RockMyAmadeus

By the way...the paper stock for Harby #1 isn't any special stock. It's not "heavier" as someone said, like Solar #10's cardstock. It's just typical cheapo cover stock that Valiant went with in 1991.

Yes, without a doubt.. While we don't have the exact numbers for either, we DO know that Hulk #181 had a paid circulation avg of 202k copies (meaning, copies sold) and BA #12 had orders of 19,200 from Cap City, which probably represents about 80,000 copies total, Direct and newsstand. Hulk wasn't setting the sales world on fire, but BA came out in an environment where the market didn't pay a lot of attention to this adjunct Batman title. It was a particularly low selling title at the time. Interestingly, this was during Knightfall, which catapulted Batman back on top of the comics market again. The latter part of Knightfall beat the pants off everything else in the market. Batman #500 won its month, and was the 7th best selling comic of 1993....which would be #1, if not for the return of Superman and Turok #1. The Cap City orders for Batman #500 were TEN TIMES that of #488, the official "prelude" to Knightfall.

if you're comfy buying from a new seller from international... Valid point. I'm still waiting for my check from that Nigerian royal family I helped out 3 months ago. Hey, me too! Man, they sure have a lot of royalty in trouble in Nigeria!

The GOTG that the movie was based on was straight from the Annihilation storyline...one of the best Marvel cosmic storylines out there. Sure, it wasn't the original team, but it's not like they pulled it out of their arse like an African-American Johnny Storm... Jessica Alba ain't exactly the spitting image of the comicbook Sue Storm... No, and there were complaints about her, too, at the time. A far better choice would have been Kristen Bell, or even Sarah Michelle Gellar.

By who? I've got one in a box somewhere. At this point, I would be very surprised to find ANY DC book from 1994-late 96 that doesn't have one. Earlier in the thread there was a conversation about it, and Revat took it off the list because there were some books where a second print may have been confused for being a DCU. It was originally on the master list, then it was taken off. this sounds right. Its probably happened in more than one case. I think that IF the cover or storyline was too violent, there was no reprint, like Wonder Woman 83 Just to be sure, the DCU books aren't reprints, except in a few instances (Green Lantern #36, for example, of #47, or the Superman books, which are entities to themselves.) The ones for the packs were printed at the same time as the regulars, and are just regular first printings. I didn't read the conversation about the Flash #94...if I had, I would have said it earlier.

Skipped right over 9.6.

I dunno, the title seems to be doing pretty well . . . Well yeah, throw a common book in a 9.8 slab and it will sell. It's all common, sure it'll sell, but it doesn't always sell enough for a profit. Then the person who slabbed it and sold it at a loss is an insufficiently_thoughtful_person Damn insufficiently_thoughtful_people.

What kind of pudding? I like chocolate, myself.

If Adams had drawn Gambit on the cover, we wouldn't even be having this conversation.

By who? I've got one in a box somewhere. At this point, I would be very surprised to find ANY DC book from 1994-late 96 that doesn't have one.

I dunno, the title seems to be doing pretty well . . . I'm not sure if any of these qualify as doing 'pretty well' hitting $80 with a freaking Sam Kieth sig actually kinda sounds low. Sad but true. Sam hasn't signed in 2+ years, but no one seems too interested in the books. I made a reasonable bulk offer on about 20 Sam SS books...Maxx #2 9.8 and the like...and was summarily turned down. I wonder what the seller got for them, if he sold?

Personally, I love how they weren't technically proficient enough to actually fit their chosen font for the Serial Number and Designation into the box they created. Cutting off parts of letters gives it that homespun, Midwestern, made-by-hand feel. They should have worked the word "Artisanal" into the company name. I love how they go beyond the technical aspects of grading and document how they feel about the book. "Overall a very nice comic with very attractive red and yellow foil cover." "What do you feel this book grades at?" "I feel this book grades at "very nice" "Is that higher or lower than "extra nice", "super sweet" and "minty fresh"? On the plus side, they do have your 9.5 grade. So did CGC, once. Once.

Pretty soon we'll be down to only having ellipses and solidi for punctuation.

Just as a rule of thumb, but by all means, not etched into stone, but a 9.6 usually equates to half of its 9.8 counterpart. So while the 9.8 is at 2k, you could view it as the 9.6 has some untapped potential Which is beyond the most ridiculous thing ever, since a 9.6 isn't in "half as good" condition as a 9.8.....

Very true. I am one of those speculators who got back into the mix thanks to these websites. Heyyyyyy, I resemble those remarks. I got back into the hobby in Aug 2013. I thought variants were very cool and bought a lot of them. Now, I still speculate on moderns but I know enough to have Silver, Bronze and a little Copper in my collection and to not buy so many variants. It's all a learning experience. Unfortunately, the "old guard" are pretty uppity when it comes to speculation. Regardless of what people think about how others should spend THEIR OWN money, the hobby is just fine. In fact, some of the new collectors/speculators are the ones buying their Gold, Silver, Bronze and Copper so that they can buy that same book in a higher grade (speculation). It's still called speculation. Even "readers" aren't buying books to fold up and put it in their back pocket. Books are read very carefully so as not to cause any, or more, damage, speculating that the book will not decrease in "value". Speculation, Holmes. Again you weren't here for the last go around with large scale speculation from card dealers. So please don't tell me you understand the market when you just above admitted to being a victim when you started. I got nothing personal against speculation. We all do it some extent. Even your ridiculous paragraph about doesn't really bother me. Where I have issues is just the outright lying and manipulation that comes with large scale speculation. Or when speculator web site pump a book that they themselves have bought dozens of copies. You cant be unbiased when you are vested in the success of the book you are reporting on. I seriously doubt you know what readers do with their books or even what they read. I do not think all spec sites are trying to market manipulate or doing it to sell their own books. I know there are a couple that do, but several that don't. Why on earth would anyone spend the time to create a site on speculation books for any reason other than to sell the ones they have? Train of thought: 1. Create website 2. Buy books 3. Pump up demand for books by writing an article about it 4. Sell books on Ebay 5. Abnormal Increase in profits from doing step # 3 In conclusion: spec website = false spec market There have been creators who have done this, for kicks, profit, and both. "Let's see...what's an obscure character that I can buy a ton of copies of, then reintroduce in my current book?"

Very true. I am one of those speculators who got back into the mix thanks to these websites. Heyyyyyy, I resemble those remarks. I got back into the hobby in Aug 2013. I thought variants were very cool and bought a lot of them. Now, I still speculate on moderns but I know enough to have Silver, Bronze and a little Copper in my collection and to not buy so many variants. It's all a learning experience. Unfortunately, the "old guard" are pretty uppity when it comes to speculation. Regardless of what people think about how others should spend THEIR OWN money, the hobby is just fine. In fact, some of the new collectors/speculators are the ones buying their Gold, Silver, Bronze and Copper so that they can buy that same book in a higher grade (speculation). It's still called speculation. Even "readers" aren't buying books to fold up and put it in their back pocket. Books are read very carefully so as not to cause any, or more, damage, speculating that the book will not decrease in "value". Speculation, Holmes. Again you weren't here for the last go around with large scale speculation from card dealers. So please don't tell me you understand the market when you just above admitted to being a victim when you started. I got nothing personal against speculation. We all do it some extent. Even your ridiculous paragraph about doesn't really bother me. Where I have issues is just the outright lying and manipulation that comes with large scale speculation. Or when speculator web site pump a book that they themselves have bought dozens of copies. You cant be unbiased when you are vested in the success of the book you are reporting on. I seriously doubt you know what readers do with their books or even what they read. I do not think all spec sites are trying to market manipulate or doing it to sell their own books. I know there are a couple that do, but several that don't. Why on earth would anyone spend the time to create a site on speculation books for any reason other than to sell the ones they have? You know what's cool...? I can hear that in your voice now...

Now you've done it. Used up the board's allotment of question marks. Now no one can ask a question until November. Damn it.

It's a Liefeld cover, so yeah...

Personally, I love how they weren't technically proficient enough to actually fit their chosen font for the Serial Number and Designation into the box they created. Cutting off parts of letters gives it that homespun, Midwestern, made-by-hand feel. They should have worked the word "Artisanal" into the company name. I love how they go beyond the technical aspects of grading and document how they feel about the book. "Overall a very nice comic with very attractive red and yellow foil cover." "What do you feel this book grades at?" "I feel this book grades at "very nice" "Is that higher or lower than "extra nice", "super sweet" and "minty fresh"?

Editor needed.

You could totally press that to a 9.6.............

Hey, I tried. No one wants to make a "Modern Comics" and "New Comics" forum distinction, so everything from whenever anyone decides is "modern", whether it's 1990, 1992, 1995, or whatever, gets buried in "what's the latest hot Spider Gwen variant coming out????" You can forget trying to discuss comics that came out in, oh, say, 1997. It is sad. There's so many great books that got lumped in with the junk from 1993-1999, and they have no real place to go. The powers that be, moved the Harley thread I started here to the variant age (modern) section. To me ,there's nothing really "modern" about a 22 year old comic. Maybe some day there will be a "dark age", or "chromium age", or something along those lines? I won't hold my breath. Maybe a poll is needed? I requested, was told a "poll" was needed. I have no interest in starting that poll, because I don't wish the results to be swayed by personal feelings. Maybe you could.

We're MEN. We're men in BLACK (DARK BLACK!)

If it had Jim Lee pencils, I would have owned a lot more of them. But at least the Kubert cover isn't a mess.