*

A holographic A.I. version of comic creator Stan Lee

debuted at

L.A Comic Con

*

The hologram was trained on Stan Lee's myriad appearances

on red

carpets and at fan conventions

*

The hologram has sparked controversy among some fans

By Danielle Broadway

LOS ANGELES, Sept 26 (Reuters) - Wearing a green sweater

and tan pants against a bright blue screen, Marvel comic book

superhero creator Stan Lee will return to L.A. Comic Con in

holographic form to meet fans of his characters including

Spider-Man, Hulk, Iron Man and Thor.

Fans can interact with a hologram of Lee, who died in 2018

at the age of 95, in an enclosed booth at the Los Angeles

Convention Center.

"It was obviously sad for many of us when Stan passed," said

Chris DeMoulin, chief executive of Comikaze Entertainment, which

operates Los Angeles Comic Con. "For the last couple of years,

we've been talking about things we might be able to do to help

extend Stan's legacy."

About six months ago, DeMoulin said he came up with the idea

of creating an avatar of Lee to serve as an "entry point for

fans, old and new, into the Marvel universe."

The project was a collaboration of Proto Hologram, a company

whose holographic technology has been used in malls to promote

films such as "The Conjuring" and "A Minecraft Movie," and

Hyperreal, an artificial intelligence firm that creates

realistic-looking digital humans.

The hologram was trained on Stan Lee's myriad appearances on red

carpets and at fan conventions. Fans who never met Lee in person

might recognize him from his cameo appearances in every

live-action Marvel movie made during his lifetime.

"This avatar will never say something that Stan didn't say,"

said DeMoulin. "It will never have a point of view about Marvel

or the stories or Stan's role in them that hasn't come directly

from something Stan has said."

Mammoth Vision's George Johnson said that they used

technological guardrails to prevent Lee from saying something

out of character.

"We take Stan Lee's words and import them into the model and

then we put rails on the side of it," said Johnson, "So he

doesn't go off and talk about things that Stan wouldn't have

said."

In a demonstration Friday, holographic Lee talked about his

love of fan conventions.

"My favorite thing about being at a comic convention is

getting to meet all the amazing fans and hearing their stories

about how Marvel has impacted their lives," Lee said in the late

actor's voice.

Not everyone welcomed Lee's posthumous appearance at

the convention.

Some commenters on Reddit criticized the Stan Lee

Experience.

"Even in death, they won't let the guy rest," wrote one

commenter, posting under the name RGCBlade. "It's all pretty

dystopian."