Roger66

Not everyone is an objective grader and I believe most collectors simply put are below average graders especially when it comes to their own books. Grading I find is often about personal experience with comics, critical honesty and intuitive skills. Without seeing your books I would bet CGC got it 100% right. Someone said it before me but you should 'temper your expectations' and perhaps continue to engage in selective discussions that lead to your becoming a better grader. Also don't fall into the trap of looking at books already graded without seeing the notes and wonder why this book got a 9.0 and not a 9.4 for example. No one is perfect but I find CGC the best game in town - head & shoulders above the rest - and I continue to maintain 100% faith in them. Finally be patient and don't lose sleep over this. My 2 cents.

Even without a press... a 5.5 with a lean foreword.

DC Keys are sadly flatlining with many on life support. In really high grades DCs are a different book of course but truth be told most dealers have a way significantly higher rate of sale turnovers in Marvel Keys then in DC Keys. I am in my 50s. As a child I loved Marvel heroes over DCs because I could relate more to them but when I got back into collecting decades later I found I had a fonder if not more nostalgic appreciation for DC keys. Wax and wane however you choose the fact remains that the prices keep moving up on Marvel keys. If we use that as a factor or index to determine the love for a book - then the DCs are losing love monthly like a deflated tire. If, however, you look at your collection not in dollars but in emotions - then who cares what anyone might have to say negatively about DC keys. Pendulums do swing. Perhaps in another 5 plus years DC will get their act together and produce movies that resonate with the public on a deeper and more meaningful level like Marvels do. I already left a scalding review of WW84, which really was especially disappointing after the 1st one. WW84 had a chance to really give DC fans true hope that iconic characters such as Wonder Woman could shine just like Captain America did on the big screen. Instead we were treated to such a pointless, boring, awful, shallow, plot-less, cliché-driven, vapid and hollow movie that it just further buries DC IMO. In the end I don't collect comics because of the movies - I never did and never ever will. I collect because of my love and appreciation of the characters in the comics. At the same time if someone offers you say a semi-high grade Daredevil 1 for your low grade Showcase 22 - you know you are doing that trade in a minute even though intuitively it might feel wrong. Happy collecting everyone.

Four Color 74 (aka Little Lulu #1) CGC 7.5 OW pages. Take per PM

It will look even better in a blue label CGC case. Enjoy this iconic key! One of the best of the silver age.

Trying to analyze or dissect this pointless movie is akin to trying to occupy the headspace of a complete insufficiently_thoughtful_person.

Well said. I concur and while it likely is between a 2.0 and 2.5 it leans IMO to a 2.5. As far as market value on this blue chip key - despite that missing piece it remains overall handsome and might command more money to the right buyer. Good luck.

Thank you for sharing. We certainly could have a lively debate you and I. After my utter and total disappointment with the atrocious WW84 (I stopped it after the 54 minute mark) I started noting my thoughts on the Boards about the state of today's media depictions of our favorite superheroes. So as to not belabor my points here is a quick random short list of some of the best in this genre I have seen. 1) 1st season of Netflix's Daredevil (a total dark masterpiece if ever there was one). Season 2 was wonderful but not close to the consistency of Season 1 and Season 3 was just good. 2) HBOs WATCHMEN is brilliant if not as close to perfection as one can get. 3) 1st Wonder Woman movie with Gal was super fun and highly entertaining thus I had esp high hopes for the most forgettable WW84 4) The animation series Young Justice and a lot of Bruce Timm's stuff.

Whether an expanded (well conceived) universe like Marvel or stand-alone (vacuous) movies like most DCs, a really-really good movie starts with solid intricate plotlines and intelligent witty dialogue. DC characters can and should be just as intriguing as Marvels on the big movie screen, however, DC simply gets a big fat D minus in the vast majority of their movies which are juvenile, tedious, boring and mostly devoid of any good plots where fine actors unfortunately are subjected to cliché ridden dumb scripts written by people who either never read comics in their youth and or just sucked big time in their writing (exceptions were the 1st WW movie and the Captain Marvel movie). The irony is DC does the opposite with most of their cool animation, which I often find witty, stylistic, engaging and overall entertaining. I am not sure if there are fundamental unfixable problems with DCs approach to live action movies, which even without comparing to Marvels, bring nothing of any interest or merit to these beloved characters. If you are emotionally vested in say Wolverine, Wonder Woman or Batman for example (and not an 8 year old) don't you want to get into these heroes' heads some, learn about them on a deeper meaningful level and walk away from these movies feeling more connected to them before you entered the theatre (or watched on cable)? I hold out dim hope that DC gets it right one day and that Marvel's next phase is not an excuse to milk the pockets of an enthralled public with consumer throw-away garbage like most of what we see these days in general (and like what George Lucas did after the trilogy). The bar is often set so so low on what Hollywood dishes out - that garbage often passes for art. Indeed this part of a speech by Newton N. Minow could easily apply to DC movies not just TV. My 2 cents. "When television is good, nothing — not the theater, not the magazines or newspapers — nothing is better. But when television is bad, nothing is worse. I invite each of you to sit down in front of your television set when your station goes on the air and stay there for a day without a book, without a magazine, without a newspaper, without a profit and loss sheet or a rating book to distract you. Keep your eyes glued to that set until the station signs off. I can assure you that what you will observe is a vast wasteland."[8]

Almost but not quite reminds me of this guy Rick's past threads. What a class act! Miss him

Take Archie 50 per PM

Many-many comics don't heat up as much as speculators drive the prices up, which soon enough collapse or come back down. There's market manipulation and outright fraud. Certain solid keys you cannot go wrong with long-term such as FF48, Avengers 4, HOS92, DD1, WBN32, HULK181, ASM129 etc.. even keys like BB28, Showcase22, Action252 while flat if not cold are mainstays to any good true collection. These sudden 'hot' books are truly distractions at best (like shiny pennies) and only have a brief if not short moment in the sun before returning to Earth. The market these days is based more on illusions and slight of hand than anything well grounded or well reasoned. Most collectors are lemmings, who follow the smallest trends and are complicit in steamrolling those illusory keys into something bigger based only upon the mob's inclinations and or a movie rumor. Original thinking in this hobby is almost dead as everyone seemingly looks at final auction house sales as an indication of future projections, when often it was nothing more than 2 possessed over-thinking bidders pushing each other up in the final seconds before the hammer falls. We chase more then we discover in this hobby. We follow more then we lead. We buy high - hoping to sell even higher. Every month I see someone list something for sale with the comment "I need to get back what I paid for it," which begs the question - what were you thinking at the time of purchase? People's 'Hot List' are simply marketing tools or a honest but misguided persons attempts to help the novice collector. This is not your big brother or daddy's hobby anymore. Think on your own before hitting the buy or bid button. Don't mistake one high or one low sale as a road sign because often it is not. Better to save your money and buy that one real key book then a dozen overinflated bloated books. Avoid those TMNTs type books, which were so much cheaper not too long ago but now are the cat's meow (and don't get me ranting over Variants, which are TULIP-MANIA incarnated). Collecting is often based on mixed emotions and a sense of regret. Don't do that and don't be that way. Think independently and if you have to ask others for their opinions over and over the answer is often simply don't do it. My 2 cents.

That sadly is less lame and a tiny fraction funnier than any scene in the movie.

IMO WW84 was a lifeless, banal, uninspired movie full of silly clichés and a juvenile plotline. What a huge let down this follow-up was after the 1st one, which I loved. There was no reason to set this movie in the 80s other then to try and garner some cheap laughs (I found nothing funny btw) and creating her arch villain via a wishing stone is by far the dumbest way to show an origin. Why would perhaps the strongest and most independent of female heroes still be moping around over her dead boyfriend 60+ years later (pathetic) and then sleep with him knowing he has stolen another's body and mind? Gal Gadot deserved much better than this ill conceived cringe filled trash. These weren't characters as much as soulless puppets reading an awful --script. This disaster of a movie needs to be forgotten fast. It adds nothing positive to this amazing character but in fact detracts if not demotes her. At about the 54 minute mark it was too painful to watch and I turned it off. I believe the bar has been set so-so low on DC movies that some mistake this trash for tongue and cheek entertainment. At a reported cost of 200 million you would think they could do measurable better then this. I could go on and on but I made my point. To each his own. My 2cents.

Plus often a novice buyer overspends mightily thus skewing GPA, which can also stand for Grossly Paying Amateur 😁

Have to wonder how many of these eye-raising eBay auction sales in general are dishonest. I see enough eBay re-listings of KEYS right after the auction closes that I can't help but raise an eye-brow. Thank you for the site - I like this info regardless but I still question it.

Today's proliferous variants, moderns, limited production runs and all those other 'special' exclusive books are IMO very inflated and another form of tulip-mania. The comic industry has created a symbiotic feeding frenzy from top to bottom where the distributors create the limited run and sense of specialness, the comic stores purchase and respectfully hype them, the naïve collectors hoard them and grade them at times, the novice buyers end up bidding up the book on eBay, which gets reported by the smart you-tuber or the perpetual IG comic-today's hot-pick-guy, who correctly shows you the upward market trend in price on that particular spec book, which starts the feeding frenzy all over again. This cycle is all a house of cards built on the shaky premise that everyone is in on the con, which is to create an immediate market with willing spec buyers and happy sellers, who perpetuate the unsaid charade that these books really have such bloated values. Truth be told when the merry go round stops (and I believe it will), whoever is holding none of these books but all the cash made from their many sales - said individuals will emerge as the winners and whoever is sitting with a display wall or long box full of them in all 9.6s & 9.8s may end up feeling very cheated and full of regret. My 2 cents . Only time will prove me wrong or right.

Scanning through this thread's topic my take is I cannot help reflect on how expensive participating in this hobby has become for me. It seemed only a couple of years ago (likely longer) that with $1,500 in my week-end pocket I could pluck some nice coveted gems off a sale's thread here or there and still have some loose change left over for eBay. Fast-forward to nowadays and I would rather keep that $1,500 in my bank account because what is being offered at today's prices is in IMO more often than not very over-priced (with some exceptions of course). There are many times I will see a sale's thread here with perhaps a 1/2 dozen golden-age books being offered at prices that IF even offered to me at 50% off I would immediately decline. Intuition and love has carried me through this hobby and those same 2 feelings have me thinking that over 80% of what I see being offered for sale on the Boards, eBay and IG is just not worth the price even if offers are accepted. So I remain an observer, a private messenger and I will pick up the phone on occasion to talk with old comic pals, who's dear friendship I made here on the Boards. So I am active but quiet about it. I think many members may be like me - still here, watching, listening and communicating in private.

nice book

Take per PM -

Take FF48

It could have easily been folded in half and placed in a 10 year olds back pocket. A subscription could also be a general one not necessarily for a series - for example you get 10 random comics each month for a buck 🙏☀️

Sub-Mariner Comics 18 CGC 5.0 OW pages. 🦈 Take per PM thank you ☺️

Take per PM the TTA#27 CGC 3.0 ☀️

Take Shock #20 (not 22) 🤓