Machine Man is an android superhero appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. The character was created by Jack Kirby for 2001: A Space Odyssey #8, a comic written and drawn by Kirby featuring concepts based on the eponymous 1968 Stanley Kubrick feature film and Arthur C. Clarke's 1968 novel. Shortly thereafter, Machine Man spun off into his own Kirby-created series. He is a robot, the only survivor of a series, raised as a human son of scientist Abel Stack, who was killed removing his auto-destruct mechanism, and further evolved to sentience by a Monolith.

2001: A Space Odyssey is an oversized American comic book adaptation of the 1968 film of the same name as well as a ten-issue monthly series which expanded upon the concepts presented in the Stanley Kubrick film and the novel by Arthur C. Clarke. Jack Kirby wrote and pencilled both the adaptation and the series, which were published by Marvel Comics beginning in 1976. The adaptation was part of the agreement of Kirby's return to Marvel.