VintageComics

Don't forgot about Mr. Mom and Johnny Dangerously. He started out as a comedic actor. Good points. I remember the outrage in the late 80's when they announced that Mr. Mom was playing Batman (much like fanboys get outraged today over some choices). He's carved out quite a career for himself.

Hi Marwood & I, Two things, 1) that's pretty grim. 2) that's pretty grim.

Hi Marwood & I, Two things. 1) I didn't know that. 2) Cool beans.

It's not even a discussion.

I can see that @delekkerste, yes. I completely understand why most US collectors feel the way they do about pence books and I get that they will never command the same sort of interest or prices as their US cousins. We like them over here of course, but also like the US originals too for their 'purity' for want of a better word. I do like to bang the pence drum though and have always liked variants of all shapes and sizes (hence the four threads in my signature line). Maybe one day, when all the US collectors have all the US copies they can handle they'll turn to the pence copies and say "OK, let's try a run of those". If nothing else, they don't half look good. And you guys made them don't forget! Two things. 1) if you quote someone they'll get a notification. You don't have to @ them (unless you just want to). 2) While I agree with delekkerste's summation of how I used to feel about cover prices (I felt the same way about blank UPC boxes when I was younger) I no longer do. The world is a much smaller place than it used to be and I now realize that they're all the same books, just for different markets. While the ROW does not value Pence copies like American copies to me they are all the same. Until someone proves otherwise anyway.

That's something I've made mention of before. I never used to think about such things until someone mentioned it here on this site and I read it. And it snowballs from there. Personally, it still doesn't bother me. I'm into comics for the passion and the history and not the minutia. But I do understand how everyone's tastes are different.

We won't know definitively until someone who has worked with a printing press answers. That's why I'm asking for @DiceX to chime in as he has. If they were printing 100,000's of each issue it is possible that blades got changed or sharpened during a print run. But the books with chipping are almost no doubt done by dull blades, which caused the paper to tear rather than to cut cleanly. It's been my (albeit limited) experience that the further from NYC the books had to travel to, the better the print quality on the books. I picked up a very nice early Marvel SA collection a few years ago from Hawaii. All the books were purchased from the newsstand in Hawaii. They were early JIM and FF books, issues that were RIFE with printing defects from poorly centered covers, to Marvel chipping, to off center staples. What was very interesting to me is that nearly every issue had perfectly centered staples on the apex of the spine, perfectly centered covers and little to no Marvel chipping. Even issues that are known for having these specific defects (and believe me, there are certain issues that are nearly impossible to find without them) were clean and had terrific production quality. My theory is that the books that left the presses 1st would be shipped to the furthest regions (in these cases Hawaii and the UK) and the earliest books would have the best production quality because all of the tolerances were tight. As you crank out 100's of 1000's of books, those production values change as the machines move ever so slightly out of tolerance, blades get duller, etc. It's just a theory but so far I have nothing to contradict it.

@DiceX worked in this exact field for many years, which is why I posed the question to him. He'd be able to say definitively.

By age I was implying scarcity I figured you meant something different as it's a pretty important book.

Part of the stats is that there is more to watch every year. I agree that the quality of the show has been questionable (for me personally) but I am comparing the show to some of the best in television - my standard is Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul, which I consider nearly flawless.

Pretty easy to spot the difference between fan threads and pump threads. Take note of how often posts concerning sale prices are advertised compared to you know, actual discussion about the artist's work and collectors showing their books/art. It's one thing to discuss prices. It's entirely different to treat a book like a helicopter economy that only goes up, up, up unrealistically. And yes, the pumpers are easy to spot and are well known. But they'll never admit it.

I never understand posts like this. NOTHING is without risk. Nothing is a sure thing. Real estate was a no lose investment? People lost their shirts and lives over the crash in 2008. ------------------------------------------ Alibaba is one of the largest financial viable companies in the world. Not in the US. In the world. Read this quote from 2014 when this thread was last visited: Yahoo could make anywhere from $8.3 to $9.5 billion from the IPO, and its remaining stake will be worth another $26 billion. In 2013, two of Alibaba's websites handled $240 billion in sales. That's double the size of Amazon, triple the size of eBay, and one-third more than the two competitor companies combined How about this quote from Sept 2017? Amazon has had a good year, but Alibaba has had an even better one — and it's now within striking distance of surpassing Amazon as the world's biggest e-commerce company by market cap. Amazon is up 30 percent this year while Alibaba's stock has nearly doubled as both companies race to a $500 billion in value. Bulls have reason to love both. They dominate e-commerce in their respective markets (Amazon in the U.S. and Alibaba in China) and both are expanding into new businesses such as groceries, original content and cloud. IMO comparing Alibaba stock to Amazing Fantasy #15 is like comparing a bicycle company to an automotive company. You might make better money on the small bet but the larger company has way more capital to stay afloat in rough waters. -------------------------------------------- Comics have gone up and down. You youngin's forget about big books going up and down over the decades and only remember the recent run up since the low interest Fed policies after the economic crash of 2008. The only thing Superman #1 has going for it is age? It's the 1st comic book devoted to the greatest hero of all time and it's rarer than hens teeth unrestored. There are not enough copies to meet demand. I sold a 4.0 last year for more than what an AF #15 9.0 was worth at the time.

So let me get this straight. On the top pic, the Pence copy is on the left, but when you are showing the interiors the Pence copy is on the right and the cents copy has the green misprint? @DiceX Dice (or anyone else that has worked in the printing industry) is there any way of explaining the color differences between the two issues to give any clues as to earlier or later printings, or could inks and cutting blades be adjusted at any time through the printing process and it's all just random changes with no real clues as to a timeline? I notice that not only are the greens deeper in the corner box on the Pence copy but there are better colors on Dr. Doom and in all the other greens on the Pence cover. It's definitely not fading as the Reds are solid on both.

Isn't it! And no chipping either @paul747. And yet, despite coming off of the same presses at the same time, and being considerably rarer, it commands barely half the price of the cents copy. Someone got themselves a bargain there.... I'd be curious to know if there are more chipped Pence copies or less chipped Pence copies out there as they may have been off the presses before the US copies. Did we ever settle that?

I'm a genius!

You mean Mr. Bob "is it my job to make you money" Storms? Yeah, that's not going to happen.

Somewhere out there Bob Storms is rolling his eyes.

Agreed but the prices of AF15 are not going back to 2015 or 2016 levels. Hulk #1 hasn't gone back to pre 2014 levels either. What point are you trying to make?

Before this newest era of free money with zero interest, comics appreciated slowly. Calling key Marvel issues dead in the water is like saying the ocean is broken because the tide went out. Metropolis sold a Hulk #1 in 9.0 for $300K a few months ago and prices have generally appreciated for Hulk #1 across the board (the higher the grade, the greater the price appreciation). Hulk #1 nearly doubled in price 3 years ago. So because it doesn't double in price this year it's dead? Oh my goodness this new generation is impatient and in need of a history lesson.

@Iceman had an AF stolen. Please send him a PM You should also include @Guardian Comics in the PM as he was also affected. It was my former copy, CGC 6.0 OWW pages, Marvel chipping on the right side. Does this sound like the book?

You should have sold me your TOS #39 Jag ten years ago.

Thanks! Yeah, after asking around about these things earlier in the thread I decided that the blue (or lack thereof) didn't bother me. Looks like there's a bit of blue in your copy, can't tell from this pic if both halves of the second quote are there. You guys drive me batty with your obsession over details like this. It's a freaking comic book, not a Jaguar or a Porsche!

It's on the high side of a normal range. It's typically a $130-150K book although there are outliers.

Because when you're printing 100,000's of a single coming, the production quality changes over the print run. Inks run out (which is how you get color variation), cutting blades get dull (which is how you get chipping and pre chipping), staples don't always get placed properly, covers don't always get cut square, etc, etc. These were throw away magazines, not hand crafted artwork. Marvel chipping also happens on DC books, just not as often as on Marvels because DC had a larger financial backing and could afford better quality production. Marvel was a fledgling company that was operating on a shoe string budget. So you don't see well centered copies sell for much more than miswrapped and miscut copies? You don't see poorer page quality sell for less than optimal page quality copies? I would disagree with you. Final prices realized always factor in things such as quality and eye appeal. MC is just one thing out of many that collectors consider when buying. And like I said, some don't care about it in much the same way that they are not picky about other defects. It's not a science. It's all just personal preference.

It may not have been a conscious plan, but there may have been some sub-conscious workings behind it. Personally, I don't believe in random co-incidence.