The Shouted  From the Rooftops but Unheard Story of Marvel Comics

Part 1-(Not So) Marvel Team-Up: Steve Ditko and Ayn Rand

                Steve Ditko was the creator of Doctor Strange, Speedball, and Squirrel Girl. He co-created Spider-Man and had the idea to make Iron Man's armor the iconic gold and red. Ditko was a huge creative force in the comic books in the mid. In the mid- 1960s' Ditko was the hottest artist in the industry working on the hottest book  in the industry (The Amazing Spider-Man). Ditko revolutionized the superhero by having every idea that set Spider-Man apart from the status quo superhero, from the age to the costume to the heavy incorporation of the characters personal life outside of the costume. These are all things that will forever be credited to Stan Lee, and as Stan Lee once said "I'll take any credit that isn't nailed down", but there are those of us who will forever know this was all Steve Ditko and we as the readers will forever be grateful for what Ditko has given us.
                Then Ditko just decided to quit Marvel Comics. I've heard several times that Ditko's departure had to do with an creative difference he and Stan Lee had over the secret identity of the Green Goblin. The story goes that Stan Lee came to Ditko and said that he wanted Green Goblin to be the father of a friend of Peter Parker's, Norman Osborn, but Ditko was adamant that Green Goblin be a random New Yorker like every other villain that Spider-Man had faced so far. I think we know how this worked out, and probably for the best. Norman Osborn has turned into an iconic character and added so much to the lore that I can't imagine Green Goblin being anyone else. I always thought that this little creative difference was a stupid thing to quit over, especially since it worked out so good for the comic book's lore. Then I heard about Ditko and Ayn Rand, particularly Ditko's obsession with Rand's philosophy of Objectivism and things started making sense.
                For those out there that were not brow-beat with Ayn Rand books by and over-zealous literature teacher in high school like I was. I'm just going to put the Wikipedia definition here:

Objectivism's central tenets are that reality exists independently of consciousness, that human beings have direct contact with reality through sense perception, that one can attain objective knowledge from perception through the process of concept formation and inductive logic, that the proper moral purpose of one's life is the pursuit of one's own happiness (rational self-interest), that the only social system consistent with this morality is one that displays full respect for individual rights embodied in laissez-faire capitalism, and that the role of art in human life is to transform humans' metaphysical ideas by selective reproduction of reality into a physical form—a work of art—that one can comprehend and to which one can respond emotionally.
Academic philosophers have mostly ignored or rejected Rand's philosophy. Nonetheless, Objectivism has been a significant influence among libertarians and American conservatives. The Objectivist movement, which Rand founded, attempts to spread her ideas to the public and in academic settings.

In Objectivism what someone creates should be the most important thing in the world to them. In Rand's book The Fountainhead, the hero of the story, an architect named Howard Roark, actually burned down a building he designed because it was not built to his exact specifications. So that goes without saying that Steve Ditko's decision to leave Marvel Comics over a small creative difference was one that he made through philosophical principal. But it goes on, there's a theory out there that there was a bigger reason that Ditko didn't want Norman Osborn to be the Green Goblin. This theory goes that
Ditko wanted Peter Parker (not having a male role model in his life) to meet his friend Harry's father and be inspired. In time Ditko planned to make Norman Osborn into not only a father figure for Peter Parker, but also a philosophical mentor  that Steve Ditko would use to put Objectivist ideologies into the comic book.
                 In the next few years Ditko would create The Question for Charlton comics and The Creeper and The Hawk and The Dove for DC comics. The early issues of these titles show a lot of Objectivist ideologies, reinforcing the idea that Ditko wanted to put this agenda in The Amazing Spider-Man. His runs would always end though with Editors him to stop. Ditko then created and independently published Mr. A, a title that anyone who has ever even panels of it online (guilty as charged) can recognize it as a platform to move ideology.
                In the years since Ditko has published with several independent companies and even returned to both Marvel and DC. These returns however were only for one shots or small runs. In the late 80s' Ditko won a Comic-Con International Inkpot Award. Since Ditko refuses to give interviews or appear publically the award was accepted on his behalf by his publisher. Ditko did not like this at all, his words to his publisher were: "Awards bleed the artist and make us compete against each other. They are the most horrible things in the world. How dare you accept this on my behalf" and made the publisher return the award.

Part 2-The Stoic Man-Thing Vs. All-New All-Different Marvel

Stoicism: an ancient Greek school of philosophy founded at Athens by Zeno of Citium. The school taught that virtue, the highest good, is based on knowledge, and that the wise live in harmony with the divine Reason (also identified with Fate and Providence) that governs nature, and are indifferent to the vicissitudes of fortune and to pleasure and pain.
                                                                                                                                -Oxford Dictionary
                The above definition sounds like the last thing you would call a character like The Man-Thing (a creature with empathic abilities), but since reading Watchmen and Philosophy: A Rorschach Test I developed a habit of trying to pigeon-hole the comic characters I'm reading about into philosophical schools. Lately I've been reading a lot of Steve Gerber's old Man-Thing books and regretting the fact that I didn't do it much earlier. These stories are great and it reminds me about what used to make comic books so great.
                In many of Gerber's early stories The Man-Thing would be sitting peacefully in his swamp when people would wonder through. The Man-Thing would watch these people from a distance for a while, then at the stories climax he would make himself known and touch somebody because "Whatever knows fear burns at the touch of The Man-Thing!" So even though The Man-Thing is empathic, Stoicism is the best word to describe him because before he makes himself known he watches then acts out of the knowledge he has gathered. This can best be shown in Adventure Into Fear # 18. This issue begins with a drunk driver who crashes into a bus and the survivors are left to trek across the swamp to a nearby town. The two survivors that the story focuses on is a soldier just returned from Vietnam and a hippie. throughout the book these two argue about war and patriotism, Gerber pointing out both good and bad qualities in the characters. Just before reaching civilization a member of the party brandishes a gun and says that he had to kill the rest because he was the drunk driver and wasn't going to jail. He kills the soldier and the hippie and The Man-Thing acts before he can kill any others. No matter what the soldier's and the hippy's feelings were on war and patriotism, they died the same. Truly a Stoic message.
                I think the story that blew me away most was in Adventure Into Fear # 12. In this issue a sheriff chases a suspect into the swamp and begins hunting him. The Man-Thing comes across the wounded suspect who told the creature his story, about how the sheriff had a vendetta against him and that was why he was being hunted. When the sheriff comes across the suspect and The Man-Thing he accuses the suspect of murder, an accusation that the suspect couldn't deny. As The Man-Thing walks away from the two men, now having all knowledge to make his decision, The sheriff shoots the suspect. You may ask me why this blew me away so much, there's more shocking content in one Garth Ennis dialogue balloon than in that entire story I described. Well, it has to do with the fact that I purposely left out the fact that the suspect was black and left you picturing  Carl "Crusher" Creel as I described the story.
                Now in a day and age where race shouldn't matter, it really does. ComicVine's description of the issue I just described reads like this:

Mark Jackson is a wanted man. One of the few black people in Topequa, Florida, Jackson is now the victim of racial crime, doggedly pursued by corrupt sheriff Wallace Corlee. But the Man-Thing has heard Mark’s plight and understands. Will justice be served in the heart of the swamps?

Nowhere in that description did ComicVine mention that Mark Jackson was actually a murderer, no they describe him as a "victim of racial crime." In the All-New All-Different Marvel and post-Ferguson America Steve Gerber would have been crucified for writing about a sheriff shooting a black man whether the black man was a murderer or not, but it was not shocking for us to imagine the sheriff shooting Absorbing Man. And let's not forget poor Man-Thing. The All-New Avengers would have chased him to the ends of the nexus of all realities and put him in a Zyklom B chamber full of weed killer.
                The thing that surprised me more about these comics was the Stoicism though. This is not something you see in modern comics and it reminded of why I fell in love with super-heroes. Captain America (Steve Rogers) was always very open and fair. Don't get me wrong Rogers stood by his guns and his beliefs but he would always gather the facts first and wasn't quick to act without the facts. The All-New Captain America (Sam Wilson), on the other-hand was quick to say: "I have a side. That's right, I have opinions, strongly held beliefs even." after facing off against of all things constitution quoting conservatives. Not Nazis, not criminals, not even Skrulls or the Kree, but Republicans (Captain America: Sam Wilson # 1). This is the attitude of the All-New All-Different Marvel, Instead of having our heroes stoically stand back and base their actions on knowledge they are enforcers of political agendas and ideologies. Exactly what editors would not let Steve Ditko do.