5 Pieces Of Advice Stan Lee Has For Creating A Great Superhero

"I take a deep breath, cross my fingers, and hope I can come up with something good."

Stan Lee, creator of such iconic superheroes as Spider-Man, Iron Man, The Hulk, Thor –and many, many more – is currently working with LINE Webtoon on a Superhero Comics Contest with POW! Entertainment.

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Winners will receive $30,000 and become a LINE WEBtoon featured artist. They'll also receive mentorship on their comic from Lee himself.

We spoke to Lee via email about his creative process and his tips for creating a great hero.

On the first thing he does when he sits down to create a character:

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"I take a deep breath, cross my fingers, and hope I can come up with something good."

On the most important trait a character can have:

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"He or she has to be colorful, interesting, unusual and sympathetic. If there's one important trait it has to be 'interesting.'"

And on how to translate a jumble of traits on a page into a complex, three-dimensional individual:

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"The best way to do that is through their dialogue."

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"Each character should have his or her own individual method of speaking, so that if you read a dialogue balloon (without seeing the illustration) you would know who it was who said that dialogue just by the style in which it was spoken."

And on the biggest mistake people make when writing a character:

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"They make the character too dull and colorless."

There you have it — the master has spoken.