ExNihilo

Well, at least he offers up the opportunity to send it in to CGC for proper Signature Series grading. It drives me nuts that someone as big and renowned as JSC doesn't do this.

Did I overlook it, or is the date of the signing missing? I see the time, but no date.

Agreed, to me the book with the biggest potential is the 1:100 Jim Lee. Judging by fan reactions, it is a very striking cover. The rest of the covers are for personal collections only. Any other illusions about store exclusives is pure speculation and subject to buyer beware as it could easily be half the value in 6 months time.

It seems a bit unfair for the board (which I believe in early posts in this thread) asked for the opposing side of the story in order to paint a more complete picture. And now Jaymole expresses his side of the story and is attacked for making excuses. Did you want both sides of the story or did you not? It's unfortunate that he didn't speak up sooner as the length of his silence made him look more and more guilty. But now it's a case of "you're damned if you do and you're damned if you don't." To call him out on it seems a little disingenuous (considering board members wanted to hear his side). (EDIT: I don't mean it makes you specifically disingenuous, I just mean the contradictory nature of it as a whole)

Funny since that's partially what the side conversations have been about. Wait a few months, the prices will ultimately come down.

Jim Lee's been doing sketches on his twitch streams and routinely gives away 2 sketches everytime. Early on, a few of those giveaway pieces found their way onto eBay for whatever the perceived market value was (probably $1000+). Since then he's occasionally told people not to post on eBay. And he's also changed so that the more detailed drawing is either auctioned off or given away to paid subscribers. He still gives a freebie away, but it's usually a head shot or bust of some sort.

I better go pick up some numbers after work. While I generally love Turner's sharp penciling, I gotta say, I love the rounded features on his Harley. It's almost Jim Lee'esque. I might have to go get that Turner variant of Harley Quinn #1. But this set is an easy pass for me...unless I do win the lotto.

I personally think there is a little psychological magic at play here. I think the bar was set so low after Dark World that anything was going to be better than it. I also think that people liked GotG so much that they associate the humor from Ragnarok with it and thus have a better impression of the movie as a result of it. I suppose the only way to test the theory out would be to find a group of people who have never watched any Marvel movie and have them watch GotG 1, GotG 2, and Ragnarok (in that order) and ask them how they would rank the 3 movies.

The blind auctions are hit or miss. I once watched a blind auction for a short box of books (maybe short of 100 books?) go for like $1500. It was a set of bronze age hulks that included an IH181 in about a 6.5. I'd say that seems worth it to me. But for every one of those, there's probably 9 that aren't worth the money. Like i said...hit or miss.

Agreed, I think what we're seeing is a cyclical nature in marketing and promotions. I stopped collecting around 97 and when I returned around 2004, the market had changed. Gone were the hologram, foil, and die cut covers. Replaced with just a book and a standard cover. Fast forward to 2015 and I started yearning for the occasional hologram or foil cover. Nostalgia was taking hold. At the time, I didn't realize that foil variants were all the rage on the convention scene. This slowly made it's way to the market where we saw a slew of lenticular and foil covers from the big 2. But as quickly as it has returned, it's already worn out its welcome having grown too large, too fast. I hope the incentive variants get cut back. Maybe have a bidding system that allows different shops to exclusively have the rights for the incentive cover for a particular book. For example, maybe Midtown places the highest bid and they have the exclusive right to the incentive variant for Amazing Spider-Man #1. But then maybe KRS Comics gets the rights for ASM #2. And maybe comicsketart gets it for ASM #3. (Or better yet, the publishers limit which books can have inventive variants and which can't, thus eliminating the likelihood that some random book like Renew Your Vows #11 gets a worthless variant cover.) This way the collecting markets tastes are satiated without a flood of 50 incentive variants diluting the market. The shops get a bump in revenue from the book sales, the publishers get a cut from the bidding rights, and the market as a whole doesn't suffer.

I agree, though my critique is harsher. Hela was your run of the mill villain and Cate Blanchett's talents were underutilized. The CG was poor (with regards to the Odin scene). Character deaths were treated with absolutely no respect, like they were red suited away team members. Valkyrie did not strike a chord in me until her flashback sequence showed how much pain she had experienced in the past, but by then, the movie was on its way into the 3rd act. Tonally, the movie was far too much like Guardians of the Galaxy. If I wanted that kind of movie, I would have watched GotG 1 or 2. Far too much attention on Korg. I don't understand the Marvel fanbases love of the character. To me it's like the director wanted a bigger role so wrote himself into more scenes. I know he didn't die in the snap, but Gods almighty, I wish he had. Overall, I left Ragnarok thinking, "I hope there's no more Thor movies". And yet, I'm in the vast vast minority since soooooo many Marvel fans seem to hold Ragnarok as a top 3 movie. I just don't get it. I watched it once in theaters and then attempted to watch it twice on long haul international flights. Both times I fell asleep...and I can never fall asleep on planes (I flew a 9 hour first class flight once and couldn't even fall asleep with a lie flat bed!). Bottom 5 for me.

I was thinking last night, I'm a little surprised Aspen hasn't tried getting in on the frenzy by releasing some "unreleased" Batman art from the archives.

Tier (also list FastTrack where applicable): Economy S/SNumber of books: 1 Received CCS: n/a At CCS: n/a Received CGC: 5/3 Verified: 6/12 Graded: TBD Shipped/Safe: TBD Received (by owner): TBD Tier (also list FastTrack where applicable): Modern S/SNumber of books: 2 Received CCS: n/a At CCS: n/aReceived CGC: 4/26 Verified CGC: 6/6 Graded: 6/11 Shipped/Safe: 6/14Received (by owner): TBD Tier (also list FastTrack where applicable): Modern S/S Number of books: 1 Received CCS: 6/1 At CCS: TBD Received CGC: TBD Verified: TBD Graded: TBD Shipped/Safe: TBD Received (by owner): TBD

It left me wondering if we'll be getting a follow up anytime soon.

Legit question: I'm not a variant person, but Batman is one of my favorite characters, I have enjoyed the story thus far, and I do like several of the covers to the point that I feel like owning a few would make me happy. I have no intention of buying to flip or speculate, all books are for the sole intent of having in my personal collection. What ledge am I looking over? (Note, the question is from a personal standpoint and is not about variants and the business as a whole. I think I've made it clear in a previous post that I disagree with the rampant trend of variants from the two major publishers recently. Now, if you want to argue that by buying copies, I am enabling/justifying the publishers actions and thus potentially speeding up the next comic book crash, then I suppose an argument could be made that I am guilty of that. But am I to blame for wanting books, or is the publisher to blame for creating a niche market for people such as myself?)

Frankly, as a reader, I'm looking forward to it. I've enjoyed King's run (at least beginning with the I Am Bane arc) and some of the issues highlighting the Batman/Catwoman dynamic have been well done. I absolutely loved Annual #2 in particular as well as the 2 issue arc where Bruce tells Clark (it was so good to see Lois and Selena interact), and the standalone issue where Selena "shops" for her wedding dress was fun as well. And the wedding issues are only slightly less impactful than the "Deaths". We all know our heroes will eventually return. And despite this, there is always hype in the run up, maybe a flurry of sales. But where are a lot of those books now? How much is the Death of Captain America worth? Or Superman? Or Batman? And while I completely agree that an excessive number of variant covers is bad (I mean, just look at Action Comics #1000...did it really need a crappy cover from EVERY decade PLUS the innumerable store variants?), for the right price, I see no reason not to add some books to the personal collection for its artistic value. When Marvel is selling ASM #800 for $10(!), it kinda opens the door and makes you think "okay, a set of 2 variant covers by Louw for $15 isn't bad." Or "sure, Middleton covers for $20? I can do that." I think the store variant covers cater to a niche market - the collectors. The more detrimental variants to the business are the variants available for all LCS's. The shenanigans that Marvel pulled with their Legacy covers was just bad as far as I could see.

I didn't know what issue they got married in so I had to look it up (Fantastic Four Annual #3). On eBay, the prices were $100+ for an 8.0+. Granted, there is that one raw book that sold for a measly $2.25.

The Warren Louw variant cover by KRS comics on the other hand did sell out (on their website) at some point over the weekend.

I mean, you're definitely not wrong. They're all books you would find in the $1 bin. But really, what percentage of your books do you go back and re-read to begin with? When I finally sat down to re-organize my books I came across books I didn't even remember I had. That said, there's a part of me that still loves Kubert's wraparound cover of the Summers/Grey wedding issue (X-Men v2 #30).

I mean, you gotta be a pretty dumb social manager to think that would be okay. But I guess it's all just par for the course for Paradise Comics. I dunno who Kristina is.

I'm guessing the account got hacked.

The start of what? Collecting comics as art? It's no different than buying a random variant issue drawn by JSC. If someone feels like the cover strikes something within them that they want to get it for their personal collection, where's the harm in that? Or are you implying that by buying into this, consumers are opening the door for more and more store variants in the future which will ultimately cost them more and more?

Curious, approximately when are guest/creator lists made available for SDCC?

For the most part, I group by publisher and then alphabetical. But then I run into the problem of crossovers and events. As such, lately, I've begun grouping by "era" (based on events and reboots). For example, DC books are organized as pre-52, Flashpoint, New 52 titles, Darkseid War/DC: Rebirth, Rebirth titles. Marvel is similar, it's pre Hickman, Hickman, All New All Different Marvel titles, Civil War 2, Marvel NOW 2.0, Secret Empire, and now Marvel Legacy. It just made it easier as a kid to group crossovers because then all the titles would be in one box instead of spread out over 2 or 3 boxes deep in my closet.

Nick Derington from Ultimate Comics.