Stan Lee, the comic-book creator and 95-year-old godfather of the Marvel empire, died Monday—but this certainly won’t be the last his fans see of him. In addition to the enduring legacy of Lee’s work—which has dominated Hollywood for the last decade—he has a variety of cameos already filmed, ready to be deployed in upcoming Marvel features. According to director Joe Russo, at least one of those will be an appearance in Avengers 4—the closing chapter of Marvel Studios’ first phase, coming next May.

It would be fitting if that were his last-ever cameo—but then again, the Lee cameo legacy stretches back years, long before the Avengers were a sparkle in studio chief Kevin Feige’s eye.

Thanks to the ascendency of Marvel Studios, Lee might have displaced Alfred Hitchcock as the most recognizable cameo actor in Hollywood history. He clearly took pride in his lighthearted repeat appearances; at one point, he even lobbied the Academy to create a special Oscar to honor his contribution to film:

Lee’s first cameo among the caped heroes and muscle-bound villains he helped create actually came courtesy of . . . Stan Lee. When he was editor of a comic called All-Winners, Lee wrote himself into a 1941 meta story in which a number of heroes (including Captain America and one of his own creations, the Human Torch) convinced him to add a few new names to their roster. The cameo, though, was text only. Lee’s face wouldn’t appear in the wild comic-book worlds he built until a decade later, when Hank Chapman and Wayne Boring wrote their editor into Astonishing #4. Sporting slicked black hair and no glasses, this drawn version of Lee hardly resembles the one current fans are now so trained to spot.

That man first started appearing on screens in earnest in 1989, when he played the foreman in the trial of Bruce Banner in the TV movie The Trial of the Incredible Hulk.

The year 1989 was a big one for Lee, who also made his first feature-film appearance, opposite Eric Roberts in The Ambulance, and then adorably grappled with some Silly String in Muppet Babies.

During the 90s, when DC Comics ruled the cinema, Lee was largely absent from screens—with a few exceptions, like a fun, lengthy (and bearded!) appearance as himself in 1995’s Mallrats. It wasn’t until 2000, when future Marvel Studios chief Kevin Feige went to work on his first comic-book film, that Lee cameos became a thing. “No one has had more of an impact on my career and everything we do at Marvel Studios than Stan Lee,” Feige told Deadline Monday. “Stan leaves an extraordinary legacy that will outlive us all. Our thoughts are with his daughter, his family, and the millions of fans who have been forever touched by Stan’s genius, charisma, and heart. Excelsior!”

From a hot-dog vendor in the first X-Men movie to Peter Parker’s bus driver in Avengers: Infinity War, Lee’s cameos united his larger Marvel universe even as the bounty was spread out between multiple studios. This summer, he even appeared in a film from rival comic-book giant DC: Teen Titans Go! To the Movies. “I don’t care if it’s a DC movie. I love cameos! Excelsior!” an animated Lee cries out while speeding around the Warner Bros. backlot.

In fact, recently, Lee began making more and more animated cameos, as his declining health made live-action appearances difficult. It was simple enough for him to record a little audio and pop up in cartoon form for Big Hero 6 and the upcoming Ralph Breaks the Internet (out November 21), as well as Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (out December 14). According to Russo, Lee’s distaste for flying also meant that the studio wound up filming several of his cameos at the same time. His appearances in Infinity War, Ant-Man and the Wasp, and next year’s Avengers 4 were all filmed on the same day in Atlanta. “He’s great,” Russo said. “He’s a blast to have on set and everybody loves it. And he seems to engender a really warm response from the audience when he comes on the screen.” There’s no confirmation yet on whether he recorded anything for next year’s Spider-Man: Far from Home or Captain Marvel, however.

Some fans have been hoping that Lee will appear as a de-aged version of himself in the 1990s-set Captain Marvel, a fun nod to the incredible C.G.I. face-lifts that Marvel Studios has been deploying over the past few years. But a cameo like this, of course, would ruin the fun concept put forth during his Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 cameo: the idea that Lee is actually an eternal being called a Watcher, who has been keeping an eye on the larger Marvel universe in his various guises as Fed-Ex delivery men, D.J.s, and bartenders. The sight of a de-aged Lee in Captain Marvel—like the computer-enhanced Leia in Rogue One—would be even more jarring in the wake of the comic-book legend’s recent death.

But if Lee doesn’t appear in Captain Marvel at all, it will be the first Marvel Cinematic Universe film he’s missed in the studio’s decade-long history. While Lee made appearances alongside Fox’s X-Men, Fantastic Four, and Deadpool, as well as Netflix’s Defenders and Sony’s various Spider-Men, he was most consistently a part of Feige’s Marvel. And as his various creations like Tony Stark, Nick Fury, and Peter Parker took absolute control of Hollywood, Lee’s wry-but-stilted delivery and up-for-anything attitude made him the most recognizable figure in comic writing or editing history. Disney C.E.O. Bob Iger recognized the enormity of this loss in the statement he released shortly after news of Lee’s death broke: “Stan Lee was as extraordinary as the characters he created,” Iger told Deadline. “The scale of his imagination was only exceeded by the size of his heart.”

Even someone who has never cracked open a comic book knows who Stan Lee is, and his franchise-hopping cameos gave a sense that no matter what was happening behind the scenes at these various battling studios, they each had the all-important blessing of Stan Lee. With the recent Disney-Fox merger and Sony’s commitment to sharing Peter Parker, Marvel Studios may have finally amassed almost all of Lee’s creations under one roof. But the whole astonishing, incredible, fantastic crew will have to battle on together without Lee by their side.

— What Louis C.K. should actually talk about in his stand-up sets

— The truth about Freddie Mercury’s love life

— Natalie Portman finds a new voice

— Diane Lane is here for female fury

— Will Netflix’s master plan help it own the Oscars?

Looking for more? Sign up for our daily Hollywood newsletter and never miss a story.