FFB

Man, that is a nice book and definitely something you don't see every day in that kind of shape. As an early Brave and the Bold collector and a Suicide Squad fan from before the movie, I salute you!

First and foremost, the book is extremely nice for a book that is hard to find above FN. There aren't many copies of this book in high grade out there and it's a very early Suicide Squad. The paper is very fresh looking for a book that came out the same year as FF1 and before AF15. The cover inks look strong and all of the creasing is light and limited to the outer edges. The staples are a question mark. I'm assuming no rust or serious discoloration? I'm going to buck the trend and say I could see this book getting VF 8.0 if there are no major unseen issues and if the inks are bright and the gloss is good. It's more VF-ish than FN-ish and I could see you getting the bump for a DC from an era that is starved for high grade copies.

The OSGG is not a great resource for this and while I have my own opinion on the matter, I definitely want a reality check. Once upon a time there was a kid named Johnnie Lewis. Johnnie Lewis loved silver age Marvels back in 1965-66 and wanted to make sure all his friends and siblings knew these were his comics. He took good care of them and loved them and wrote his damn name twice on them. (I have others with his name on them, but these are the two I'm asking about right now because these were his best ones.) But he didn't have enough really nice ones to have someone call his collection a pedigree years later. So now his dumbazz name is written (twice!) on a few of his silver age comics and there's no pedigree mystique about his name like there is with Lamont Larson's and we have to figure out how to grade them. The books are nice, roughly VF to VF+ structure and nice white pages, maybe off-white to white at worst. Really fresh paper and nice inks. And that damned name twice on the front cover! Damned Johnnie Lewis!

Man, you haven't changed in a bit since the old days! God bless you for your consistency.

That looks like distributor overspray (usually you see it along the top edge instead of the bottom, but maybe this book or that batch of books was upside down at the time the distributor applied the spray). It should not affect the grade much in the 8.5 range, but perhaps a 0.5 ding downward if it affects it at all.

Microchamber paper does not need to be swapped out. CGC used to claim that (I believe they no longer do), but there's no science behind it and Microchamber paper can absorb off-gassing for a very, very long time without losing effectiveness, according to the manufacturer's testing. Think decades, not years. Also, Microchamber paper is not nearly as effective as people might think at preventing yellowing. I've got books that had 3-5 sheets of Microchamber paper inside the book (inside front and back cover and at the centerfold on silver age and younger books, plus an extra 2 sheets about 1/4 of the way into the front and back of the books for Golden Age books). These books were stored inside of a 4 mil E. Gerber Archive Mylar with a Full Back backboard (all archival quality) for about 15 years, and the inner pages still yellowed a surprising amount, especially along the top edge of the books, because the Mylars were open topped. They were stored in Acid Fee E. Gerber boxes inside my closet in the dark, in proper storage conditions the entire time, and the box was almost never opened except maybe once or twice in 15 years. In my observation, the Microchamber paper did absolutely nothing and was a complete waste of money. Meanwhile, 1980s-era Marvel books that were in regular polybags and non-archival backboards and stored in regular, acidic comic boxes were newsstand fresh, with perfect white pages after 15 years of storage when stored alongside the other Acid Free E. Gerber boxes. Some of the back boards had yellowed a bit in a few cases, but not the books. The books hadn't aged a bit. The difference? The polybags were taped shut. Back when I first transitioned all of my expensive books into Mylar and Full Backs, I had done a lot of research on conservation, preservation, etc., as well as listening to what other dealers had to say about their observations. I think it was Bob Storms who said that in his experience, old polybags and standard backboards were just fine for storage, and even if the bags and boards yellowed and got cloudy with age, the books inside were well preserved. I was somewhat skeptical at the time, but I definitely believe it now. I've seen it first hand across thousands of books stored in identical conditions that most people would agree to be a proper storage environment (cool, dry, dark). I still use E. Gerber products for storage of expensive books, but now I put the book with a Full Back upside down in a Mylite2, bend the flap, and slide the Mylite2 flap-side down into a 4 mil Archive Mylar. The few books I had stored this way did not age at all, which leads me to believe that the most important thing is to prevent fresh air flow from reaching the book, because the oxidation is the real problem.

Yes, but keep in mind that the picture is super magnified (on purpose so you can see it) and with the book in hand, you can hardly see it unless you're looking very closely. It's otherwise a very nice copy, probably a 9.4 without the slight rust on the staple.

Yes. An abrasion is a scuffing caused by rubbing against something else. Blunted corners are from blunt force trauma, and will often have abrasion damage along with the blunting and creasing that comes from the blunt force. The top spine corner on your book looks abraded.

That will probably press out nicely and I don't see what other defects would get it below 9.4. What do the grader's notes say?

Someone call Elrod and tell him to log in. Greggy

"Look you peons, let me spell it out for you. None of that stuff years ago with my baby mama or any of the other speedbumps in this funny book business ever slowed me down. I've been killing it for decades in comics and other cash heavy businesses and I'm living large. And with my Magic 8 Ball, I foresaw crypto and GameStop before they blew up and I'm flush! You think I'm holed up in that claptrap in Floral Park? I'm listing these books and making these posts from my superyacht in the Mediterranean! My boy Bezos and I are LOLing at you plebs! Dance for me plebs! Dance!"

This thread reminds me of the old days and it warms my heart. I hope it never ends and it never gets locked. I feel like 15 years have melted away!

Jesus Christ man, you've been busy while I was gone!

Think of it as your coming out party, Danny. How about we revisit the topic of rarest silver age keys, 15 years later? That Brave and the Bold #25 is a MFer to find in anything above about 7.0. The one I found was from Chuck by way of Dallas Stephens. It graded out at 8.5 and was top census for a while. It's still close to the top. Very tough book and a lot more in demand now than back then, especially after that great second movie. The Action 242 above 6.0 is stupid hard. I found one (Chuck again, believe it or not, after calling and checking EVERYWHERE else) that structurally was about a 7.0-7.5 but it had a huge, faint blue bleed through stain (not color touch) on the inside front cover. It was probably from the cyan plate on those deep purple cover inks. Chuck said it was 8.0 but no, not even without the stain. The book cost $600 at the time, which was a lot for that book when I didn't know if it would grade over a 5.0 with the stain and I didn't know if it would confuse the grader and maybe grade out PLOD. I sent it back to Mile High because the transfer stain made me wonder if the cover had been washed, but now I don't think so and I completely regret returning it. Anyone else want to talk Brave and the Bold 25 or Action 242 or whatever the REAL hard to find silver age keys are? I'm pretty sure JJJ can spit gold on this topic, but anyone else should feel free to contribute their own experiences.

You should get the new Overstreet Grading Guide. Ink loss is a very broad concept that includes color flecks and you can see those all the way up to 9.9. There are thousands of CGC 9.8s out there with ink loss on the spine or back cover near the staples from where the books rubbed against other books or against the box while being shipped from the distributor. Words like "slight," and "small," and "very minor" have defined meanings in the Grading Guide and, using those definitions, the way you're phrasing your statement about VF 8.0 isn't technically accurate. As with anything else, the effect ink loss has on grading is a matter of degree. There are some rules about the max grade that certain defects (like tape) will allow, but "ink loss" isn't really one of them until you get to 10.0. Also, I just want to point out that I'm not picking on you, I'm just making a suggestion that will be helpful for most of the people who post here if they don't already own the Overstreet Grading Guide. Get it, read it, study it, refer to it often.

Although you may have forgotten in the almost 18 years since I joined these boards, the reason I wound up here is because I won one of your auctions on ebay for (IIRC) an ASM #1 in high grade back in early 2004. I don't remember the specific grade at this point (I think it was a VF/NM or somewhere in the neighborhood, but please correct my failing memory as I'm sure you have a record somewhere). But what I do remember is that I was going to send it in to get it graded right away, which would have been my first CGC submission. I called CGC and whoever I spoke to forwarded me to Steve Borock, who explained whose auction I had just won and directed me to a thread on here about you. After reading about the situation that I had unwittingly stumbled into, I believe I emailed you and called off the purchase. Since that time (by which time you had already been banned twice from these boards, I believe), I've seen you create a shill account here from time to time, or post elsewhere from time to time. The ComicPriceGuide.com boards were a good run for you and since they didn't ban you outright, you actually did contribute a lot of good information. For example, I chased the highest graded copy of Brave & the Bold #25 long before anyone ever thought of making a Suicide Squad movie and found a book that graded out at VF+ 8.5 because I saw a thread where you were talking about what the really "rare" silver age books are. I chased Action 242 for the same reason, but never found an acceptable copy. Turns out you knew what you were talking about. Both are seriously tough books at 8.0 or above. My point here is that you are very knowledgeable about comic books and related issues and it's nice that you share the information. People really need to be savvy to know when you are sharing good information vs bad information, however, and there are no warning signs for the unwary. As I said, I, personally, have learned a lot from you. But you are an absolute criminal and no one should buy any books from you, ever. As you know my name and state of residence, it should be very easy for you to come file your defamation lawsuit against me here in California if I've accused you unjustly. I'll be waiting.

At this point, I wonder if there is anyone left who believes this. Probably.

Occam's razor. Dont overcomplicate things.

For people who have been around a long time, the more you talk, the more convincing it is that it's really you. The farther down the rabbit hole you go, the more you sound exactly like you did when I was active on these boards more than ten years ago. No one says you have to leave the boards (unless the mods kick you out again for the umpteenth time). It's just nice when people know who they're talking to. Helps them view things through the appropriate lens.

Danny, I've missed you so much!

Here are those pics of my CGC 9.2 with staple rust. It's in the grader's notes, so I know it didn't develop in the slab.

Are you serious? Danny Dupcak *is* an expert on signatures and he and his shills have outed other scammers many, many times in the past to appear to be a "good guy."