GeeksAreMyPeeps

Isn't that Dan Slott's first comic work?

Did we ever get a clear answer on whether other retailers do linewide variants? If they hadn't, have any started doing them since the inception of this thread?

Yep. Several people have commented that the wrap is tough on this one, so I'm very happy with these.

I'd say any first appearance of a member of the Batman family is a good bet long-term.

Quantum & Woody #1, and first appearances of new or heavily revamped Valiant characters from the current line.

They should do a follow-up. Spider-man would get his @$$ kicked.

Yeah, but that's besides the point.

Even if you're willing to shell out more than $1600 on a book, you might not bid on an auction like this because you're guaranteed to be paying at least that much. Some books it's worth starting lower, when you know there's going to be enough demand to cross that theshold anyway.

Okay, I'll play.

You don't want to be standing behind him when he works that out

Gwenpool made me rethink my position about first appearances, because I've never been in the ads-are-appearances camp; it's always been an appearance in a story. But my instinct regarding Gwenpool was that even though there was no story tied to her in Deadpool's Secret Secret Wars, the cover was her first appearance. So I've refined my position to separate marketing content from creative content. An "appearance" in comic collecting terminology, to me, implies a depiction (or being a presence, in the case of characters that were in the shadows, only contributed a dialogue bubble, etc.) in creative content (stories, covers, pin-ups, etc.) rather than marketing content (ads, editorials, news pieces, and previews). This distinction I think helps clarify why my gut told me that previews shouldn't be considered appearances when the same thing is printed in those (with few exceptions) compared to the actual comic book. While I certainly think that there's a market for those (and, as an aside, the market never decides what a character's first appearance is, but the market does decide what is generally a desirable thing to own by voting with dollars), I think that those are secondary to the actual creative content, because without the content to be sold, the marketing is irrelevant and pointless.

I'm going to start referring to variants I don't care about as Nacamucses. People, WE CAN MAKE THIS HAPPEN!!!

Copyright would be for a story or piece of art. Trademark is closer to what you're looking for, but you can't really protect an idea by itself. For a trademark to hold there still needs to be some creative work in which it's used.

Yeah, but you can alter the idea to maintain the original aspects of it and excise the derivative bits. 50 Shades of Gray was originally Twilight fan fiction. (I know, the level of testosterone in this thread just plummeted.)

Youngblood was the first, but Image was tied to Malibu at the beginning. I don't know the exact relationship, but I imagine the logistical stuff like distribution would have been handled by Malibu.

I thought the second printing of the 'Nam #1 came shortly after the first print. Could be wrong, but I know when there were only a very few issues out I grabbed the second print.

My biggest problem with this is that Liefeld didn't put "wrote" in quotes. If it's correct, as pointed out, that he didn't write issue 8, then I wonder whether that could affect anything, royalty-wise, if the actual first appearance of Domino was written by someone else. I'm guessing a case wouldn't hold up in court if Marvel wanted to give royalties to someone who could have a different creator agreement and wrote issue 8, because the design and the concept of Domino would have had to been created and established already in order to be copied in the context of the story.

And this is the completed auction: http://www.ebay.com/itm/152495642090?ssPageName=STRK:MESOX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1561.l2649

I just went through a few dozen pages of this thread since I've barely been on the boards since December. I'm surprised that this didn't get more of a mention. (Maybe cuz it's 20 years old and a lot of them are consolidated in the hands of Valiant collectors?) The retailer review is doing well, but the regular comics have lit up as well. I sold a NM-ish copy of the A cover for over $40, a clearly mid-grade copy for over $20, and have another mid-grade auction that has a bid for $20. When we get some real news on the show, I think this is really going to light up.

#umactually Probably a lot longer than that. (Of course, "over three decades" is a huge range of time.) Initially ashcans didn't have any original content except for a new title (http://www.recalledcomics.com/GoldenAgeAshcans.php). Then around the late-80s early 90s the term was attached to small preview comics. And now they seem to be applied to full-size previews.

For a comic based on a book because there's a show? I should see what I can get for my signed first edition of the novel.

The second printing of Faith #1 isn't exactly a straight reprinting. It's half the book, with the other half being promotional material for upcoming books. They handed these out for free at NYCC, and I guess they went out free to stores as well. I guess they thought this sort od marketing material, with a full issue, would be more successful than a few preview pages. I got one free from DCBS as well. The only other book I can recall receiving for free was Book of Death #1. Since this book was fully returnable, I imagine Valiant requested that the books that would be returned be handed out rather than returned. Makes sense if they're already eating the cost of unsold books. Perhaps other returnable book were handed out the same way.

Marvel and DC are owned my huge public corporations that have to maximize profits to keep their shareholders happy. If you don't have a pretty book, they don't care, as long as you keep buying it. Valiant (while still a business that needs to make a profit to survive) is a comic company first, rather than a multi-media company, and they care about comics. That's why they limit themselves to a manageable line of quality comics. Sure, not every one is a huge winner, but I think the average quality of the Valiant line is on par (at least) with the average quality of any other company.

Why is Prophet's head like a half head width from centered on his body?* *Not serious; I know the answer

You're a retailer, correct? Do you, or do you not get ratio incentives for books that you reorder? If you don't, then that's a distinct difference between the incentive variants and order alls. A company knows that they're not going to need any additional variants for reorders. The number that they choose to overprint the regular editions for reorders involves some guesswork. Your numbers shows they've moved to err on the side of caution in recent years.