GeeksAreMyPeeps

I think you don't see them sold because the vast vast majority are either still in the books, or, if removed, were mailed in to redeem the zero issue. I imagine that it would sell if you put it up for auction, but for how much, I couldn't say.

If your LCSs are losing money from having to discount inventory that never moved, then I think the issue is the stores' ability to order correctly, not the product being offered. Know the market in your area and what you can move in a month. Maybe kick the order up a tad so you have books for the shelf for the month, but don't overdo it. I don't think it's the variants that are the issue, but rather a slowly dying industry that is putting that off a bit by offering up additional products.

Artists are all over the place with how they draw her

Yep. This has been my experience. Also, variant orders being cancelled, sometimes after they were due to ship, and being told (numerous times) that they were shorted and those shortages were not replaced. So if there's a variant that you really want that might be impossible to find when it's already been out a few weeks, pre-order it somewhere else.

This latter point is true, and I realized while listing a copy of DC's Agent Liberty Special on eBay recently that that was the case on that book. (The bottom corner is black only, while the black on the figure is a 4?c black.) There may have been a goos reason on specific issues why there wasn't a cost difference is running all 4 plates as a run rather than just the black.

"…one of the best 9.8's out there!"

They could have left the box blank, but they could not have left it off. Generally the cyan, magenta, and yellow plates would have been identical for all covers, direct and newsstand. The black plate was changed for the two editions, which is why you still have the box there in later direct editions, just with some artwork instead of a crossed out barcode. The plates probably weren't a huge cost on a print run like this, but being able to run all of the three colors for every book at the same time likely saved a good amount of press time, and that likely would have been the important cost here.

I think Marvel kept people interested between films by having this thing on the horizon that people were looking forward to. While I think the best DCU film was a standalone (Wonder Woman) there were hints of more to come. Unfortunately (as I remember it) Cosmic Odyssey doesn't have something as obvious and well known as Infinity Stones that they can dangle out there, but WB could take a lesson from Marvel on how to do it right.

Sounds like some Mezcal would go nicely.

But that coin would have to be made from a magnetic metal, which most coins aren't

If Warner Brother knows what's good for them, they would build towards a Cosmic Odyssey movie. (Also written by Starlin, with art by Mignola)

CGC grades the Acclaim (Valiant) Retailer Review editions, but those are closer to a comic format. Are these basically photocopies? Is there anything about them that would make it difficult to counterfeit them?

Well, that's basically it anyway. Some of these books may have newsstand distribution, but no direct edition without a barcode. It seems unlikely to me that they would have distributed Wolverine Saga 1-2 to the newsstand and then not distributed 3-4 to the newsstand but included a barcode anyway.

Yep. That's it. I think it's mostly complete right now. But I need to go through the list of Epic Comics, which were mostly direct-only but which did have a few titles distributed to the newsstand, to see which titles as a whole would fall into this category, and which of the titles may have books that were distributed both places but might only have a code.

The threshold for grand theft is way lower than the alleged value of the books stolen

Generally I would prefer to not have to open a case, but will if they don't take care of it.

Bump. Will get back to this at some point

Yes, he has, so no, you don't.

While we're talking about Mile High, I figured I'd mention that I bought two copies of the same book from them on eBay recently. They delivered one copy (I'm assuming it was a duplicate listing but both were active), and they included a letter that gave me a credit in their store, rather than the money back. So I sent them a message, politely saying thanks but no thanks, I'd like the money not a credit. That was at least a week ago and they haven't bothered responding yet. EVERY TIME I have to contact them it takes multiple attempts before they actually respond

Is that $42K in Mile High asking prices or in actual realized sale prices? Because we may talking about a few hundred dollars

Not if you want the first appearance.

Just because people aren't complying doesn't mean there wasn't a warning issued.

Without the cease and desist, there's no headline. So it's silly to suggest that it's a headline that pushing thing.

It was reported in multiple places that DC issued a cease and desist. Your suggestion that it was only a headline suggests that you know that to not be true.