucks and bad words on network television.

BOB GARFIELD: This is On the Media from National Public Radio.