Comic Books Comic Strips Obituary

Jim Shooter – RIP

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D. D. Degg Published: July 1, 2025 Updated: July 4, 2025 1 minute 0 comments

Comic book writer and editor Jim Shooter has passed away.

it is being reported that comic book writer, editor, and publisher Jim Shooter has passed away.

Comic book writer Mark Waid informed the world on his Facebook page:

RIP Jim Shooter, 1951-2025.

I’ve just received word that Jim Shooter passed away of esophogeal cancer, which he’s been battling for some time. I realize that for many he’s been a controversial figure in the past (game knows game), mostly with regards to his managereal style, but my experiences with him lay outside that realm and began with my lifelong love for his writing beginning with the first time I ever picked up a copy of Adventure Comics in 1967.

For those who don’t know, Jim broke into comics at the age of 13. Let me say that again: 13. I don’t know about you, but when I was 13, I could barely put sentences together on paper. During a hospital stay, he’d been given some Marvel and DC comics and could clearly see how much more exciting the Marvel books were and couldn’t understand why DC’s books couldn’t have that same vitality. Having no idea how comics scripts were done, he literally wrote and drew a Legion of Super-Heroes story on notebook paper and sent it in to editor Mort Weisinger, who put him to work immediately–having no idea how young he was until later.

Jim left comics in the late 1960s, returning in the mid-1970s to a DC that didn’t quite know what to do with him before moving to Marvel and eventually serving as their EIC for many years. Subsequently, he launched a succession of long- and short-lived comics companies.

Jim Shooter is mostly famous in comic book circles for writing the Superboy and The Legion of Super-Heroes series as a teenager and creating the best-selling Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars. And as the Marvel Editor-in-Chief who, in the late 1970s, got Marvel Comics back on track by insisting things be done his way.

Jim Shooter’s career is detailed in number of obituaries by comic books sites such as Comic Book Resources, and Comics Beat and non-comic sources like Forbes and Wikipedia, with more to come.

Jim’s passing is noted here because he plotted The Amazing Spider-Man comic strip for Stan Lee for about a year from 1977 (beginning with the second story that began on March 1) into 1978 (when Jim became Marvel Comics Editor-in-Chief with the first business day of 1978 his workload became too great to continue on the comic strip), and for most of that time he provided thumbnail layouts/story breakdowns for John Romita.

As Jim Shooter told it:

Finally, in desperation, [Stan Lee] called me to his office.  Looking as though he had a tremendous headache, he asked me if I’d plot the strip.  I said sure.

Then, looking as though his headache was worsening, he explained to me what he needed me to do.  Slowly, and in small words.  As if he were trying to prep a chimp.  Sundays had to fit in continuity, yet stand alone.  They had to add something, but something non-essential to readers who only read the dailies.  16 week arcs.  Big events mid-week.  Teasers.  Etc.  I kept saying, “I know Stan.”

I delivered my overview of the first arc in a day or two.  Stan liked it.  And seemed amazed, befuddled.  I delivered my first few weeks plots, broken down day by day and panel by panel a few days later.  Stan said, “These are good,” with amazement in his voice.  I said, exactly, “I know what I’m doing.”

Stan gave my plots to John to draw and away we went.  There were only two bumps in the road.  First, when Stan went to dialogue a daily a couple of times, he ran into trouble and called me in.  He hadn’t checked what John drew against the plot, of course, and assumed the glitches were plot flaws he hadn’t noticed.  I showed him the plots.  John hadn’t drawn what was called for.  Nonetheless, I had to do some fancy steppin’ to adjust the story.  No time to redraw the art. 

So, instead of turning in written plots, I started doing scribble-sketch layouts, like I used to do at DC, along with notes for clarification. Stan loved it. He wrote the dialogue from my scribbles! Then John couldn’t very well give us a big close up of Mary Jane when an establishing shot was called for.

Update: The Beat pulls together some memories from comics pros of Jim from social media.

feature image by Secret Wars artists Mike Zeck and John Beatty