"the illusion of change" - did Stan Lee ever say it?

[JKCarrier]

Ironically, the Spider-Clone was an attempt to restore the status quo...they wanted a young, single Spidey again, and the clone was supposed to be it. But ultimately they chickened out, which turned it into an even bigger mess. Of course, the recent "Deal with Mephisto" storyline was an even clumsier, goofier attempt at the same thing. And this time it stuck.

[earl]

They turned Hal Jordan into a mass murderer who completely destroyed the Green Lantern Corps. Then they turned him into the Spectre.

That isn't just burning the crops, that's salting the fields.

It made them some money in the short run, but it was pretty much breaking the toys. Thing is that when you undo those kind of stories, you got to get into some weird kind of comic logic that is even bizarro for a comic book fan.

[icctrombone]

I'm trying to track down the source of the "comics are about the illusion of change" quote. Most people say that Stan Lee said it, but they admit it's apocryphal. The earliest reference I can find is from 1983, an essay on Stan Lee by Alan Moore:

So who really said it? And if it was Stan, when did he say it? Does anyone know who I could ask? I was going to ask Brian Cronin on Legends Revealed, but I already asked a question five years ago (he's still working on it I assume) and he is obviously a busy man.
Any ideas?

If anyone knows the answer to this question, it must be cei-u

[MonteMike72]

I recall John Byrne talking about how he "played fair". He described that as only having a title character for a fixed period of time, and that writers were 'required' to leave the character pretty much as they found him... that is, you could put him through all kinds of changes and challenges, but when you leave the strip, it must still be the main character with the basics of what defines him intact.

You can see this happen again and again in Marvel comics. Examples are everywhere, from Iron Man to Peter Parker, from Mary Jane to Aunt May, from the Hulk to the Thing, and especially, in the Fantastic Four.

In my opinion that is a very sound and good policy. Why ruin characters for future readers?

[Brannon]

In my opinion that is a very sound and good policy. Why ruin characters for future readers?

I like innovation and the maintaining of a "good" status quo, so this has always been a tough one for me. I can't really see how you can constantly innovate and change characters as popular as Batman or Spider-Man, making it permanent of course, without damaging the "brand." Like it or not, that's what Superman, Batman, Spider-Man, etc, are. Alan Moore is probably my favorite writer from a technical perspective, but there is also a place for other good writers like Chris Claremont and Roger Stern who like "playing with the toys."

I think what works best with established characters is not to seek to change them so much as to seek to add to their mythos, making the mythology that much richer. Creator owned and finite series are the places to truly "change" things--characters aging, etc. I can understand why certain creators have no interest in writing a character like Batman or Spider-Man who will never be allowed to change or evolve all that much, but I can also understand those creators that like working in such an environment. The only problem I see is when one method takes dominance over the other. We need characters that evolve and grow with us, but we also need idealized heroes that will always be there when we need a psychological "rock" to lean on.