alexgross.com

On 8/31/2023 at 3:51 AM, namisgr said:

Consigners are blocked from bidding on the comics they consigned.  As for the stickers, nobody but Comiclink likes them but I imagine they'll continue to use them for advertising their business.

this may be true on CL but i am told on excellent authority that another major auction site allows at least some big sellers to bid on their own books. 

i have no evidence but a strong suspicion that all 3 major auction sites participate in some kind of shill bidding on the bigger auction books. allegations to that effect have been around for a long time by some people who apparently worked at some of these places. and all three sites appear to be owned by people/businesses with major collections of their own. therefore the auction house winning a book because they shilled it too high simply can mean it goes into the vault for awhile.

ultimately no one should be shocked by weirdly strong auction results at any auction site. 

On 8/11/2023 at 11:47 AM, gadzukes said:

My last two collections have come my way from a "friend of a friend" so make sure ALL of your friends know you collect!!!!!

nice pickup! just curious if you used overstreet to let him know how you came up with your prices, or some other way. i've only bought one collection before and used a combination of gpa and overstreet...

On 7/27/2023 at 10:24 PM, DC# said:

Here is the $43k book from Heritage this week.   Definitely weaker than recent sales though some of those had MC too as I recall.  

yes lots of chipping and the cream pages also dont help. imo a well presenting 5.0 with owwp or wp would likely do much better than this right now, despite the economy being in a sort of netherworld. 

many of us would like to see tobey play spidey again. but not with raimi, please. was doctor strange and the horror zone of terrible moviemaking not enough proof that he's not a good filmmaker??

On 7/16/2023 at 5:57 PM, Robot Man said:

Yeah, very comic book centric and compact.

Yeah, Mr Bedrock I’d going down to SD as well. He had a somewhat smaller booth but brought a very nice variety of books. Something got most everyone. Dealers really get a bang for the buck with 2 shows in basically a week. 

great report, thanks again for all the pictures! wish i could have made it. 

what was the consensus on sales saturday? i heard mixed things so far about crowd size and sales. dealers don't usually chime in here when sales are slow but they are quite willing to let us know when books are flying off the walls. 

the market seems to be stabilizing a bit but i also know some collectors (me?) who are somewhat skittish right now as well. observations? 

On 7/15/2023 at 6:53 PM, Robot Man said:

Just got home from Torpedo. Whoo Doggies! What a huge packed room of beautiful vintage funny books! Saw a lot of friends, made some new ones and spent a load of cash.

If you didn’t go today, make sure to hit it tomorrow. I left a few for you. If you can’t find something to buy in that room, you aren’t a comic collector…

No time today for a full report but will try tomorrow. Got pictures to prove it…

thank you for the pics! i so wanted to be there but it was not meant to be this year. next year for sure i am coming down. 

On 6/24/2023 at 9:58 PM, Primetime said:

Thanks to @Bunky Brian for a very unusual haul for me today 🤓😛

one of my very favorite dealers! 

On 6/24/2023 at 2:44 PM, rptcomics said:

CLOSED It won't allow me to edit the title so I made a new one.

if you edit the first post in the thread, it allows you to change the title of the thread. 

my condolences mike. it's a terrible thing. all the best wishes to you and your family during this time. 

On 6/20/2023 at 4:03 PM, Microchip said:

The ease has arrived.

A few books I've been following in the last few clink auctions have softened consistently.   

Silver Surfer vol 1 has come right off the boil.   #1 is $45,600 on GPA in CGC 9.6 universal.

 

This has been to date in the last 36 months, a blue chip book.

 

with two days to go, the same book is already at 26k on heritage. so the lesson is sell your books there, i guess. 

also, the only sale on gpa of this book in grade in 2020 was for 13k, which was a record high. so if we're assuming 2021 was an outlier due to pandemic, this book is still doing quite well, as are most keys. 

https://reason.com/2023/06/16/the-flash-makes-the-case-against-the-multiverse/

interesting review in reason magazine. i don't fully agree with him, but it's worth reading. he's not a fan of multiverse stories in general. a quote from the piece:

"Like No Way Home, The Flash is more of a self-regarding nostalgia trip than an actual movie, the cinematic equivalent of flipping through an old yearbook and murmuring, Hey, remember when…? But No Way Home, as cynical as it was, also offered some actual value along with its winks and nods and nostalgic remembrances, setting up a warm send-off for more than two decades of Spider-Men, all of whom brought something memorable to the character."

On 6/15/2023 at 12:52 PM, D2 said:

I am interested to hear feedback on this one from boardies.

This movie looks like a guilty pleasure movie to me, pulling on my Michael Keaton heartstrings. I would have a hard time finding faults in this movie simply because of my nostalgic blinders.

saw it yesterday with my 8 year old. first of all, the way to enjoy superhero movies that you otherwise might not is to go with your kid. it's always way more fun because i know he is enjoying it. 

but to your point about the NOSTALGIA factor, i'd say that is the core appeal of this film, or was intended to be. it very much reminded me of spiderman no way home, except not nearly as well done. perhaps this storyline in comics precedes that film, but it doesnt matter. feels like once again DCU is playing catch-up to the MCU. yes, seeing keaton again as batman was super cool. some of the other CGI or AI created other appearances nearer to the end of the film are fun but also very forgettable. i think without the nostalgia factor this film would have been pretty mediocre. with the addition of keaton, i'd say it was good but very far from great. ezra miller is charismatic but also borderline annoying to watch. especially when he overacts as a teenager. 

when this comes on hbo max, i will have no need to rewatch it. whereas when spiderman no way home came onto disney plus, we couldn't wait to rewatch it again. so, in comparing nostalgia trips, i'd say that one wins hands down. 

and i don't personally agree with @jsilverjanet that this is as good as GOTG3. not by a long shot. GOTG3 had better writing and acting, and far better visual effects. 

lets see some pics from this years show!

On 6/9/2023 at 2:28 AM, Bosco685 said:

they've shown the preview for this at both GOTG3 and spiderverse, and it could not look more formulaic and lame. i predict dismal numbers when released. 

On 6/9/2023 at 4:06 AM, Microchip said:

The biggest bargain at the last Clink Auction..

 

And the only other copy I've seen in 20+ years with the full M visible in Marvel.   The only the copy with proper wrap is the Curator copy.

 

 

several boardies here last year were predicting prices would return to 2020 pricing once the pandemic bubble burst. i was skeptical that they would fall that much, but this book is at least one example of that being accurate. this is right where pricing was in 2020 for this grade according to gpa. basically double what it was worth in 2018, but far, far from the highs achieved in the crazy times of 2021 and early 2022. 

On 6/7/2023 at 6:58 PM, awakeintheashes said:

 

Really cool to see the animation changes throughout and oftentimes to fit the mood of the scene. The scene between Gwen and Captain Stacy towards the end really stands out. Really ambitious but done so in a way that wasn’t, “hey look at us. We are being ambitious.” It just worked. 

i thought exactly the same thing in this scene! a gorgeous mix of watercolor effects, dripping paint, evolving color palette, style of characters, and all in service of the emotions in the scene. 

how they were able to integrate different styles of animation throughout the film so well was truly amazing to see. the first film has already been oft imitated stylistically by other animated films like 'puss in boots 2' and 'mario bros movie' and i expect this one to be even more influential visually. 

i have set up at a few shows and bought at many. credit card acceptance is certainly a must. stripe and square both have easy systems and i know square can send you a chip reader. probably stripe does as well. 

On 6/4/2023 at 4:10 AM, Bosco685 said:

Not to worry. From your expert predictions, this is an 80's animation style that will release on PBS, the CW and ABC. All these forumite reviews are a fabrication to build excitement for the nostalgic VHS and Beta Max release.

lol! i put that guy on ignore years ago and my experience here is so much better.

saw the movie today with my son and we loved it. no audio problems. perhaps the most creative animation ever in the modern era. a bit overlong, but really a great ride. we cannot wait for the conclusion. i expect it to break records. 

On 6/2/2023 at 5:57 AM, GreatCaesarsGhost said:

 

they say amputees still feel tingling in a missing appendage years later, and that’s how I think it will be for me

going somewhere?

On 5/25/2023 at 11:28 PM, Primetime said:

I’ve owned several copies over the years, but here is my copy since 2012.

can't see the top half well but wow is that a gorgeous copy, and looks far better condition than the assigned grade. well done sir!

On 5/19/2023 at 10:40 PM, jjfversion1 said:

Have to disagree with all the High Evolutionary hate. I thought he was one of the better comic movie villains in a long time and the over the top acting was great.

His fake crying during that one heart wrenching scene was icing on the cake of a true dirt bag villain. I loved it.

i agree with you! i found him very compelling in general. more than Jonathan Majors who played Kang in the Loki series (and later in quantumania). I don't envy Marvel in trying to come up with the next great villain post-Thanos. 

On 5/15/2023 at 5:33 AM, Mark Warren said:

If there isn't a thread dedicated to the insanity of paying a 5X multiple of the 9.6 price for a 9.8, there really should be. I feel like someday the whole 9.8 fad will collapse and the hobby will collectively realize just how much money it has wasted chasing a subjective and mostly meaningless number ("It's a teeny tiny little microscopic bit better than a 9.6--except when it isn't! And who cares that the 9.6 has better centering!"), but so far I've been dead wrong. I get that for resellers, 9.8 is sometimes the only grade that makes sense financially. But for people who are paying through the nose for 9.8s for their personal collection...it just seems strange.

I started buying comics in the 1970's, off of spinner racks, and I almost never encountered comics that were essentially perfect, even fresh off the rack. 9.8 comics, at least from the copper age on back, just look unnatural to me. I think Overstreet had it right when he listed 9.2 as the defacto highest grade.

9.9 and 10.0 prices are even sillier than 9.8 ones! and i agree that it's ludicrous that a teeny tiny often indistinguishable difference should be worth 5x more. but i dont think it will ever change. too many people will want the status of 'best grade' for their books. 

On 5/14/2023 at 4:05 PM, drotto said:

 

 

Just trying to look at this realistically, because I really like this film, for me it was the best since Infinity War.

strongly agree. best marvel film since endgame for me, not counting 'no way home' since its not exactly marvel. my 8 year old also loved the movie. great writing, acting, visuals, etc. rockets backstory was really moving and well done. but ultimately it was the writing that made this special. and the chemistry this group of actors has had together for almost a decade too. 

also saw a preview for 'the marvels' movie and i predict that will be a godawful flop and incredibly unfunny to boot.