Scenes from Fan Expo Vancouver 2014

Fan Expo Vancouver rolled into town on April 18 to 20. This was the third edition of Fan Expo in Vancouver and it was another big success. This year's Expo was expanded to three days instead of two, and it was a little unusual to fall on the Easter holiday weekend. Like the upcoming 2014 Fan Expo in Toronto, this year's Fan Expo Vancouver was scheduled on a holiday long weekend, and this may have prevented some folks from attending. On the bright side, the organizers seemed to have solved the long line-ups problem from last year, as this year's wait lines didn't seem as long as the ones from last year.
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For The Love Of Collecting

So how do we make wise decisions as collectors and as businessmen or women? I really don't have a magical answer to that question. I have both bought and sold books, and afterward wondered why I did either, but invariably a lot of it comes down to money. Moulaaah, cash flow! Even if I have a great copy of an issue, when I see one that is a little bit nicer I can justify buying it with no problem whatsoever.
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GTA Comic Con 2014

April 19th/2014 was the inaugural GTA Comic Con at the Sheraton Hotel in Toronto. The show was organized and presented by RPG Events, who also organizes the Canadian ToyCon and Burlington Toy Show. This was their first foray into being a straight comic book convention, with of course, attractions for all fans of comics, toys, collectibles and general "nerdery".
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Cap’s Artist Alley Part One: Captain America 109-113

This eleven issue run has two strong story arcs, and features Rogues gallery of Marvel artists. Early Daredevil and late Original X-Men runs also feature a stellar group of artists in them, however I think they fall just a little short of this one. Jack Kirby, Jim Steranko, John Romita, John Buscema, Sal Buscema, and Gene Colan all get a crack at Captain America here. All of the stories are written by Stan Lee. This edition of Arcs and Runs will be as much about the artists as the stories themselves, and will be in two parts.
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The Return of ComicLink Canadian Whites

The last ComicLink featuring a collection of Canadian “Whites” was this past February and, in the end, commanded some eye-opening prices for these scarce books. There we had about three dozen books, most in mid-grade to better. In my opinion even 6.5 and up should be considered “high grade” for these scarce Canadian wartime comics, given that so few are found in this condition. This month’s auction, even though it has almost double the amount of books (61), has them in mostly in lower grades. Almost a dozen of them are incompletes (0.5) because of a centerfold missing or a rectangular coupon cut out of the front cover. I’ve done a summary of the books on offer in a chart form anchored on condition, going from the lowest to the highest.
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Captain America: The Winter Soldier

In writing this column I was forced to abandon my original idea of a spoiler-free review. The movie came about 6 days ago and you can find all sorts of spoiler-free reviews online, and all of the really interesting stuff I want to discuss requires this to be a pretty spoilerific article. So here is the warning: don't read any further if you have not seen Captain America: The Winter Soldier.
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Canadian Crude

I recently came across a copy of a newsprint comic put out in April of 1941 called Canadian Rocket. I’m sure that some of you have already seen it. This has no glossy or cardboard type cover and is simply a newsprint publication that is a little larger than a regular comic book. Perhaps this was also the format of Robin Hood Comics No. 1 by Anglo American Publications which appeared on the stands a month earlier along with Better Comics No. 1 from Maple Leaf Publications. The indicia attribute it to Victory Publishing Co. in Toronto.
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