Stan Lee's voice and likeness have been resurrected, thanks to AI

Source: Engadget

Frazer Harrison/Getty Images

Stan Lee’s Voice and Likeness Added to ElevenLabs

Voice‑cloning specialist ElevenLabs has signed a deal with Stan Lee Universe to use the late Marvel legend’s voice and likeness across its apps and licensing platforms. Lee now joins Judy Garland, Michael Caine, John Wayne and David Hasselhoff on the ElevenLabs Iconic Marketplace, where companies can license celebrity voices and IP for commercial use.

ElevenReader and the Stan Lee Book Club

The partnership also brings Stan Lee to the ElevenReader app, launched in 2024. Users can upload text files and have them read aloud by an AI‑generated narrator. ElevenLabs offers 10 free hours of text‑to‑audio each month, with an unlimited paid subscription at $8.25 per month.

ElevenReader will feature a Stan Lee Book Club of the Month, a monthly celebration of literature Lee loved. The June pick is Robert Louis Stevenson’s Treasure Island, and a new public‑domain work will be added each month for the next year.

ElevenCreative Image Generator

According to Variety, Lee’s likeness can now be used in the ElevenCreative AI image generator. Users may place him in comic‑inspired visual templates for non‑commercial use, and the technology could eventually enable Lee to appear in any movie cameo.

“Stan always believed in meeting his fans where they were: in the pages of a comic, at a convention, or in a quick on‑screen cameo,” said Chaz Rainey of Stan Lee Universe.
“This partnership is a way of continuing that. Fans have always told us that when they read his comics, they hear the words in Stan’s voice, and now, thanks to ElevenLabs, we can make that a reality. His voice, his image, his love of storytelling… ElevenLabs gives us a way to keep that alive and in fans’ hands in a way that’s true to who he was.”

Audio Filters and Eleven Music

ElevenLabs is also adding several Stan Lee‑inspired audio filters to its AI music generator, Eleven Music. Filters such as “Superhero Swells” and “Retro Hero Fanfare” are available to all users without approval.

Eleven Music, launched last year, is a royalty‑free AI music service that generates songs from prompts. The model was initially trained on data licensed from music labels Merlin Network and Kobalt Music Group, with plans to eventually bring major labels on board.