Marvel Studios is licensing Stan Lee’s likeness from the company he sued before his death

Image: Marvel Studios

Stan Lee has been dead for a while, but there is a new deal between the two companies. It is possible that the legendary comics creator is going to be appearing in more than one project in the near future.

POW! Entertainment, the production house co-founded in 2001 by Stan Lee, has entered a licensing agreement with Genius Brands and has the right to use Lee's likeness in its upcoming projects. Genius Brands CEO and chairman Andy Heyward expressed pride and stewardship for the rights to Stan Lee's name, likeness, merchandise, and intellectual property brand, in a press release about the 20-year deal.

Stan should be able to experience his movies and theme park experiences at Disney.

In the years and months leading up to Lee's death in 2018, his life was marked by scandalous allegations of elder abuse as well as financial troubles that seemed to stem from his being surrounded by people looking to cash in on the X-Men co- creator's name. Lee filed a suit against POW! co-founder Gill Champion and CEO Shane Duffy for using his likeness in a deal that Lee believed was non-exclusive at the time. POW! insisted that Lee's claims were completely without merit, and the lawsuit was dropped just months before Lee's death. In his press release today, Champion said that he sees the licensing deal as a way of honoring Lee.

Champion said he was looking forward to commemorating Stan's work in a new way.

The writing has been on the wall for some time now that Hollywood is more interested in using digital facsimiles of dead celebrities to keep their living fans engaged and consuming content, but it's unclear whether Lee will continue to cameo According to The Hollywood Reporter, Heyward said that while he and others always field offers with a focus on protecting legacies, what will determine how the public receives future depictions of Lee is the intentionality behind it.

If it is done with class and taste, and respectful of who Stan was, it will be welcomed.