Sauce Dog

Pretty sure this is demonstrably not true. Leaf casting any missing material, be it from a ripped off chunk or trimmed edge, can result in a conserved label as it is repairing a structural issue (so long as there is no color touch being added afterwards). I've seen many purple label GA books shift to conserved labels in such a manner. edit: reached out to some of the restoration pros I know - confirmed that leaf casting a trimmed book will result in a Conserved label. It doesn't matter the intent or how the original pieces were removed (ripped off by accident / panels clipped out by a kid / or edges trimmed by a scammer), all that matters is it is now fixed and would be labeled as pieces added (or something to that effect, give or take some details depending on who is filling out the notes that day)

Honestly, I've never been a fan of ASM #1 - if you can't get AF15 then I honestly think investing in a very nice ASM2 and some other issues you like might be better. ASM2 is a great key; his third appearance as well as the firsts of two decent MCU villains, and an amazing vivid cover that pops (but I reaalllly hate the #1 cover, so I'm highly biased)

Yup, that would be how it would look. No guarantee (as maybe CGC sees something with the staples they didn't put in the grader notes) but still a decent gamble in your favour if regraded (can't just be reholdered - it has to be regraded in this case)

If your intention is to sell it, then I honestly would leave it as is. Regrading fees would just add to your costs, and honestly most seasoned buyers would regard this as one of the better Qualified books to pick up (as it doesn't feature missing parts or major damage) so would fair better at auction compared to other qualified copies of similar grade. If this is for your personal collection and you want a blue label due to OCD, well that is your call if the money for re-grading gamble is worth it.

This is where it gets difficult, as CGC has already designated the staple work to be of A-1 quality I'm thinking they are in fact vintage staples (that were at most cleaned prior to installation or pulled from another minty book of the same era by a professional) and it was just a label oversight, OR since it was graded in 2017 there is a chance they thought these are not vintage and hence why it could not qualify for conserved designation. The value for a Conserved vs Qualified would be higher (a couple hundred dollars at most I think) as it is regarded as a positive rather than a negative defect present (much like restoration which can hurt the book). If you resubmit the book I would include a note stating 'CONSERVED: Staples replaced' (I submit all my conserved work this way).

Replaced staples can qualify for Conserved label - so my guess this book was graded long before the Conserved label was a thing and would benefit from being regraded (especially since it is already clearly designated A-1)

Hard to value it outside of an auction, which as mentioned before would come down to two parties fighting over it to complete their copies. As is, just listed for sale I would clock it at $3-5k at most - certainly not 10-12k ;)

You can see the part in another photo (that shows the cover), however the original poster (and I) was mistaken; it's not another book, but rather the interior wraps that seem to have been detached (the page peeking out matches the art of one of the interior pages).

yeah you are right, looking at it closely I checked my copy...the page that is peaking out from below the cover matches an interior page, so it seems the entire middle of the book has been popped - making it a hellevah 9.8

Though it might be giving credit to the scammers where none is due, it is entirely possible these inconsistencies between tells are on purpose as a means to minimize false positives. By making some minor but obvious shortcomings, the scammer can isolate the most gullible targets and automatically turn away anyone with a more critical eye and who will just waste their time or call them out. It likewise allows for a fallback if a buyer recognizes one book as an obvious scam, they can point to the other books do not share that same tell and thus the buyer will feel at ease accepting those other books are legitimate (the seller can just apologize and make a big show about how they were scammed and thank the buyer for noticing)

Anyone else saw this absolute banger of a QC issue (found on the CGC Facebook group): Somebody had an extra book encapsulated inside their own book!

At this point I have no idea where the premium for Pedigree books begins or ends. I love em and they are a focus of certain parts of my collection (Tales of Suspense for example) but what some sellers are expecting boggles my mind. Last week I put in a very drunk offer on a pedigree book, which also had a same grade non-pedigree copy of it auctioned the same time that ended for around $500 a day after my offer...the seller rejected my $1300+ offer for his pedigree (it wasn't anywhere near a top census copy and was a fairly common Silver Age lesser key). Maybe they love pedigrees or the characters involved as much as I do (but in retrospect I breathed a sign of relief when the rejection came as the sober mind realized a $800 premium for just a pedigree label was a little too much).

Which can be missed when one is quickly glancing around the slab and not comparing to others (especially if you are slightly disillusioned with CGC quality control already and have seen worse ), as well as if the level of warping was different between all the fakes (which I imagine they were). Those unsealed slabs are more common than many might think - I've seen more than a dozen people on Facebook groups post about receiving them and offering them for sale.

While I am able to catch the typographical discrepancies on the label, I know even if I got that Hulk #1 in hand it is very easy to potentially slip into the assumption of safety just because the thing is in a legit CGC holder - that physicality alone (with the hologram and a nice tight seal) can be enough to make our primitive lizard brains at peace and potentially get lax about really scrutinizing something (especially if we are excited about the books we are trying to buy). Hope they are able resolve this and perhaps get some money back to the buyers.

To be fair Bruce Lee had nothing to do with karate, on account of being Chinese and not Japanese, so even while training there are few reasons to bring him up in the dojo. So unless a kid is a big Wuxia fan and explores classic movies their ain't much in modern popular culture that even mention him explicitly anymore (its all costume/sound references that otherwise won't land) Nobody needs to know about Chuck Norris though, so he's better off ;)

This will be a fairly easy conservation job (and yes it would be conserved, not restored...and a non-zero chance at Universal because CGC has missed tear seals before) and will help the book overall, I have a few qualified books that are detached at one staple and I've noticed over time this puts stress on the other staple when moved around and can result in shifting of the interior away from the cover (so it is now visible in the slab) - assuming a book is now persevered when in a slab would be incorrect, especially if you are knowingly putting it in there with structural defects.

No, the studio did that. Fans should not be expected to just turn up and throw money blindly at whatever the next iteration of thing-we-love. Fans actively made it clear they didn't support the studios choice to not let Guillermo del Toro direct (didn't offer him chance to write it either, only a producers credit to slap his name on it) and they wanted Perlman back (who was happy to return so long as Del Toro was involved), and with the studio ignoring everything the fans wanted the project was soured in our eyes before they even started production.

I'mma just going to give Gunn a complete free pass to remove anyone he wants from the DCEU, all because he added Neal Adams to it

computer...enhance! and it seems the Bat-fleck suit gets some blue/grey treatment

That trailer had no right going as hard as it did. Looks like the transition from the old DCEU to the new is going to be far better than I expected.

They are incredibly backed up and understaffed right now (and as of 01/01/23 they stopped accepting any new books for restoration work) as well as having some health issues; so if you are waiting for a book being worked on to be finished its going to be awhile (my book they've had since 2018 is still in progress), and if you are waiting for them mail you stuff back that is already done that will just be a slightly less a long wait (they have something else I've been waiting on since last October that literally just needs to be tossed in an envelope).

That was honestly a great deal - I've seen just the Superman stories cut out, and each 'page' sold individually for $50-$100us on ebay.

Hard no. This would result in either requiring a paid API to another price guide for data (which brings a host of issues, including but not limited to; questionable accuracy if the source mixes up variants/newstand values, outright lack of data points for things like GA books, allowing people to have direct access to gaming the registry values via fraud on books with little to no sale history, ), or require so much constant maintenance by a limited team of CGC employees to update that it becomes unfeasible. It makes more sense to just have a standard point structure (which can differ across each era of comics, so Golden Age books feel more 'valuable' to obtain compared to any Modern age book), then introduce bonuses such as; completion % points, image bonus, and perhaps introduce a KEY BOOK bonus which is assigned to some of the most obvious books out there that have great significance (such as Hulk 181, AF15, a slew of DC GA first appearances) and makes those books stand out from others (this is where the community can suggest new books that deserve the tag & key bonus, rather than us constantly suggesting registry point corrections every week)

The good news is this story was reprinted, and I highly recommend checking out the entire newspaper reprint book. You can read about it here: https://nicksupes.com/2021/11/01/superman-sunday-classics-1939-1943-a-review-2/ In fact, if you are going to buy a single golden age reprint for Superman, make it that book. You get the the great origin story in Action Comics #1, as well as lots of his other famous stories, but also the really good missing stuff like this robot story that you will not find in any DC archive reprint.

It is cut from a from a full-size newspaper page, looks to have been the bottom part of it and I'm not sure what was above it (on the back are articles and advertisements). The framed clipping I posted above is 15"x11" (it was trimmed again to fit the frame, so when I originally bought it the size was slightly larger)