Eponymous

Last of the series. Thanks!

You mean in the second-to-last image? Yeah, it looks like the printer was not having a good day. You can see on that page how the cut is not squared with the art as well as how the rollers(?) left marks on some pages. That's part of why I posted this one. I'm curious about the impact of manufacturing mistakes. Reverse stamps are worth more!

Starring Batman and, uh, Batman (Earths 1 and 2, of course). The Outsiders also get a preview. There's some staining on the cover, but it also looks like the top was not well cut at the printer. You can see the ugly edges on the too-long pages. It's also glued (I think) and not stapled.

Another toy tie-in from Marvel. They did get the FF appearance in #15 & 16.

Ah, there's also a little Conan trial story at the end, though it's Starr the Slayer, not the Barbarian. That could have been it, too.

Re-publishing the origin story in this series. I'm sure there's a term for this (which I don't know), but the staples are not on the spine and apparently not through the cover either. They're the source of those marks on the back near the spine.

Not at all sure why this appealed to my teenage self.

First appearance of the Black Mask, sporting a stylish fedora.

Interesting. I guess he was able to revive that during his stint at DC.

Curious here: would the "minor creases" of the definition be the "color breaking creases"? I see a lot of reference in people's comments to the latter along the spine, but nothing specifically mentioning them in the grade definitions. TIA.

I guess Jack and Stan were feuding.

Hollywood's favorite Batman villain gets his own comic. I like the self-referential cover dialog.

Thanks, everybody, for the interesting comments. My own sense of the grading that I see here is that there's a steep drop-off from 8 to 5. That is, what I'd have said were relatively minor things cause a quick fall in grade.

Thanks for the detail. You’re right that that looks like a tear on the back, but it isn’t. Some kind of pressure resulting in a dark colored artifact? I’ve been looking around at various on line guides to grading and it seems to me that books like this one qualify for something in the 6 range, though again I’m inexperienced with this, so the notes are helpful.

Thanks for this. I'm trying to get better at grading and am curious about just which defects draw this to ~5.5. I see the creases and stress lines on the fold. But no tears and pretty good gloss on a clean cover. I'd have put it a little higher.