The Man-Thing (Dr. Theodore "Ted" Sallis) is a fictional character appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. Created by writers Stan Lee, Roy Thomas, and Gerry Conway and artist Gray Morrow, the character first appeared in Savage Tales #1 (May 1971), and went on to be featured in various titles and in his own series, including Adventure into Fear. Steve Gerber's 39-issue run on the series is considered to be a cult classic. The Man-Thing is a large, slow-moving, empathic, humanoid swamp monster living in the Florida Everglades near a Seminole reservation and the fictional town of Citrusville in Cypress County (also fictional), Florida. The character made its live-action debut in the film Man-Thing (2005), played by Conan Stevens. He later appeared in the Marvel Cinematic Universe television special Werewolf by Night (2022), motion-captured by Carey Jones and with Jeffrey Ford providing additional vocalizations. Publication history As described in the text featurette "The Story Behind the Scenes" in Savage Tales #1 (cover-dated May 1971), the black-and-white adventure fantasy magazine in which the character debuted in an 11-page origin story, the Man-Thing was conceived in discussions between Marvel Comics editor Stan Lee and writer Roy Thomas. Together they created five possible origins for the character. Lee provided the name, which had previously been used for unrelated creatures in Marvel's early science-fiction/fantasy anthology Tales of Suspense #7 (January 1960) and #81 (September 1966), as well as the concept of the man losing sentience. As Thomas recalled in 2002: Thomas worked out a detailed plot and gave it to Gerry Conway to script. Thomas and Conway are credited as writers, with Gray Morrow as artist. A second story, written by Len Wein and drawn by Neal Adams, was prepared at that time, but, upon Savage Tales' cancellation after that single issue, "took a year or two to see print", according to Thomas. That occurred in Astonishing Tales #12 (June 1972), in which the seven-page story was integrated in its entirety within the 21-page feature "Ka-Zar", starring Marvel's jungle-lord hero. This black-and-white interlude (with yellow highlighting) segued to the Man-Thing's introduction to color comics as Ka-Zar's antagonist-turned-ally in this and the following issue (both written by Thomas, with the first penciled by John Buscema and the second by Buscema and Rich Buckler). The Wein-written Man-Thing story appeared in between Wein's first and second version of his DC Comics character the Swamp Thing.