jimbo_7071

Parked rocket to parked rocket.

Pleasure cruise to porthole.

Man whose face we can't see pointing a gun to woman whose face we can't see firing a gun.

Interesting. I haven't been able to get my hands on any Famous First Editions. The word on the street is that most of them have been trimmed and sold as originals.

Jr. flying towards Sivana to Jr. flying towards Sivana.

I agree that they should be in purple holders if there's a way to detect the treatment, but in the case of using only blue light, how would CGC be able to tell that fading was caused by blue-light treatment rather than by normal exposure to sunlight or fluorescent light? (They don't even seem to downgrade comics for fading, which might be even more concerning.) Even if there are non destructive tests that could detect the treatment, I doubt that CGC is sophisticated enough to do it. Maybe viewing books under 1000x or 2000X magnification could detect evidence that some areas had been exposed to more light than others, but that isn't certain, and you'd need a highly-trained technician to do it. Besides, the time required to view books under that kind of magnification would be cost prohibitive for most books. It would probably have to be reserved for six- and seven-figure books.

I've always been skeptical of all autograph verification services, including JSA. I'm sure they can catch some fakes, but no one will ever convince me that a good forgery can't slip past them.

My understanding is that an intense beam of blue light can cause a stain to fade (the same way leaving your clothing out in the sun will cause a stain to fade). Some of these guys use the light only on white areas of the book while others are more liberal with it. In a video that I saw months ago, a couple of guys on YouTube were talking about using blue light alone (i.e., no bath) to treat books, but I have not been able to locate that video again. (I cleared my history in YouTube not too long ago, otherwise I could search through my watched videos and find it.) If blue light is being used to lighten stains and foxing, that could potentially be done while a book is still in the slab. I don't know of any other way that a book could be lightened yet still retain the same slab number. (I do think it's possible that the changes we're seeing are the result of differences in the scans, but there is no way to verify that.)

Well, middle-aged is usually about 40–59, and elderly is usually 60 and up, so he could be either. Joseph Kearns, who played him in the T.V. series, was 52 when the series started. He died at 55 during the third season and was replaced by Gale Gordon, who was 56 at the time and 57 when the show ended.

Are you sure they're not using blue light? Some flippers are using blue light in conjunction with peroxide and possibly getting some books through undetected, but other guys are supposedly using blue light alone, and I don't think CGC could catch that.

Closed closet to open closet.

I had a subscription to Crazy in 2nd grade, and my mother's boyfriend tore up a bunch of my issues because I got in trouble at school (for calling one of my teachers a D***, I think).

*spoon* Winters to *spoon* Tracy.

I may go if CGC is doing on-site grading. If not, I will probably skip it. I went to the 1st one in the Renaissance Center in 1988, and I went to the 2001 show. Those are the only two I've been to. Chris Foss and Ed Jaster were the only two dealers at the 2001 show with any high-grade GA material. (I bought a Mile High Wow from Ed.) There is so much good material available in the online auctions now that it's hard to get excited about a convention. I was planning to go a couple of years ago, but then I found out that admission was $35, and I almost had a coronary. Adam West is the only guest I remember from '01. I didn't stand in line to get his autograph, but I saw him in the men's room. (He was 72, apparently, but he didn't look it; he could have passed for 52.)

I've never cared about first appearances. (I care about #1 issues even less; they're often the most common issues from a run because so many people save #1s.) That said, here's a 1st appearance from my collection: the first appearance of Maximilian O'Leary (Sargon the Sorcerer's apprentice).

Carnivorous plant to carnivorous plant.

I would not delete anything. The only reason why he would want your comment deleted is if he intends to deceive someone else about the status of his piece when he tries to sell it. He sounds like a conscienceless con artist to me. He may have believed what he was saying originally, but now that you have provided proof, there is no legitimate reason for him to still be sticking to his untenable position.

These Australian reprints are in pretty rough shape, but they were a lot cheaper than an airline ticket to Australia to look for better copies.

Timely bad girl in a yellow dress to Timely good girl in a yellow dress.

Bucky swinging from a rope ladder to Bucky dangling from a rope.

He'd better be nimble, or he won't be having any kids. Fire to fire.

Burning torch to burning candle.

Disembodied arms to disembodied head.

What are your thoughts on this one? Bedrock had it in the Whitman list, too, but CGC didn't designate it a Whitman cover.

I think they'll do the same think with cream areas. This book has pages that were white or close to it except for some light tanning along the top edge, so the book came back cream-to-off-white. The pages are significantly nicer than those in other books that I've had come back as cream-to-off-white, but there's no way to tell that from looking at the slab or even the notes. It would be nice if the notes had a little more clarity on things like that. (I actually thought the tanning was light enough to get an off-white-to-white designation; I'm pretty sure I've had books with entire pages as dark as the tanned area come back off-white.)