Bronty

Yeah, that's the same thing in that people want what was local to their area. At the same time however, its a little different in that I presume there isn't a 50% discount between a New York TV guide and an LA TV guide.

Well if you like the use of the word foreign, you would really enjoy the use of the word "overseas." A good number of Americans conflate "overseas" with "international" regularly. I once had to ask an ebay seller that was mad at me for purchasing an item with no "overseas" shipping to specify exactly which "sea" was between BC and California as my map didn't indicate one He begrudgingly agreed there was no sea to fly over but I should have 'known what he meant.' In other words, Outside of US = Overseas. Hawaii and Alaska = Not overseas. Despite there being, you know, "seas"/oceans separating the land masses which require flying "over." And look, if I'm living in the US, I'm probably acting the same way, so no hate. They are used to the convenience of being able to transact totally within their own borders. If anything I'm jealous!

the market is what it is. American buyers don't respond to foreign collectibles to the same extent as American collectibles. I've had some American buyers express this to me in very clear terms. Obviously, others don't care. And there's also many that want to feel like they don't care, but their buying behaviour says otherwise.

That might have been the reason put on it at some point, but let's not kid ourselves. Foreign = yuck for most US buyers. 1980s Cdn variants don't sell for as much as US variants either. And TBH I can understand wanting the exact version that was for sale in your own country; that's fair. It is what it is and its fair play. But to bring it full circle, in the same way that people want the comics (or other collectibles; lots of examples...) that came out in their own country, Americans want to watch shows that look American to them. That's just a fact and I think generally very apparent to those of us outside the US. I don't think its 'wrong' to be clear. People can watch what they want and buy what they want.

x

It’s both of those factors. If it’s not ‘murican a lot of people aren’t interested. Pence variants of amazing fantasy 15 trade at 50% for this reason. The book is otherwise identical… but it’s not ‘murican.

finally, a decent Signature

I don't think the data really supports what you're saying. If we look at HA results, 1) the most an Usagi cover has sold for is $8400, for #15, back in 2020. The most a groo cover has sold for is $13,200, for #8. Both are excellent covers. I think you can say that Usagi #15 might sell for more now than in 2020, but how much? 10-15k? That's the same as the Groo of similar quality. More sparse Usagi and Groo covers have sold for less. (Groo 15, Usagi 9). I think the best you can say is that the covers are in a similar range. 2) Nexus - same story. Biggest sales on HA are $8400. One was a cover, one was a nice interior page from #1 in 1981. I feel pretty confident that a page from Groo 1 PC would do more than that, considering the endpage from #28 or something just sold for around 5k. 3) Aragones has been selling off books of OA for years and years now. He doesn't have as much as you think at this point, and people have cherry picked away all the best issues. A lot of pages have been out there and been out there for a while now. I own some myself, and as you can see from the sales of interiors on HA, some of the pages bought by people like me are starting to hit the market. The same can't be said for Usagi - not a single published interior page has hit HA. That makes me think (perhaps you know better) that Stan is in fact holding on to all of his interior pages and only sells the covers? As a good number of those have hit HA. So, I think you may have it backwards. If there is a price bump from restricted supply of interior pages that's probably helping Sakai prices not Aragones prices. That's before we even consider how much more Aragones art, in total, exists and is out there compared to Sakai. Metric tons of Mad art. DC Art. Groo. His overall output has dwarfed Sakai's and really has dwarfed almost everyone else in comics, period. More importantly, the pages are just great. From time to time I consider selling some, but I can't bring myself to do it, at least not yet. They are masterfully drawn.

To be clear neither I nor I suspect anyone else considers it a significant pedigree. But the average grades and PQ are super high, thats just a fact.

Nontheless if state of paper preservation - and nothing else - is the criteria as per the quote I replied to , then that’s a top pedigree.

Vancouver?

On a different note, I've been impressed with the prices realized on Groo OA lately. Pieces from early marvel issues in the last signature did very well, and so did pages, in a recent weekly, from the Image series which in my eyes are much less desirable (although some of them did feature my favorite witches, Arba and Dakarba). Maybe that makes a lot more sense than 9.8 destroyer duck 1's.

We could say the same about pretty much any 9.8 comic from 1980 forward in 2021 vs now. Let it go ;)

sounds like a definite maybe!

that's terrific. Last one? Calling it quits?

I typed the words 'image size' into comic connect to get a filter on art that left out comics. I got 700+ hits. Of the first 100 hits, 98 were graded 8.0 and 2 were graded 6.0. It seems 8.0 is their default grade for art and 6.0 is how they let you know its had some damage to take notice of.

in HA's art grading nomenclature, excellent > very good > good. As examples, HA graded: - Secret Wars 8 page 25 'excellent' (more or less new looking, perhaps some very minor overall wear - in this case some very light toning) - the What if #11 cover 'very good' (some typical wear and/or minor damage) - Prince Valiant 214 strip 'good'. (more significant wear or damage. In this case, multiple tears/pinholes and other issues).

I haven't looked at comic connect's listings in a long time but I recall them just giving a few rudimentary grades, which is the same thing HA does. The only difference is that HA's oa condition is words rather than numbers, which makes more sense for something like art. It conveys the condition without getting overly specific.

Those are awesome. The pedigree books do look great for the most part. I had a few White Mountains once upon a time too. Tasty books!

congrats! I haven't seen that one before. What character is pictured there? Its quite a striking contrast to Archie.

its interesting seeing the various designs on these torture wheels. A lot of the wheels pictured on these covers just seem to dip the head into water or the body onto spikes or whatever when the wheel is turned. Seems more like a visual danger on the cover rather than depicting a torture device (why build a wheel if you are just going to drown someone or dip them in acid a la Mister Mystery 6?). The ones that are more interesting/ sadistic and probably truer to life I imagine (?) seem to follow a formula - either hands or feet are affixed to something that does not move, and then the other half of the body is affixed to the wheel. And then as you turn the wheel you stretch the person a tiny bit at a time until they pass out / die etc. The BP cover is probably the one that makes the device easiest to understand as the male has his feet fixed to the floor while the wheel pulls on his arms. Ouchie.

I guess. There was a lot of rapid inflation in the 70s so maybe between inflation and being very early in his career, it would be possible. Just kind of shocking at that's literally 1/10 of what people were being paid 15 years later.

Can't unsee that now

I think the drawing is fine and the published image really quite nice, but the cover is more digital than traditional at this point. You have to imagine the logo, imagine the inking, imagine the vanish effect on stranger, imagine the 'justice league dark' text, imagine the trade dress, etc. At some point.. why bother.