--- product_id: 286685 title: "Marvel Comics: The Untold Story – The Behind-the-Scenes Company History of Martin Goodman, Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, and a Dominant American Force (P.S.)" price: "KD 10.56" currency: KWD in_stock: true reviews_count: 8 url: https://www.desertcart.com.kw/products/286685-marvel-comics-the-untold-story-the-behind-the-scenes-company store_origin: KW region: Kuwait --- # Marvel Comics: The Untold Story – The Behind-the-Scenes Company History of Martin Goodman, Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, and a Dominant American Force (P.S.) **Price:** KD 10.56 **Availability:** ✅ In Stock ## Quick Answers - **What is this?** Marvel Comics: The Untold Story – The Behind-the-Scenes Company History of Martin Goodman, Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, and a Dominant American Force (P.S.) - **How much does it cost?** KD 10.56 with free shipping - **Is it available?** Yes, in stock and ready to ship - **Where can I buy it?** [www.desertcart.com.kw](https://www.desertcart.com.kw/products/286685-marvel-comics-the-untold-story-the-behind-the-scenes-company) ## Best For - Customers looking for quality international products ## Why This Product - Free international shipping included - Worldwide delivery with tracking - 15-day hassle-free returns ## Description desertcart.com: Marvel Comics: The Untold Story – The Behind-the-Scenes Company History of Martin Goodman, Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, and a Dominant American Force (P.S.): 9780061992117: Howe, Sean: Books Review: Give the Author a No-Prize! - This book gives a history of Marvel comics, and by extension the comic book industry that it influenced and dominates. It is full of behind the scenes human drama that as young readers would not matter much to us, but those revelations fill in a lot of cracks and fascinate as we grow older and want to better understand the world we live in and the reading material that shaped many of us. Growing up, comic books were my companions and Marvel comics had a magic that warmed me that continues to this day. I will still sit down in a library or bookstore and spend a few hours reading stories from my past or new ones that are being developed now. Comics were fun, they connected with some part of me that needed what they offered. Maybe they kept me distracted from some things in life that might have dragged me down had I focused on them. Comic books were a kind of lifeline for me. At the end of most lifelines we cling to is a human being and that is true here as well. Marvel comic books, those magnificent modern myths were, like all myths, created by people and this book discusses those people and the way they shaped the Marvel company. What emerges is a picture of a reality we never suspected as children. We love the art but frequently the artist is not who we imagined. The author, Sean Howe does a good job exposing the human interaction, the creativity, the contracts, the admirable, the petty, the honorable, the idiosyncratic, all the ingredients of life are present in the Marvel comics’ story and they are compelling reading. For me reading so long ago Lee and Kirby and all the players in the Bullpen were simply having fun. Like so many who read them I imagined Marvel comics to be a theme park where dreams were encouraged and indulged. When reading the works of Lee, Kirby, Ditko, Steranko, the pure pleasure lept off the page and inside the reader. We all thought, surely Marvel is a place where gifted people have fun all day and night. This book turns that idea on its ear and gives a deeper sample of a more adult reality. Human beings, the kind that live and work in offices, made Marvel comics and for all the deep joy they brought to their adoring audience, the backstage perspective exposes the fully human aspects that I never would have understood as a kid reading those stories. The business of Marvel comics is what we have come to expect from profit oriented enterprises. There is no shortage of cheated artists, corporate objectives, or swollen egos. Marvel comics was, and is, a mix of talented, heroic, selfish, flawed, grand or tunnel visioned human beings trying to tell great stories in a structure that needs it on Tuesday in order to keep the lights on and the shareholders happy. Comics are a human construction, and creating art and fun is not always artful and fun. This is partly an examination of art as business. Who is this for? Mostly comic geeks like me, although history of business students might enjoy seeing the ontogeny of the Marvel organism as it evolved from some guys trying make a living with sequential art and seeing it grow into a very odd animal indeed. There is much for everyone to reflect on in this story. There could be a deeply complicated discussion of an art from where the stories and characters are handed from creator to creator and never age or really die and there is no true end. Perhaps most importantly it could be a test of your character. As you are exposed to the behaviors of everyone who made or make Marvel run you might find yourself examining your choices and where you might have made your stand had you been there. Review: Worthwhile though not brilliant - As a longtime comics fan with an interest in comics history, I found this book a good read, worth the purchasing and reading, but not the last word on the subject. The strongest element is the coverage of Marvel history from the 1970's through the 90's. The accounting of the pre-Fantastic Four period 1939 through 1961 is relatively thin, perhaps because of the lack of primary sources still around, and/or because most of the material produced by Timely/Atlas/Marvel during the early period was not of much current fan interest (except for a hard core of collector aficionados). During that first couple of decades, the policy of publisher Martin Goodman was to see what was selling for other comics publishers and jump on the bandwagon-- first superheroes, then horror, crime, romance, teen humor, etc.-- with competently produced but often uninspired knockoffs. Indeed, "Fantastic Four" itself was another knockoff, a jump back onto the superhero bandwagon started by DC, except that Stan Lee (by his own admission pretty much a hack writer up until then) and Jack Kirby decided to try doing superheroes in a different way. The story of Marvel's "Silver Age" glory days from FF #1 through about 1971 is a many-times-told tale. It is told here competently but with a bit of a "you had to be there" feel... if you didn't already know what the early stories of the FF, Spider-Man and the rest were like, and how they were different from what DC and other publishers were producing at the time, you might not get a clear idea from this book. And even though this is not a history of DC comics, the book might have gained from looking further at how the rise of Marvel was a response to a previous resurgence at DC, and how Marvel in turn influenced-- and was influenced by-- DC. (By the 1970's and beyond, writers, artists and editors were all jumping back and forth between the two companies, and DC's handling of its classic characters was thoroughly "Marvelized"..which I'm not saying was a bad thing.) As I said, the freshest information in the book for me was the look at behind-the-scenes goings-on at Marvel during the 1970's, when the wave of fans turned creators that started with Roy Thomas took over the store... a development that definitely had its up and down sides. Again, here, the author is maybe a bit thin of descriptions of the actual comics being produced and their significance. A comment of my own not so much about the book as some previous reviews... as a reader of the comics, I'll defend Stan Lee from charges that he was a mere hack stealing credit from Kirby, Ditko and others. Looking at the comics produced during those few years of the 60's-- and comparing them to the comics produced by Kirby and Ditko before and after that period, on their own or with other collaborators-- it seems clear to me that for a while there was a genuine synergy between Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, and between Lee and Ditko, enabling them to produce work that was "more than the sum of its parts". From the standpoint of a reader, again, I'll make somewhat of a defense of the infamous Jim Shooter. He may not have been a fun guy to work for, but I've always liked Shooter's own writing, and from my reader's standpoint, when Shooter became Marvel editor-in-chief, the effect, at least at first, was to "get the trains running on time" without snuffing out creativity. The Marvel Comics produced under Shooter's early editorship, I thought at the time and still do, were part of a kind of "Third Golden Age" of the late 70's through mid '80's... along with comics produced by DC and by the burgeoning independent publishers of the time. (I'd like to see a good overall history concentrating on this period of the 1980's.) ## Technical Specifications | Specification | Value | |---------------|-------| | Best Sellers Rank | #475,673 in Books ( See Top 100 in Books ) #65 in Comic & Graphic Novel Literary Criticism #91 in Comics & Graphic Novel History & Prices #654 in Popular Culture in Social Sciences | | Customer Reviews | 4.5 4.5 out of 5 stars (1,166) | | Dimensions | 1.4 x 5.3 x 7.9 inches | | Edition | First Edition | | ISBN-10 | 0061992119 | | ISBN-13 | 978-0061992117 | | Item Weight | 14.1 ounces | | Language | English | | Print length | 496 pages | | Publication date | October 1, 2013 | | Publisher | Harper Perennial | ## Images ![Marvel Comics: The Untold Story – The Behind-the-Scenes Company History of Martin Goodman, Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, and a Dominant American Force (P.S.) - Image 1](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/512cOtbyVlL.jpg) ## Customer Reviews ### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Give the Author a No-Prize! *by J***L on September 1, 2014* This book gives a history of Marvel comics, and by extension the comic book industry that it influenced and dominates. It is full of behind the scenes human drama that as young readers would not matter much to us, but those revelations fill in a lot of cracks and fascinate as we grow older and want to better understand the world we live in and the reading material that shaped many of us. Growing up, comic books were my companions and Marvel comics had a magic that warmed me that continues to this day. I will still sit down in a library or bookstore and spend a few hours reading stories from my past or new ones that are being developed now. Comics were fun, they connected with some part of me that needed what they offered. Maybe they kept me distracted from some things in life that might have dragged me down had I focused on them. Comic books were a kind of lifeline for me. At the end of most lifelines we cling to is a human being and that is true here as well. Marvel comic books, those magnificent modern myths were, like all myths, created by people and this book discusses those people and the way they shaped the Marvel company. What emerges is a picture of a reality we never suspected as children. We love the art but frequently the artist is not who we imagined. The author, Sean Howe does a good job exposing the human interaction, the creativity, the contracts, the admirable, the petty, the honorable, the idiosyncratic, all the ingredients of life are present in the Marvel comics’ story and they are compelling reading. For me reading so long ago Lee and Kirby and all the players in the Bullpen were simply having fun. Like so many who read them I imagined Marvel comics to be a theme park where dreams were encouraged and indulged. When reading the works of Lee, Kirby, Ditko, Steranko, the pure pleasure lept off the page and inside the reader. We all thought, surely Marvel is a place where gifted people have fun all day and night. This book turns that idea on its ear and gives a deeper sample of a more adult reality. Human beings, the kind that live and work in offices, made Marvel comics and for all the deep joy they brought to their adoring audience, the backstage perspective exposes the fully human aspects that I never would have understood as a kid reading those stories. The business of Marvel comics is what we have come to expect from profit oriented enterprises. There is no shortage of cheated artists, corporate objectives, or swollen egos. Marvel comics was, and is, a mix of talented, heroic, selfish, flawed, grand or tunnel visioned human beings trying to tell great stories in a structure that needs it on Tuesday in order to keep the lights on and the shareholders happy. Comics are a human construction, and creating art and fun is not always artful and fun. This is partly an examination of art as business. Who is this for? Mostly comic geeks like me, although history of business students might enjoy seeing the ontogeny of the Marvel organism as it evolved from some guys trying make a living with sequential art and seeing it grow into a very odd animal indeed. There is much for everyone to reflect on in this story. There could be a deeply complicated discussion of an art from where the stories and characters are handed from creator to creator and never age or really die and there is no true end. Perhaps most importantly it could be a test of your character. As you are exposed to the behaviors of everyone who made or make Marvel run you might find yourself examining your choices and where you might have made your stand had you been there. ### ⭐⭐⭐⭐ Worthwhile though not brilliant *by W***Y on November 23, 2012* As a longtime comics fan with an interest in comics history, I found this book a good read, worth the purchasing and reading, but not the last word on the subject. The strongest element is the coverage of Marvel history from the 1970's through the 90's. The accounting of the pre-Fantastic Four period 1939 through 1961 is relatively thin, perhaps because of the lack of primary sources still around, and/or because most of the material produced by Timely/Atlas/Marvel during the early period was not of much current fan interest (except for a hard core of collector aficionados). During that first couple of decades, the policy of publisher Martin Goodman was to see what was selling for other comics publishers and jump on the bandwagon-- first superheroes, then horror, crime, romance, teen humor, etc.-- with competently produced but often uninspired knockoffs. Indeed, "Fantastic Four" itself was another knockoff, a jump back onto the superhero bandwagon started by DC, except that Stan Lee (by his own admission pretty much a hack writer up until then) and Jack Kirby decided to try doing superheroes in a different way. The story of Marvel's "Silver Age" glory days from FF #1 through about 1971 is a many-times-told tale. It is told here competently but with a bit of a "you had to be there" feel... if you didn't already know what the early stories of the FF, Spider-Man and the rest were like, and how they were different from what DC and other publishers were producing at the time, you might not get a clear idea from this book. And even though this is not a history of DC comics, the book might have gained from looking further at how the rise of Marvel was a response to a previous resurgence at DC, and how Marvel in turn influenced-- and was influenced by-- DC. (By the 1970's and beyond, writers, artists and editors were all jumping back and forth between the two companies, and DC's handling of its classic characters was thoroughly "Marvelized"..which I'm not saying was a bad thing.) As I said, the freshest information in the book for me was the look at behind-the-scenes goings-on at Marvel during the 1970's, when the wave of fans turned creators that started with Roy Thomas took over the store... a development that definitely had its up and down sides. Again, here, the author is maybe a bit thin of descriptions of the actual comics being produced and their significance. A comment of my own not so much about the book as some previous reviews... as a reader of the comics, I'll defend Stan Lee from charges that he was a mere hack stealing credit from Kirby, Ditko and others. Looking at the comics produced during those few years of the 60's-- and comparing them to the comics produced by Kirby and Ditko before and after that period, on their own or with other collaborators-- it seems clear to me that for a while there was a genuine synergy between Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, and between Lee and Ditko, enabling them to produce work that was "more than the sum of its parts". From the standpoint of a reader, again, I'll make somewhat of a defense of the infamous Jim Shooter. He may not have been a fun guy to work for, but I've always liked Shooter's own writing, and from my reader's standpoint, when Shooter became Marvel editor-in-chief, the effect, at least at first, was to "get the trains running on time" without snuffing out creativity. The Marvel Comics produced under Shooter's early editorship, I thought at the time and still do, were part of a kind of "Third Golden Age" of the late 70's through mid '80's... along with comics produced by DC and by the burgeoning independent publishers of the time. (I'd like to see a good overall history concentrating on this period of the 1980's.) ### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Tells what was really going on at Marvel, beneath the facade and hype *by D***E on April 11, 2024* Edited review: Marvel Comics: The Untold Story is well written, lively and engaging... a fascinating oral history. The author definitely catches the energy of the early Marvel years, and the personalities, quirks, frustrations, emotional issues and entanglements of seminal figures such as Martin Goodman, Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, Don Heck, Steve Ditko and Flo Steinberg who made Marvel the phenomenon it became - and the generations of writers and artists who followed them. The book has a few errors, such as which artists took over which books in what order, but it's right in the broad strokes, and explains things like why some Marvel characters started having psychedelic experiences in the early '70s (reflecting the lives of the comics' creators), and why the "Clone Saga" in Spider-Man expanded from what was to have been a four month to a two year "epic" (read: tangled mess), as writers and editors changed, were fired, and quit in frustration, and ended up complicating, rather than simplifying, the character's backstory. Anyone who was reading the comics as the years went by and noticed how bad and weird they sometimes were, will learn why in these pages. I'm left with the feeling that it's a miracle that the comics ever got made, with all of the backstabbing and politics that were going on. Some artists and writers were fired for petty reasons; some literally died of strokes or heart attacks at their desks, under the terrible working conditions at the company; others left Marvel (and comics) permanently while still in their prime; this book explains why. ## Frequently Bought Together - Marvel Comics: The Untold Story - All of the Marvels: A Journey to the Ends of the Biggest Story Ever Told - Slugfest: Inside the Epic, 50-year Battle between Marvel and DC --- ## Why Shop on Desertcart? - 🛒 **Trusted by 1.3+ Million Shoppers** — Serving international shoppers since 2016 - 🌍 **Shop Globally** — Access 737+ million products across 21 categories - 💰 **No Hidden Fees** — All customs, duties, and taxes included in the price - 🔄 **15-Day Free Returns** — Hassle-free returns (30 days for PRO members) - 🔒 **Secure Payments** — Trusted payment options with buyer protection - ⭐ **TrustPilot Rated 4.5/5** — Based on 8,000+ happy customer reviews **Shop now:** [https://www.desertcart.com.kw/products/286685-marvel-comics-the-untold-story-the-behind-the-scenes-company](https://www.desertcart.com.kw/products/286685-marvel-comics-the-untold-story-the-behind-the-scenes-company) --- *Product available on Desertcart Kuwait* *Store origin: KW* *Last updated: 2026-05-21*