Hey Mad Minions,

As I am sure most of you know, Stan “the Man” Lee passed away at 95 today.  My diabolical Mad Overlord heart is heavy. Some may wonder why, I never met the man, so why should I, in this time of selfishness and indifference, care about someone I have never met before?

Because in some ways, Stan was the gent all of us should strive to be.

I know he wasn’t perfect. There are claims that he was arrogant…. but I am looking past that. At his core he was an innovator, a creative genius, and he always out reached to his fans. Any fan who has met the guy said he was friendly and cordial. Not to mention, he was meeting fans and signing autographs almost up until his time of death.

Heck, I probably wont even make it to 95, most likely one of my experiments will turn on me and kill me as Mad Overlord experiments tend to do.

But  think of the effect this man had on pop culture these days. I would make an argument, that more people these days know the Marvel characters then they know sonnets by Shakespeare or the writings of Hemingway.  There was something in his storytelling that was on one hand intellectual (The story of how he came up with the name of the Hulk villain “The Abomination” comes to mind) but ‘down to earth’ enough that appealed to a broad audience (Peter Parker having girl trouble for example).

My mind, while usually overcome by madness, today is touched by sadness as well. We need MORE creative, innovative thinkers these days. People who know how to appeal to the humanity in all of us, instead of just a few.

God Speed Stan.

Excelsior.