EastEnd1

And who's to say that the staple indent and color rub wasn't worsened (or even created) by the pressing process that the book likely went through. That would clearly make both handling defects.

Maybe... maybe not. Impossible to tell unless you look at all the 9.8s and this "9.9" side-by-side. But one thing this book certainly ISN'T is a 9.9... not with staple color rub and indent, and a spine mis-wrap. It might even be impossible for ANY GSXM1 to achieve a 9.9 due to staple placement. And that is perfectly fine.

Actually I posted in GENERAL (as did you). And there should be no technical difference between grading bronze and modern. Tell you what, why don't YOU do the work and find me another 9.9 with color rub.

Guess you haven't seen my Westfield comic box thread in the modern section...

Couldn't agree more... having submitted hundreds of 9.8 candidates and never gotten a 9.9, this book is clearly not a 9.9. The color rub at the staple is more than enough to take it out of the category.

Can't say I've heard much about light-only brightening... though that strikes me as a far less intrusive (ie, egregious) approach. I'd imagine it's much less successful as well.

This is my recollection too... numerous videos of people being "shocked" that they'd gotten PLODs for simply "cleaning" the book with these techniques. This is the thread I was thinking of covering this topic... https://boards.cgccomics.com/topic/520982-problems-with-cgc-grading-a-cleaned-and-pressed-book-with-a-purple-label-my-thoughts/#comments

I thought CGC was treating this technique with PLODs. There were a number of vidoes that were posted about it maybe summer of last year?

That's it for this box... next up is April 2001!

And lastly, an Indie that I thought might have some potential from the Westfield catalog description... alas, it was not to be...

One more for the Spawn fans...

Dark Horse hit the trifecta when they got the comic book rights to Aliens, Predator and the Terminator, three of the most popular film villains from 1980s horror/sci-fi. So how could you go wrong ordering a comic featuring all three! Interestingly, the film business would later mimic some of Dark Horse's team-ups...

Now that's what I call a face only a mother could love... though it does make one hell of a comic book cover. For those unfamiliar with the character, his name is "Arseface"... I think you can understand the reference (though his origin is quite tragic).

Neil Gaiman's Sandman might be the best scripted comic series ever (though there's some work from fellow Brit Alan Moore that I think gives it a run). The character Lucifer was first introduced in issue #4. Apparently his look was modeled after David Bowie (though I'm not quite seeing that here). I do wish I'd ordered more than one copy of the first issue of Lucifer's own title though... think I'd ordered four Sandman #1s but dropped the ball here...

I thought this Howard Porter cover on JLA #42 was pretty neat... talk about superheros in peril!

Landmark numerical issues were almost always ordered... in this case Hitman #50. The Garth Ennis script made it an even easier book to order...

Orion #1 made it's appearance that month with Walt Simonson cover and art...

Crypto is back to going nuts too... we could be seeing a sequel...

Wow, was $1 million this morning when I checked! My prediction of $5.5-6.0 is looking pretty attainable... and some...

That's very true... I'd forgotten that the books auctioned off after the first big auction or two actually went much cheaper. Just took a quick look and this is one I got for $260!

And last one for tonight (more still to come from this box though) is this JSA #11. I stayed with this series for maybe it's entire run, much of which wasn't very attention grabbing. But this execution cover is definitely a stand out...

Think you guys know by now what a big fan I am of the Batman: Dark Victory limited series... here's #7...

And here's another one of those great DC Millennium Edition reprints... this time All-Star Comics #3... the 1st appearance and origin of the Justice Society...

That's a pretty solemn Black Bolt on the cover of issue 1 of this Inhumans limited series...

Another wonderful George Perez Avengers cover on this one...