Legendary authors Stan Lee and J.K. Rowling are among the inductees into the Museum of Pop Culture’s Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame, the MoPOP announced in a press release. Lee and Rowling will be featured in MoPOP’s Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame exhibition later this year.
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Among the most influential comic book writers of all time, the 95-year-old Lee is best known for the co-creation of iconic and enduring Marvel Comics characters Spider-Man, Iron Man, Black Panther, and super teams the Avengers, the X-Men, and the Fantastic Four.
Born Stanley Martin Lieber, Lee began his illustrious career as an assistant at Timely Comics at age 17. Lee became editor and wrote a wide variety of comics, including horror, westerns, and romance.
Lee helped birth the Marvel Universe in 1961 with the creation of the Fantastic Four, which he co-created with Jack Kirby after Lee’s wife, Joan, urged him to write a comics story to please himself when he considered quitting the business.
The Fantastic Four began an era of massive success and pop culture notability for the newly named Marvel Comics, resulting in Lee’s collaborations with artists like Steve Ditko and John Romita Sr., establishing hit titles like The Amazing Spider-Man and The Mighty Thor.
Dozens of films inspired by Lee’s works have followed in the decades since, resulting most famously in Marvel Studios’ shared Marvel Cinematic Universe, home to fan-favorite A-list superheroes Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.), Spider-Man (Tom Holland), and Black Panther (Chadwick Boseman).
Marvel Studios’ films have brought in over $16 billion worldwide. The Disney-owned studio next releases their 20th film, Ant-Man and the Wasp, July 6.
52-year-old British novelist Rowling is best known for creating the beloved Harry Potter series of books about a young boy who discovers he’s a wizard, embarking on a magical and at times dangerous journey at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.
Rowling first mapped out her expansive saga on a massive number of handwritten notes, which she would then transform into a seven-book series. The first installment of the series, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, was released in the U.K. in 1997 before reaching America in 1998 as Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone.
The book series was brought to life by Warner Bros. as a successful film franchise, releasing eight films between 2001 and 2011 and earning nearly $8 billion worldwide.
Warner Bros. revived the franchise in 2016 with prequel-slash-spinoff series Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, produced and scripted by Rowling. The planned five-film franchise releases its next installment, Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald, November 16.
Also among the class of newest inductees are the fan-favorite Legend of Zelda Nintendo video game series and the Joss Whedon-created Buffy the Vampire Slayer television series.
