MadGenius

Yeah, but that's a big gamble. If you're going to pay money to press, you're probably looking to get a 9.8 at the end. If that bend breaks any color, you're screwed.

I can't argue with the prices on the NM sales, but $90 for a VF copy with a bent corner seems excessive. Personally, I'd rather pay the extra $10-45 for a higher grade copy, but that's me.

So...in the last 3 minutes, 2 NM copies sold for $119.99 each and 1 VF copy sold for $89.99. WOW.

I'm doing the same thing and I keep missing the lower priced ones too. I had a shot at one over the weekend, but I took too long reading the description, trying to get a sense of the grade, and somebody beat me to the Buy-it-Now.

Like Mike said: the paradox of the hot comic is, if everyone thinks it's a hot comic, it won't be a hot comic for very long. If something is tabbed as the "next big thing" right out of the gate, then it will be hot while all the collectors buy them up to stash them away. But that level of hotness is unsustainable once all the speculators get their fill, or the TV show doesn't happen, or when the next "next big thing" comes out. If there is a "next big thing," nobody knows what it is yet. It got ignored when it was released and only in the years to come will people realize it. A la Walking Dead.

Also true. He's very selective with his projects, concentrating on one book at a time, and I think that shows in the quality. But, man, the ending of Ex Machina was such a bummer. Same goes for Y: The Last Man. Good endings, just sad.

No doubt about it. He's a great business man, a pretty good writer, but I wouldn't consider him a Gaiman/Moore class writer. Those guys are just on a whole other level.

Buy Kirkman & Buy Often How many copies of Haunt & Astounding Wolfman do you own? i've got boatloads of SuperPatriot, Brit, Capes, Tech Jacket and MTU as well. I'm gonna be filthy stinkin rich. I agree the guy don't gold. Haunt isnt burning up the charts. Too many people read these boards for advice like that to be given. +1. Nothing against Kirkman, but if one writer could generate that type of heat for every project he worked on, wouldn't it be Neil Gaiman? or Alan Moore? that was then, this is now Then, now, or in the future, I still say Gaiman and Moore write circles around Kirkman.

Buy Kirkman & Buy Often How many copies of Haunt & Astounding Wolfman do you own? i've got boatloads of SuperPatriot, Brit, Capes, Tech Jacket and MTU as well. I'm gonna be filthy stinkin rich. I agree the guy don't gold. Haunt isnt burning up the charts. Too many people read these boards for advice like that to be given. +1. Nothing against Kirkman, but if one writer could generate that type of heat for every project he worked on, wouldn't it be Neil Gaiman? or Alan Moore?

In regards to ToT, I think we've seen this movie (or, I guess, TV show) before. About this time last year Locke & Key was tearing it up based on a TV development deal. L&K made it all the way to pilot, but wasn't picked up by the network. Bottom fell out of the L&K market as a result. Nothing is guaranteed with ToT and a TV adaptation. Far more of these deals die than ever make it to the air.

I was looking at the numbers between Walking Dead, Leverage, and White Collar. Movies are harder to compare, since hiest/crime movies as a rule get far more a-list talent than zombies, so I was trying to stick to TV shows. Leverage and White Collar last season finales both have less a third of what the Walking Dead was. I wasn't trying to argue that Thief of Thieves will not be a great book to make profit off of short term, I just don't think we'll see the crazy numbers of Walking Dead, I'd even be surprised it it hit Chew 1 numbers and held. My point was, I can't see this book staying hot long term. Short term, if you can get them for cover, seems like a fantastic buy. Does anyone else see the problem with trying to guess the next big book, when everyone else is doing the same thing, reading the same news, and buying multiple copies of the same book?

I think patience is a virtue with the Saga RRP. Case in point: Back in the good 'ol days (2007) Dark Horse produced a limited edition RRP of Umbrella Academy Apocalypse Suite #1 (limited to 1,000 copies). I don't have data on what raw copies went for when they first hit the market, but GPA will show you what the first 9.8 slabs went for. If memory serves, it was somewhere around $300. Once the market for these things matured, the average price fell back to the $150-$200 range. People see "limited edition" and freak out because they don't want to miss out on it, but believe me when I say they will be available later. I've managed to secure 12 copies of the UA book in a little over 2 years (6 raw, 5 CGC 9.8, 1 CGC 9.9). Granted, the Saga RRP has half the print run, but copies will be available at a more reasonable price once all the hype dies down.

CBC waiting to happen.

As much I'd like to get my hands on one these books, I was in no way considering $100 for a raw "NM" copy.

Look again. All gone...

It might be worth it to find a beater copy and rip the page out. The questions are hilarious!

A LOT. I've been to two stores today, and both were well stocked. They both had copies of the #1 first print still on the shelves, so they clearly ordered heavy.

I've heard that orders for 2nd prints were limited to 20% of the order for 1st prints. I'm not sure why, but that's what I've heard.

Spoilers? I considered that a spoiler-free review.

Just finished reading #2 and, man, that was some good stuff. The Stalk! The Horrors! Alana's bad-assery! It's going to be a long wait until #3.

Also, see me for raw copies in about 10 days. I have a good amount coming my way.

I think stores that still have copies ordered prettily heavily. I went into a local store on Friday, and they still had some minty fresh copies. I brought 2 to the register, but the the clerk told me only 1 per customer (this only applied to Saga, as he let me purchase multiple copies of Danger Club #1 in the same transaction).

I'd buy a NM copy for $6. If it was a NM/M copy, I'd probably pay $10.

All right. Preliminary March sales data is up. No estimates just yet, but Saga #1 was the #40 book in March. It was sandwiched between Daredevil and Red Lanterns. For the sake of comparison, the #40 book in February was FF #15 with an estimated 40,583 copies sold. Daredevil sold 37,891 in February and Red Lanterns sold 39,105.