10 Mind-Blowing Facts You Didn't Know About Stan Lee
2. He Didn't Know They Were Going To Kill Of Gwen Stacy
The death of Gwen Stacy is now seen as one of the major turning points in comic book history. Up until this story, it was unthinkable that a major character could be killed off this way, but when writer Gerry Conway, editor Roy Thomas, and inker John Romita Sr. got together, they reasoned that to shake up such an established character as your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man, something drastic needed to be done.
Their plan was to have the Green Goblin throw Gwen from a bridge and when Peter attempts to save her, the sudden stop from the fall would break her neck. A tad drastic, but with Stan's blessing they went ahead with it and created history. Except Stan didn't realize what he was agreeing too.
According to an interview he gave with Alter Ego magazine:
"... I was just getting ready to go to Europe on some sort of a business trip... And I think I wasn't thinking too clearly, because when they said, 'We'd like to kill Gwen Stacy,' I said, 'Well, if that's what you want to do, okay.' ... and when I came back and found out that Gwen had been killed, I thought 'Why would they do that? Why would Gerry write anything like that?' And I had to be reminded later on that I had perhaps reluctantly or perhaps carelessly said 'Okay' when they asked me."