Mark Bagley was born to a military family in Frankfurt, Germany. He had always wanted to break into the comic book business. At age 18, he joined the military so that he could qualify for the G.I. Bill and go to art school. After his work in the military and art school, he continued trying to break into the comic industry but ended up working for Lockheed Martin making technical drawings. Later in life, he fathered a child, a daughter named Angela, who is a teacher In 1983, Marvel Comics Editor-in-Chief Jim Shooter created the Marvel Try-out Book to draw new talent into the comic book industry. The contest involved a deconstructed comic book in which contestants could complete the comic and submit it to Marvel. The winner would be awarded a professional assignment with Marvel. At 27 years old, Mark Bagley entered the contest and won first place for penciling. This led to a series of low profile penciling jobs including jobs for Marvel's New Universe line and backup stories in Captain America. A majority of his work during this time was for the first series of Marvel Universe Trading cards A couple of years into the New Warriors run, New Warriors editor Danny Fingeroth became responsible for the Spider-Man line of titles. At the same time, Erik Larsen vacated his spot as penciler on Spider-Man’s flagship title The Amazing Spider-Man. Fingeroth decided to take a chance on Bagley, who was a relatively inexperienced artist to be assigned what is arguably Marvel’s flagship title. After a rough start, Bagley hit his stride on The Amazing Spider-Man and eventually grew to be considered the definitive Spider-Man artist of the mid-1990s. His artwork was used extensively for licensed material, appearing on everything from plates and cups to credit cards. Bagley also holds the distinction of being the artist on Marvel’s first web-based comic book, featuring Spider-Man, which appeared on Marvel’s official website.