Beyonder123

I was recently searching for Mark Jewelers Inserts when I came across a Newsstand copy of Superman #421 from July of 1986 with the following insert.

it's probably the longest insert I've seen in a comic at 12 glossy pages. I also found one in Tales of the Teen Titans #66 from June of 1986, this one being a direct edition. Anyone know anything about it?

On 3/10/2024 at 3:56 AM, onlyweaknesskryptonite said:

If I were a betting man, my guess on these would be a multi pack variant.  Probably reprinted with different ads . My money would be on these packs.

Yes and yes. The interior ads and checklists are different and line up with the first printings of later issues giving a good estimate of when each multi pack was released.

The Smurfs so far is the only other title I've been able to find with different ads and no printing noted in the indicia. I've actually held back getting some of mine graded because I want the correct notation of "Multipack Edition/Second Print, etc" on the label. CGC isn't very consistent with their notation of these.

I'm back from a long stint of not being on the forums. I'm glad to see my thread is being referenced. I need to dive back into my research on these!

Couldn't find many of these on the bay'. Picked mine up at a local show. L Miller, 1959.

On 8/16/2023 at 7:17 AM, Stefan_W said:

My current submission that is SFG is also no longer clickable as of yesterday. Maybe it is just a glitch.

Same here. Thought it was because one of the payments didn't go through but I guess not if other people are having problems.

Old thread but I have a copy of Legionaires Three #3 with the Waldenbooks insert.

On 7/27/2023 at 7:03 PM, Danno616 said:

I had subscriptions through Marvel to Avengers, Rom, Alpha Flight, Marvel Two-in-One, and Thing circa 1980 through the mid-80s, and all of them were newsstands with the barcode.

Interesting. I assumed they had always been direct and at least were by the late 90s.

Fantastic thread. One of the most compelling I've read in a while. I think the principal problem here is an inability to agree on a definition for what constitutes a "Newsstand Edition" and a "Direct Edition". This should be a relatively easy problem to solve when you just list out all the different places of distribution and their correlating covers. 

Places comics were distributed:

Gas stations/convenient stores - newsstand

Book stores - newsstand

Newsstands - newsstand

Military bases - newsstand 

Comic stores - direct

By subscription - direct

People get so fixated on the variant and edition part of the picture, that they don't stop to think about the story the "newsstand" and "direct" cover indicators actually tell. 

What is the ultimate difference? A newsstand edition is any comic that was sold with a promise of credit upon destruction or return. A direct sale comic was not.

So now is it correct to say that any comic printed before the direct market system is automatically a newsstand? No, because comics before this time had other forms of distribution like subscription, not intended for return. But they are indistinguishable from one another. This could arguably be considered an early form of the direct market. 

It was not until the unreturnable distribution of books to comic stores that it became necessary to distinguish the two types with physical cover changes.

Here's another example. Marvel multipack comics. These all contained traditional "Direct Editions" as soon as they began to be printed. Even though they were often times sold in the exact types of locations (gas stations, book stores, etc) as their newsstand counterparts. Why? Because the multipacks were sold at a discounted price, and were therefore unreturnable. Not necessarily because of where they were sold.

On 7/17/2023 at 5:45 PM, Pixx_L said:

Double Cover Misprint - Signed by both Joe Quesada and Jimmy Palmiotti on each cover

I'm suprised CGC doesn't notate 2 names written on each cover. Just 2 names written on cover.

On 4/24/2023 at 7:47 PM, BlowUpTheMoon said:

 

Ah! I knew there was one but there were no results for "printing error" or "misprint". Thank you!

I couldn't find a thread dedicated to this, but let me know if there already is one. I've had this one for a while. Printed with two sets of guts and isn't cut in some spots.

On 4/21/2023 at 7:51 AM, Robot Man said:

I don’t really collect them in the sense that I look for them. I subscribed for many years and that was the way they came. Thought about carefully removing the outer mailers but have never done it. Never heard of anyone seeking them out. 

I had a subscription back in 2014 or 15 for a couple years. I was suprised when they came with the outer cover since I had never seen them like that before. I rarely see them, especially the 90s ones. So that causes me to search them out. I'd be happy to take your copies off your hands if you don't want them 😁

Does anyone here collect mad subscription copies? I never hear anyone talking about them but I always am buying them. I can post more photos of others if people are interested.

Additional photos courtesy of eBay.

The "Crazy" mag got me thinking. Mad had to have beat it. Definitely did. By 8 years too!

Here's a Mexican "Paquito" comic from 1938 that reprints a segment of Action Comics #1. CGC encapsulated it backwards to present the Action Comics page.

On 4/8/2023 at 5:32 PM, lowball said:

I definitely thought there would be some more interesting slabbed things out there 

CGC is a comic grading company. Other than a small handful of interesting outliers, comics are all they've graded.

If you're looking for uniqueness look into foreign graded comics, or graded comics with printing errors.

Saw this on ebay

On 4/12/2023 at 11:30 PM, THE_BEYONDER said:

Unfortunately, it looks like the interiors have shifted independently of the cover.  Are there tears at the staples?

I don't have the book in hand right now as I sent it in for someone else, so I would have to take a closer look. But from what I remember the staples didn't appear to have torn the book.

Idk how to feel about this. Seems like it could end up damaging the books. Is this normal? I don't submit super often. If they did end up fixing it for me would they press the book? Would that fix any possible damage?

Maybe I'm overreacting.