Get Marwood & I

Thanks Albert - accepting that I've only got eBay, eBid and some UK sellers sites as reference points, some titles - and individual issues within runs - are remarkably scarce I've found.

Changing tack, here's my vote for the single best Marvel UKPV of the 3,022 current confirmed candidates: Close second:

Alas, nay...

Take your pick

That's my current position Albert - we can make a damn good guess, but the smoking gun is absent in places. When I 've finished populating the table with all the DC's (including the other titles that started within the first 4 cycles / after October 59) let's all look again. And then I'll add in Charlton, Archie and ACG. The stamps don't lie - they are physically present and, in the main, the majority of the extant examples for the same issues have the same stamps. The stamp to cover dates sequencing broadly correlate well. So the picture is more than substantially complete, if only for DC. It's just those early 6 stamp DC copies that create a problem - and a big one, if we are all interested in establishing which books arrived first. All good fun.

Loom how many 1's and 3's there are compared to 6's in the second cycle by the way: It looks like the May cover date books were split over two stamp deliveries doesn't it, 5 and 6.

I gotta agree with this Hence my assertion that the market test theory is likely a duff one and should be discounted as a) it doesn't make sense and b) we have no examples of the alleged title issue numbers

See above - the second cycle 6's are a pure little date set, currently.

Is that market test theory of Duncan's a phantom do you think? I've been undertaking a huge overhaul of the images I had saved, and it's taking a while, but I should soon have the updated table ready to post. In the meantime, all the second cycle 2 stamps are May or June 1960 cover dates: Adding the first cycle 6's would completely mess up the pattern.

I think Albert's gone to the foot of our stairs

Now come on Gary, Moonstone is a classic. Did you not see the Klaw, Solarr (with two r's) and Wundarr (also with two r's)? I think they gave him two r's otherwise he'd have been an 'r' sole.

That's kind of where I'm going with it Eric - identifying what we can and cannot say for 'certain'. And that's before we've even factored Charlton, Archie and ACG into the mix

Good point, but doesn't that also apply to the market tester / make-weight theory full stop? Are you saying Pat Boone wasn't popular back in the day Albert?

@Mr Thorpe @Albert Tatlock @Kevin.J Guys, a theory for you. To recap, we have five titles currently eligible to be sitting in the 6 box of the first cycle: Our current theory, supported by the absence of 7's, is that they are actually late second cycle books, which would make the 8 stamp the first DC delivery. What gets me, still, is that the cover dates all kind of match what would have been a first cycle 6 stamp set of books. How likely is it that those five issues were all late, all arriving as second cycle 6s? Now, to my theory. What if those books are the 'market testers' / 'make-weight' books that Duncan refers to over at the CBPGUK? The concept of the testers must have come from somewhere? He wouldn't have made it up would he? So what if those books - and any others waiting to be found - were the testers, and the lack of first cycle 7s is indicative of the market research delay? Whaddaya think guys? Is that plausible?

Sigh... Challenge accepted.

Hello Aaron and welcome. Revat has given you good advice here to build upon. If you check eBay sold listings as he suggested you'll get a good idea of what your comic has sold for and why: Captain Britain 8 has a first appearance of a popular character as you will see, and you can also see the prices ranging from £59 all the way up to £271 for the graded copy. Your copy looks to be a high grade copy, so it will likely be at the higher end of the prices shown if there are no hidden surprises (missing coupons, internal writing, things like that). Not to be sniffed at, and a nice book to own. Or sell, if that is what you intend. Good luck.

On that point, I've found that for the Charlton UKPV comics, some of the UK prices appear stamped by hand, as they vary in position from one copy to the next, and others appear printed as they all occupy the exact same position on different copies of the same book. The placing of the UK prices on these three copies indicates by hand: If so, you couldn't call these magazines price variants as such of course - just another variation of stamped distributed US originals. But for the Charlton comics, the original US prices were clearly omitted during printing so they are variants by definition, even if the subsequent UK price was hand or mechanically applied after the original printing event on some copies: I like to think a 'no price' version will surface one day, if I'm right....

I found another 'RV Series' Charlton Horror magazine example during my searches yesterday - the 'shield' version of Horror Monsters #10 (a non-shield logo version also exists). It's the first new example I've found in a long while since I plotted them last year over in my now defunct Charlton thread. Here's how they currently plot: There are UK / RV examples for 'Black Zoo' and 'Werewolf and Vampires' too by the way. And the UK versions have different types of stamps / overprinted price versions - some with the RV shield logo, some without and some with numbered 'new series' versions for which the numbers do not correlate with the original US issue numbers. Confusing, eh? The 'New Series' versions, which are numbered, and have a mix of shield / non-shield logo versions, plot out as follows: RV New Series #1 - Horror Monsters #7 RV New Series #2 - Horror Monsters Presents Black Zoo #1 RV New Series #3 - Mad Monsters #6 and Mad Monsters #10 RV New Series #4 - Horror Monsters #8 RV New Series #5 - Mad Monsters #7 RV New Series #6 RV New Series #7 - Horror Monsters #9 RV New Series #8 RV New Series #9 - Horror Monsters #10 RV New Series #10 RV New Series #11 - Horror Monsters #2 Not sure why #3 was used twice - maybe it was an error or maybe the shield / non-shield make up has a bearing (Mad Monsters #6 and 10 below, both No.3): I haven't seen examples of the missing numbers (6, 8, 10) or indeed whether later numbers exist. It could be that the unnumbered UK examples may fill the gaps, and were not numbered for some reason, but there are more of them than there are gaps so that feels unlikely. A few examples of unnumbered non-shield versions: I've spent a good amount of time trying to find out anything about these books and, as I've mentioned a few times, who 'RV' were. As with the 1964/1965 Charlton comics, I can't find one single reference to them online having searched every possible word combination, even on UK based horror magazine websites and forums. Odd isn't it? Anyway, I seem to be talking to myself again on this. Back to plotting the first four DC titles now....

Here's an odd little one - it looks like the erroneous black ink blob went on first, then the colours to make the red and blue, hence the black showing only in the white of the wording (and only faintly under the colouring): Hulk like

Don't worry, there are only 4,787 of them to collect. Start now and you'll soon have the lot

Changeable date stamps were quite a common stationery item I suppose so I can't imagine a store going to the trouble to have a named one made up given the mechanics. Static price stamps are another matter though. Lots of those around in the UK

Something fairly obvious has only just dawned on me which makes me feel ever so slightly thick. The three 'market tester / make-weight' books that Duncan refers to have the same October cover month as the eight stamped examples we have found. So if they did come over to the UK, it's much more likely that they would have done so as first cycle 8's and 9's, not anything earlier. Why didn't I see that until now?

Jayzus you've got some comics Mr T Brilliant. The number sequencing is odd there isn't it - the 9 (26) and 3 (27) are spot on, but the 1 (25) is out of place somewhat. Got any more then Mr T? Flippin DC gold mine you are

Morning Using Mike's Comic Newsstand, I plotted the books that we currently have confirmed T&P stamped copies for, for the 'first UK arrival cover month' of October 1959: Pat Boone #1 is the only stamped copy that I have seen that predates them, i.e. sits on the September page on Mike's site,but we know that that copy likely exists as a second cycle / late arrival book. Seven examples so far. Here is the updated table showing the first stamped copy I have an example of for all the 47 titles which cross the October 1959 cover month: Have I missed any guys? Comparing the exercise to the data on the CPGUK... ...there's quite a few missing. Regarding the assertion from Duncan that 'market testers' / 'make-weight' comics may exist for Action #257, Detective #272 and Adventures #109, I've never seen any evidence of this as we know. If stamped copies were to materialise however, it would be interesting now to see what stamp number they had as this, now we can plot the sequencing, could indicate whether they indeed were genuine first cycle arrivals or, as would perhaps be more likely, late second cycle books. Maybe Duncan can recall seeing them, but in the fog of time, he was remembering late arrivals? I've been looking periodically for evidence of those 'market testers' for as long as I've been interested in researching pence books. If one does finally turn up, I think I'll pass out.

You don't often see a date stamp on the back cover do you - here's an example from my UK distribution review thread (there's a few more on the same page): I like date stamps - anything about the physical distribution process back in the day fascinates me.