Origin
Wilbur’s origin on how he became Stilt-Man was probably by far one of the cheapest ways in gaining a starting career as a super villain. Stealing hydraulic rams from his employer Carl Kaxton, Wilbur used them for a designed battle suit that uses telescopic stilts, using this design for greedy purposes by robbing places and victims both ground and air. Starting a one-man crime spree wasn’t enough for Wilbur seeing how there’s no real appreciation for his suit, seeing how it wasn’t he who designed the main component, the hydraulic rams. Coming up with the most devious plan, Wilbur decided to hire attorney Matt Murdock in order to claim full credit for designing the hydraulics and that his employer, Carl stole the ideas from him. Instantly having both Wilbur and Carl getting into a dispute at his home and ending with Wilbur stealing another design from Kaxton. This time Wilbur managed to acquire probably one of the most powerful devices ever designed, which was molecular Condenser, a weapon that could shrink and teleport any object or being. It wouldn’t be long after Wilbur pulled this crafty stunt that he would be facing Daredevil. Which resulted with Wilbur accidentally using the condenser on himself and shrinking himself into a “microverse”.
Creation
Stilt-Man was created by Stan Lee and Wallace Wood in 1965 and first appeared in Daredevil # 8.
Mayor Story Arcs
An unlucky career
Managing to return back to normal, Wilbur found himself continuing his career as a villain and finding recruitment from another Daredevil villain known as the Masked Marauder. Believing that he knew valuable secrets about Daredevil after learning that theirs a connection between Matt Murdock and Daredevil, Stilt-man abducted Murdock and his co-workers trying to lure Daredevil into a trap. Instead, Spider-Man confronted Wilbur instead. Even though Wilbur was clearly out-matched, he managed to gain victory by knocking Spiderman out with one of stun gas bombs. Clearly a victory by sheer luck, Wilbur found his luck instantly changed when he was defeated by Daredevil minutes later.
Officially a villain for the guardian of Hell’s Kitchen, Wilbur found himself being recruited by a small gang of other Daredevil villains formed by Electro. Calling themselves the Emissaries of Evil, this group didn’t do any better than individually as all members found themselves quickly defeated by Daredevil. After Wilbur’s escape from prison, he decided to take another turn for his career as a hired assassin. Self-proclaiming to be the best, Wilbur’s false claim was shown when he was unsuccessful to kill Foggy Nelson and face another defeat by Daredevil. After facing more defeats by the hands of Daredevil, Wilbur decided to haunt Kaxton by kidnapping his daughter, Barbara. Forcing the scientist to rebuild a molecular condenser by threatening the life of his daughter. Blinded by the extremely delusional idea of being a god, Wilbur’s plans was to shrink cities and to simply rule them. As predicted, Wilbur found himself and his hired henchmen facing defeat by Daredevil and Black Widow, and both of the Kaxtons being saved.
From being unlucky to being humiliated
It wouldn’t be long until Stilt-Man found himself going against the likes of other heroes within the Marvel Universe. Even though his encounter with Spider-Man landed him with a positive outlook within his career, Stilt-man didn’t succeed any better than sheer luck when trying to attack Falcon (Sam Wilson). Respectfully standing trial for his crimes, Wilbur’s second attempt to pursue his career as an assassin found himself not only fighting Falcon, but also his partner Captain America as well. Facing another embarrassing defeat as Wilbur found himself literally begging for mercy after facing defeat. However, Wilbur’s career took another victory when fighting against Black Goliath with his Z-Ray gun. Believing that he annihilated the hero, Wilbur only sent Goliath to another planet. As expected, the hero returned with the superhero team known as The Champions and not only was Wilbur’s Z-Ray destroyed, but he also faced a violent defeat at the hands of Goliath, when Goliath beat Wilbur with one of his own torn stilts.
Later Wilbur would find himself being freed by Blastaar and recruited to serve the sentient computer known as FAUST. Armed with a new upgraded and adamantium version of his battle suit, Wilbur was sent to steal radioactive isotopes. Gaining the attention of Thor, Wilbur couldn’t fend against the hero and attempted to flee from battle only to find FAUST taking over the armor and forcing Wilbur to fight against the hero alongside Blastaar. Thor managed to defeat Blastaar and and the unwilling Wilbur, who started to realize that his career as a villain may not be the best idea for him.
Changing his course as a mercenary and remodeling his armor, Wilbur’s bad luck struck again when a low-life criminal Turk Barrett managed to steal Wilbur’s armor. Instantly going on crime spree as the new Stilt-man, Wilbur found himself ironically teaming with Daredevil and stopping Turk from his rampage. After the humiliation that Wilbur went through once again, Wilbur finally decided that being Stilt-man was nothing more than a sad joke, quitting his career as a super villain.
When it was believed that the Kingpin had died, his wife, Vanessa Fisk, offered Wilbur a portion of her husband’s wealth and power. When Wilbur’s position was challenged by Owl, Wilbur decided that he had had enough of his criminal career, and went to confess all of his wrong-doings to Matt Murdock. Matt denied everything he was told, truly believing that Wilbur had reformed, and let Wilbur go free. Wilbur turned in his suit and went on to live a normal, villain-free life.
Civil War and Death
Days later he returned to the suit, becoming a wannabe crime-fighter. He used a new and improved suit courtesy of Phineas Mason aka The Tinkerer. During oe of his busts, an attempted arrest of already convicted mafia informant Fulvio Morsella, The Punisher who also had Morsella in his sights, promptly blew him off his legs with a LAW and shot a bullet to his face at point blank range. He was last seen at his wake, which was attended by many of his supervillain friends.
Successors
During Day’s absence from the world of costumed crime, a unnamed criminal acquired the Stilt-Man armor. This Stilt-Man was defeated by Daredevil and Luke Cage. He was next seen being dispatched by Ms. Marvel and Spider-Man.
Stilt-Man’s armor was also wore by an unknown criminal with a supposed Napoleon complex. When in jail, he met The Owl and joined his Gang of Four. Together, they tried to gain control over Kingpin’s criminal empire, but ultimately failed when The Copperhead double-crossed the rest of the gang and tried to bring Hell to Earth. He hung Stilt-Man and Gladiator (who was an impostor of the original, too) in the church, making them see nightmarish hallucinations. When Copperhead was sent back to Hell, both Stilt-Man and Gladiator were presumably arrested.
At some point a petty criminal by the name of Michael Watts was able to come across Stilt-Man’s old costume thanks to the Tinkerer. After making a notion that he should be the new Stilt-Man he was voted in also by the owner of the bar that the Punisher blew up during Stilt-Man’s wake, and two other small bit criminals.
A fifth (this time female) version of Stilt-Man, calling herself Lady Stilt-Man, adopted her codename an homage to the original. She was easily defeated by Spider-Man and Deadpool.
An anti-hero anarchist techno-terror cell Bastard Sons of Wilbur Day, was formed in the name of orginal Stilt-Man.
Other Versions
Marvel Adventures
Stilt Man would be involved in several stories taking place in the Marvel Adventures comics which are standalone stories and does not take place in the current Marvel Universe continuity.
Stilt Man would team up with Rocket Racer and Leap Frog to commit various crimes for the Tinkerer and come into conflict with Spider Man.
In Other Media
Television
- Stilt-Man makes a cameo appearance in the Iron Man: The Animated Series episode “Armor Wars: Part 1,” voiced by Dorian Harewood. He is seen as one of the armored criminals whose suit incorporates stolen technology from Stark International. Iron Man confronts Stilt-Man while the latter is pulling off a heist, and uses his Drill Armor to destroy one of the legs. Once Stilt-Man is knocked off balance by this, Iron Man uses one of his negator packs to destroy the armor.
- While Stilt-Man himself does not appear in the series, his trademark legs can be seen in the background of Melvin Potter‘s shop in the first season finale of Daredevil.
Video Games
- Stilt-Man appears as an assist character in the PSP version of Spider-Man: Web of Shadows.
- Wilbur Day appears in the Nintendo DS version of Iron Man 2.
Merchandise
- Stilt-Man was featured in the HeroClix figure game.
- Stilt-Man was featured in Diamond Select’s Minimates line as part of a two-pack with Iron Man.
- Stilt-Man was featured in Hasbro’s Marvel Legends line as the subject of a Build-a-Figure wave based on the animated film Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. The Hand Ninja figure in the wave came packaged with special leg extenders for the character, meaning that, depending on the number of Hand figures purchased, collectors could make Stilt-Man as tall as they liked.