Discussing the minutiae of comic book collecting.
Discussing the minutiae of comic book collecting.
ComicLink August Featured Auction
The ComicLink August Featured Auction has ended. I really like these Featured Auctions because they are not dominated by Silver and Bronze Age Marvels. In last month’s ComicLink Focused Auction 94% of the top 50 comics traded were Marvels. This time around Marvel represents only 42% of the top 50 books. DCs came in at 26%, original art 14%...
For me Batman #1 delivers a lot. The comic outperforms two other notable title launches in several ways. A quick look at the credentials of Batman #1 vs. those of Superman #1 and Amazing Spider-Man #1 highlights just how important the first issue of Bats is. Pick up a copy of the Overstreet Price Guide and read up on the above issues, I’m sure you’ll agree that Batman #1 brings the most to the table. The Joker’s first appearance will trump J.J. Jameson any day. The first female villain...
Terribly sorry for the large intervals between articles but I’ve been held captive by Dr Doom, much like the Scarlet Witch in Avengers Children Crusade! Why doesn’t the Asbestos Man have cancer yet? Professor Orson Karloff was one of the…
Fan Expo 2010 is done for me. None of my Sunday goals were reached and the show remained packed; no last day slow down. It’s solid for the retailers but as a buyer I like bargain hunting at the end…
Saturday at Fan Expo was crazier than usual: the crowds were so intense all afternoon there was a long line waiting to get in. If only the deals were that crazy… I dedicated the day to getting various hardcovers signed.…
Fan Expo 2010 started today at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre. The early bird package had a 2:00 PM entrance and there were hundreds lined up to get in: I’ve never seen a crowd that large buying a premium VIP…
What a cover! What an issue! "A Time of Titans" tells the tale of Thor fighting along side Adolf Hitler and the Nazis (all part of a Hitler scheme to get all the Gods of Asgard to help him to conquer the world). Thor is in Russia trying to kill Josef Stalin. Sub-Mariner and his Invaders somehow manage to save Stalin. Thor eventually gets wind of Hitler’s scheme (thanks to an in disguise...
In 1989 Marvel decided to give some Joe Simon and Jack Kirby works the deluxe treatment in the form of hardcover reprints. The Fighting American, Captain America and Boys Ranch were reprinted as hardcover volumes outside of the Marvel Masterworks…
Here’s the thing. I really couldn’t pick one over the other so I’m picking both of these comic books for this week’s Undervalued Spotlight.
In January of 1947 Avon Periodicals published Eerie Comics #1. Eerie #1 is credited as being the first true horror comic. Overstreet guide value for Eerie #1 is a healthy $8,200.00. Though the book is also credited as establishing the horror genre it really did not cause an...
Early Marvel Keys are one of the most collected group of comic books in the hobby. A hobby wide consensus regarding a book's status as a legitimate Marvel key is enough to send it's value way up. The Tales to Astonish title had already given us Hank Pym, the Ant-Man a year and a half earlier. In Tales to Astonish issue #44 Janet van Dyne becomes...
The ComicLink July Focused Auction has just ended. Much like last month’s ComicLink auction this one was dominated by Silver Age Marvels. Only 3 DC books cracked the top 50 in terms of price realized...
American Comics Group (ACG) editor Richard E. Hughes contributed much to comic books. Hughes was already a veteran of the industry in 1958 (he was ACG editor at this time). The early 1940s characters Fighting Yank and Black Terror were among Hughes’ more popular creations. A prolific writer, Hughes used many pseudonyms. The most famous of these ‘pen names’ would be Shane O’Shea (though my favorite is Ace Aquila). It was Shane O’Shea that received the writing credits for the...
Apologies for the hiatus but we’re backing with another mindnumbing installment of Why are we thinking about this? What happens to size-changing superheroes that eat before size alterations? In Marc Millar’s Ultimates, it is specifically stated by the Wasp to…
It was 1989 and DC comics was celebrating the 50th anniversary of Batman. They had started slowly publishing reprint material in softcover trade paperbacks but hardcover editions were left to Warner Books, Graphitti Designs and with these volumes Longmeadow Press.…
What kind of features should we demand of a principle Marvel key? This group of comics is one of the most important investing blocks in the hobby. People are buying up high grade Marvel keys as a group and you can’t really have one without any of the others and call yourself a true high end collector...
The Phantom was the brainchild of Mandrake the Magician creator Lee Falk. Mr. Falk’ brilliant twist to the character was that he made his Phantom the 21st in a line stretching back over 400 years. The Phantom always fought evil wearing the same costume, part of a ruse to get the bad guys to believe that the character was immortal.
Four Color Comics was a Dell Comic anthology series that ran from 1939 top 1962. Often Dell introduced characters (original and licensed) in the Four Color run. If the character sold well Dell would launch a separate series devoted to the character. When we look at titles like Turok (original) and Bugs Bunny (licensed) we see that Dell published several issues within the Four Color run (actually more than...
Captain Victory and the Galactic Rangers #3, Pacific Comics, March 1982. This little gem has quite a lot going for it. First off the book features the first appearance of Ms. Mystic (back up story). Ms. Mystic is a witch who was burned at the stake during the Salem witch hunts of the late 17th century...
The Cover: Why does Jimmy Olsen even consider Superman a friend? Superman apparently can’t take a joke or something, as he tells Jimmy off for being a wise-guy and rebuffs his pleas to being rescued from the slum! Can we…
The June Focused Auction ended last week on ComicLink. This auction really should have beed called the Marvel Silver and Bronze Auction (with a few DCs thrown in to make it look good). Only 1 DC cracked the top 30 in terms of price realized (only 4 DCs in the top 50). Star Trek #1 from Gold Key was the first non