F For Fake

I've lurked in this thread for quite some time, and felt it was long past overdue for me to give my two cents. Having grown up as a comic reader in the 80's, Dave Stevens has been my favorite artist for longer than I can recall. By the late 90's I had managed to put together a pretty much complete (I think it was complete, but it seems there's always some weird rarity here or there) collection of his covers. Once they started collecting this stuff in hardcover form a couple of years ago, I decided to sell the floppies. It remains one of the biggest mistakes of my collecting life, and a few months ago I started re-buying those books, only this time I'm going the slabbed route. At any rate, it was my great pleasure to get to meet Dave at DragonCon several years ago. I know I've mentioned this elsewhere, but D-Con remains my favorite con for meeting comic pros because comics are just one tiny sliver of what that show is about, so you can oftentimes find your idols just sitting at a table, with no line whatsoever. So it was that I found Dave at his table, completely alone and eating a sandwich. I decided to let him finish up before I bugged him, so I made a couple of passes at his table before I finally settled in. Of course at the time I had no idea that we would be losing him so soon, so I take some solace in the fact that when I met him, I used the opportunity to tell him that he had been my favorite artist since I was a kid, and how much his work meant to me. He was very humble and pleasant. I never like to overstay my welcome, so I had a couple of things signed and then went on my way. Of course now I wish I had bent his ear all day long, but at the time it seemed best to not burden him. These are the prints I walked away with, and they remain some of my most treasured possessions: and I had a couple of other pieces signed that I later sold off, and I'm kicking myself about that now. But they weren't personalized, and that is what makes these so precious to me. Some other favorite Dave related pieces that I own: Signed/Numbered Bettie Print Brush With Passion signed/numbered slipcase edition Signature page from same I bought the BWP book from a guy auctioning off several pieces of Dave's estate. (Who knows, he may be in this thread too!) He threw in a couple of extras that I was happy to have. I know someone else posted it earlier, but I was THRILLED to have the "Thanks for a Wonderful Evening" motion greeting card after years of searching. He also threw in some neat odds and ends like what appears to be a Christmas card. Anyway, the morals of this long-winded tale: 1. Never pass up an opportunity to tell your heroes just how much they mean to you, because you never know how long they'll be around. Don't put them off until "the next con". and 2. Dave is the best, and this thread is a terrific place to talk about his awesome stuff. Thanks gang!

My personal (admittedly worthless) opinion is no. The Cult of Harley has been growing steadily since she first appeared on BTAS, and now has an entire generation of fans only making her hotter. As far as DC's mainstream visibility, she is arguably the third or fourth most recognizable and/or popular female character in their stable (I'd suppose Wonder Woman is technically still the top, with Catwoman, Harley and Supergirl mixing it up behind her). The character has been cultivated through a previous solo series, a recent team book, and now another solo series coming up, plus appearances in video games and merchandising out the yin yang. I know I said this in another thread at some point, but it really seems like DC has been working the "Gotham Girls" characters, trying to turn them into their own twisted version of the Disney Princesses. She stands alongside Venom and Deadpool as one of the very, very few characters from the last 20 years that actually stuck. I really do feel like the sky is the limit with her. Joker's Daughter has obviously been around quite a bit longer, but has largely been out of the public eye until this recent New 52 reboot. The combination of the Joker + sexy lady mixed with the 3D cover hype has made the character a sensation overnight, and I don't doubt that those books will make a jump, and perhaps even stick there for awhile. But I think she has a long way to go before she is as omnipresent, and therefore as hot on the marketplace, as Harley. Again, just my two cents! They are still really cool books!

From one fellow Kentuckian to another that is one sweet run of books very impressive Ditto!

Conan picture frames.

Glad to see this finally getting some love around here. Love this series, it scratches my old school Suicide Squad itch. When I first ordered I was concerned about the production quality, but they really are very sturdy and well made books.

$10??? Congrats!

Beautiful Thors. Four years in, this is still my favorite thread. Keep 'em coming, folks!

THIS. That #1 variant is ugly as , and has nothing to do with Hawkeye. Variants are enough of a pain in the as it is, but variants that actually have nothing whatsoever to do with the book are a double headscratcher. I myself had trouble unloading this variant, and I think in this particular case the variant is unloved because the "real" Hawkeye covers are SO distinctive, and such a huge part of the appeal of the book. I was going to flip my set on eBay when the prices went nuts, and still give it some consideration (I already have the trades and the hardcover is on the way) but I just can't give up those covers. They're just so purty. In fact, not only can I not let them go, I'm tempted to pick up the later printings for the color variants.

Got these back from the framers a couple of months ago but never got around to posting them here. The pics are kinda , but the pieces look great. Tried Hobby Lobby for the first time and was blown away by the customer service. The Museum Glass is really astonishing in its clarity, I love the mattes, and the price couldn't be beat. Will definitely use them again. My JLI covers My Allred My Mignola

Good luck. I had a few copies of this book back in the day because I loved (and still love) Booster, but in recent years I haven't been able to find a HG raw copy. Most of them seem to have gotten beat up up in the bargain bins over the years.

Thanks! Yeah, it was definitely the best surprise bargain I've run across in all of my years of collecting. In addition to the pf's I also picked up a bunch of nice bronze, including 1st Deathlok, 1st Spider-woman, a few Captain Marvels including 29, 32,33 and 35, a handful of Warlocks, GiJoe 1, and just a bunch of cool stuff. Couldn't believe my luck, it was like a dream.

This thread fired my passion when I ran across it a couple of years ago, and started me down the rewarding road of collecting picture frames. Finally have a decent reason to post in the thread! I posted a pic of these (along with the rest of my haul) over in Comics General this weekend, but I saved the scans for this thread. Attended Wonderfest this weekend, which is a big sci-fi model kit convention. Found a single table selling comics, which were kept in dusty boxes beneath the table marked "$3 each". Found lots of great stuff, but germane to this thread: After discount I ended up paying around $2.50-$2.75 a piece for them. Made my day! This one I picked up at a LCS a few weeks ago during a 40% off sale. Spent considerably more than $3, but still glad to have it. It's a little rougher than the books above, could use a press, but I still love this cover. The color of the logo pops so beautifully on that yellow frame! I hadn't bought any PF's for a while, but I can feel the bug biting again!

Went to Wonderfest today, which is something like the world's largest sci-fi model kit convention, or something to that effect. I have no aptitude for model making, but I still enjoy the show. This year I was going primarily to pick up these prints from John Tyler Christopher. I'd seen them online some time ago, and finally put the art with the artist, and when I saw he was attending, I thought I'd try my luck at picking them up. $20 later, I brought these home. I'm glad I got there early, as I got his last copy of the bikini Jessica print. But while that is WHY I attended, that was not the highlight of the day... I wandered the aisles for a bit, and was getting ready to leave when I spotted a table that had some comic boxes marked "$3 each". I hadn't really planned on pawing through a bunch of back issues today, but suffice to say I'm happy I made the stop: I overheard him telling someone that this was his personal collection and he had "priced them where I knew I could get rid of them." It was mostly bronze stuff, and while there were a few beaters, for the most part everything looked great, with either very minimal or at least pressable defects. Nice gloss and pages on nearly all of these. Found some nice picture frames too! (Sorry they're sideways...) He also had lots of magazines. THese were a little more beat up than the comics, but still, the price seemed right: And even though the books were marked $3, he also gave bulk discounts, so it came out to $2.50 or thereabouts per book for me. I don't usually stumble across these sorts of deals, so it was a very nice day, and of course I'll be returning to Wonderfest next year!

Thanks!

Picked up some nice panel pages from a Silver Surfer collection this week. Silver Surfer - The Enslavers by Keith Pollard. LOVE the quarter splash image of the Surfer, the inks on this piece are gorgeous. It's also an a very LARGE piece, displays very nicely. And picked up three consecutive pages from Silver Surfer #70, featuring Big G the Mighty Hungry, Nova, and Morg. Love the final panel on the last page.

Just got an email from DCBS stating that orders for the B&W Quitely incentive cover of "Jupiter Rising" are being limited to one per customer, and if you'd ordered more than one, your order would be automatically reduced. I'd only ordered one, so it doesn't really bother me, but I found it interesting that they're already restricting orders. I've never received a notice like that before. I guess there's pretty heavy ordering activity?