CAMP PENDLETON,Calif. -- Servicemembers and their families attended the first of Stan Lee’s POW!er Concerts at the Pacific Views Event Center here April 5.
Country music band Gloriana played live music to honor what POW! Entertainment suggests are the “courageous everyday superheroes” on base.
“All my life I’ve created fictional superheroes,” said Lee, chairman of Marvel and member of the Editorial Board of Marvel Comics. “These (servicemembers) are real superheroes and they deserve to be recognized.”
The concert series was developed by Lee and Mike Dodd, a former Marine and current managing partner of KC Capital LLP.
“We got together one night, had dinner and I asked ‘How do we make our worlds collide?” Dodd explained.
Lee said they wanted to do something affordable and different for the troops.
“Years ago during World War II, Bob Hope used to go around to the USOs and traveled overseas,” said Lee. “What he did was wonderful, and I’d like to do a little of what he used to do.”
Lee autographed concert pamphlets and superhero paraphernalia before the show began. Paul, an 11-year-old comic reader, eagerly waited to meet Lee.
“I wanted to meet Stan Lee so he could sign my comic book,” Paul said while gripping his Spiderman comic. “He created some of the greatest superheroes of all time.”
“We hope that tonight’s concert will be fun for (servicemembers),”said Lee. “They deserve a lot more than what we can give them.”
After signing autographs and taking photos with fans, Lee and Brig. Gen. Vincent A. Coglianese, the base commanding general and regional authority for five military installations in the southwestern United States, presented Gloriana to the crowd.
“I think it’s great that Stan is involved in our lives by putting on these shows,” said Lance Cpl. Rich Kearney, a staff judge advocate clerk with Headquarters and Support Battalion here.
