The rivalry between Marvel Comics and DC Comics goes back decades ? and Stan Lee used to be awfully sassy about the competition. In fact, the comic book icon once said that back in the day, Marvel would do some trolling when ? according to Lee ? Marvel discovered DC was convinced Lee's books were more popular due to certain colors used on the covers. Lee said he and his staff had friends who worked for DC, and they would tell their Marvel pals how DC staff would have big meetings to try and crack why Marvel was moving more books. Whenever DC thought they had figured out Marvel's "secret"--which was usually something cosmetic on the covers--DC would try to mimic Marvel. As soon as Marvel found out, they would remove that element from their own covers, and continue to out-sell DC.
