Michael Browning

Here are a few that I hardly ever find in the wild, but found them over the last few weeks:

Yes, I could not figure out why Marvel went with those really bad 1950s Miracleman reprints -- that were so expensive -- instead of going with the Alan Moore MM reprints first. The price was prohibitive to most fans. I talked to a lot of comic shop owners and they all said the price was too high. That and the fact that these were all bagged and new readers couldn't flip through them. I'll even go so far as to say that many retailers didn't have a clue what Miracleman was to even try to promote it to new readers. Most shop owners were too young to remember Miracleman, had never heard about the back issues, thought they were Mr. Miracle or, since it didn't have Alan Moore's name on it, they didn't know how to promote it. Heck, one of the shops I frequented didn't even order any at first because the manager had no idea who Miracleman was, nor did he know that it was an Alan Moore comic. He said he didn't have a single request for a copy and there was no buzz around it at all, so he wasn't going to buy a comic that was going to sit on his shelves and not sell. One retailer said the shop still had copies of Miracleman sitting in longboxes that had never sold and I went over to look for them and, lo and behold, it was a six-inch-deep stack of ... Mr. Miracle. When I corrected the owner, I was told that no one ever came in asking for Miracleman and that they thought it was the same character.

Until recently and just right before Cates made Carnage Mind Bomb a hot book, I hadn't paid more than $1 for a copy and, the last copy I bought, which was bought before the hype started, only cost me $5. I was buying them because Lone Star Comics was paying $17 a piece for NM copies. I thought I was making a killing on them. Now, it seems I was giving them away. But, the It's A Wonderful Life one-shot is now being bought by Lone Star for $22 a NM copy, while Mind Bomb is still being bought for $17, which surprises me. But, I would have to think there are fewer copies of It's A Wonderful Life than there are of Mind Bomb. I found cover-price copies of Cates' Venom 1-5 (#4 was the toughest to find) all when they came out. Those, along with Rune Vs. Venom and the two Carnage issues will give me a little extra spending cash this month.

Great analogy.

The word alleged can have a negative connotation when it's used the way you used it. It certainly did have a negative connotation and made it seem like you were pointing out that the piece of art in question is probably a fake. Then, you asked the two best sources and both confirmed it was real, then you deleted your previous post to make it seem less like the art was fake, but that you were the one who confirmed it was real to put everyone's minds to rest. Thanks for confirming what we already knew.

After he started this thread, he THEN went to the sources - Ruben and Frenz - and asked them. Ruben has been around this business longer than I've been in it and he is a very reputable dealer. If he thought it was a fake, he wouldn't have bought it, I'm sure, and, he certainly wouldn't have put it up for sale. Ruben is a straight-up, good dealer. He and I have had our differences in the past, so I'm not taking up for him because he's a friend, but he's always been a straight shooter. The original poster got confirmation from both Ruben and Frenz and then went back in and edited and changed the tone of his question. Now, if he didn't know how to get in touch with Frenz (which is very easy to do if he'd just look him up on the internet and see that he is repped by Catskill Comics ... oh wait, he did that AFTER he posted), he could have asked on here or numerous other sites asking for Frenz's contact information. My biggest problem is that he's not even a guy who is considering buying the art! He's just some random collector who saw it and decided to ask his question in a way that made it sound like the piece was a fake -- in a public, original art forum. I know my tone sounds very harsh on here concerning this issue and I do get frustrated with collectors who just automatically call something "alleged" or "fake" before checking. But, as collectors, we have to be mindful of what allegations of forgery such as this one can do to a piece's value. It's just like someone accusing you of a crime you didn't commit and it appearing in the papers and on the news that you were arrested for that crime, then it being proven that you didn't do it. After that first story hits the news, many people will consider you guilty, no matter that you are later proven innocent. The stain is still there and it's hard to remove and it can follow someone the rest of their life. Same thing with art. There will always be that one collector who says "I saw on a thread where this is an 'alleged' preliminary, so I won't touch it," because they didn't see the amended thread or that the original poster later got confirmation that the art was indeed the real deal.

Howard the Duck was a comic LONG before it was ever a movie. You should look it up. It's on the internet.

Miracleman is NOT a movie. It's a comic. Two different things and two entirely different situations, since the comics are reprinted from the originals. The movies were adapted from Moore's works, so that leaves them open to interpretation by a director, movie studio, writers, etc.

You would think, though, that the most knowledgeable people to ask would FIRST be the SELLER AND THE ARTIST.

Gargoyles went to issue 11, right? I recently found a stack of Gargoyles 2-9 in a dollar box at a local shop and picked them up.

Howard the Duck was never a "TV product-related comic book". It was and still is owned and published by Marvel. Battlestar Galactica lasted 23 issues at Marvel and that was longer than the show - including Battlestar 1980. No one had or wanted Battlestar Galactica until the 1990s when Rob Liefeld picked it up under Maximum Press. Since then, it's bounced around and had trouble maintaining a solid readership. Micronauts is, at best, a mediocre-selling comic even today. They can't even use the Marvel-created characters, which many Micronauts fans loved. And, I'm not sure why you'd want Miracleman to leave Marvel. That makes no sense at all. Should it go back to the days when NO PUBLISHER had it? Yeah, that'd make it all better. Right. Moore stipulated that the work could be reprinted so as to allow the artists and other creators to profit from it -- but it would be printed without his name on it. Marvel probably had no choice in the matter to get the book back into print. I don't fault them for Moore not being amenable to his name being on the book. That's all his fault.

I found these in the wild in Myrtle Beach this week while on vacation: Uncanny X-Men 423 newsstand and Superman 75 fourth print newsstand. I'd never seen the Superman 75 before and I hadn't seen the newsstand copy of UXM 423 since it was released and I laughed at it being $2.25 on the newsstand since I'd just bought four copies for a quarter each at the comic shop.

True story: Back in 1993, right before things started going downhill for Valiant, I traded a guy an X-O Manowar #1 and Rai #3 and #4 for a VF Conan The Barbarian #1, and NM copies of Conan #2 and #3 and a VG Amazing Spider-Man 129.

Alan Moore happened. He refused to let Marvel use his name on the Miracleman reprints and hardcovers and that hurt sales - overall. People don't know who "The Original Writer" was if it's not spelled out for them and it wasn't the huge seller than we all thought it would be. Most newer readers love it when they read it, but it's hard to get them into the book when it's writer is "The Original Writer." It just doesn't have the same appeal as Alan Moore's Swamp Thing or Alan Moore's Watchmen. See what I mean: "The Original Writer's" Miracleman. Yeah, it was a letdown for me and I've collected Miracleman since the series was being published by Eclipse. Marvel pumped those issues out with variant covers that were really very lackluster compared to the original covers -- and they bagged each issue. No new reader could flip through them at the comic shop and see how great they were. I heard from comic shop owners who fussed over the bagging of the Marvel reprints. The price of each issue was also a hinderance to getting new readers to pick up a copy. I also think it hurt that the prices of the back issue trade paperbacks and hardcovers went down when Marvel announced their reprints. Those Eclipse volumes sold high for years because there was always a buzz around them. No longer was the story only to be found in the Eclipse volumes, now it was going to be found in the Marvel hardcovers that were cheaper and easier to find. At one point, the original Eclipse hardcovers were selling in the thousands of dollars and now I've seen them go really cheap on eBay. Fan apathy is also to blame. The fact that Marvel still hasn't finished the Gaiman run has hurt newer sales because no one can finish the story. New readers want a complete story. I wanted it in the omnibus format so I could have it all under one cover

Heck yeah, #1 was a major player back in the 1980s. Over the years, I’ve seen issues in quarter and dollar boxes and always wanted to buy them because I remembered a time when it was a hot seller. I have never seen this ninth issue, though, and you would figure there would be a copy out there somewhere, but eBay doesn’t appear to have any and it doesn’t look like any have sold in a long time on there.

Mike, what if every time a sketch or drawing you posted was called into question on a public forum - casting doubt on a piece that is absolutely the real deal - and that caused people to doubt what you are selling and caused those pieces not to sell? He could have gone to Frenz first and asked. He could also have gone to Ruben and asked him for the provenance. Soon, no one is going to be able to buy a commission or sketch without it being questioned and that hurts a piece’s value - no matter if, after the doubt is raised, it is determined to be 100% authentic or not. There will always be that lingering doubt and that could be stopped by simply asking the seller and the artist rather than posting a statement that read like he was accusing the piece of being a fake.

Yeah, I've had a few of these "ghosts", too. Didn't realize they were ghosts. Huh.

I greatly appreciate you, Malvin, for being a responsible voice of reason and for your comments on here. Everything you posted was right. What sucks is that a few months back I got a nasty message from a board member on here who greatly dislikes me -- all because of my tough stand on this very issue on the comicart-l Yahoo group. So, thank you.

This irresponsible allegation takes me back to my arguments against such actions (for which I received a bad reputation) on the Yahoo comicart-l group. Why wouldn't the OP ask Rueben or Ron Frenz first, rather than impugn a true cover prelim by starting an accusatory thread like this? I made a lot of people mad on the comicart-l group by standing firm on the fact that these types of questions are irresponsible and can injure the value of the art in question, but I continue to stand by what I've always said before: Please do your due diligence before making public accusations like the one that started this thread.

Actually, the Carnage Mind Bomb one-shot from 1996 has been selling for around $20 for years. Carnage It's A Wonderful Life, which came out later in 1996, has also been selling for upwards of $10 for years. They are very oddball books because they were very mature for a Marvel comic featuring a Spider-Man villain, but that was a time of transition for Marvel and they were trying different stuff so we got these two Carnage issues. Mind Bomb has gone up quite a bit. But, it's one of those 1990s comics that didn't have a big print run and they aren't that easy to find, so, it was due to go up, in my opinion. Cates made it a must-find comic for his fans and it exploded. I went looking for a copy in a bunch of comic shops down south this week and came up empty. Matter of fact, one shop clerk in Myrtle Beach said he had a copy at home and I asked if he'd sell it and he wouldn't even listen to an offer on it. I have looked for these for years because it's always a strong seller. I think I've had 10-12 copies over the years and all of them were found in shops where 1990s books had been stockpiled and shoved to the back room because everyone considered that stuff to be garbage. Now, I'm sure a lot of those people who said 1990s books were garbage are scouring those 1990s long boxes to see if they can find one.

Here’s a look at the very cool Kyle Hotz original art for that issue’s cover:

I’ve had six or seven copies over the years and I buy it whenever I find it cheap, but it definitely isn’t a very common Ultraverse comic.

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/heat-vision/russ-heath-dead-comic-book-artist-was-91-1137353

Rune vs. Venom - the first appearance of winged Venom is selling pretty high all of a sudden.

It's one of the DC Universe UPC variants that were only sold in sets or in bricks of 20. There's a growing market for these because some are harder to find than others and it's part of a variant set that collectors want to complete.