BabaLament

@DocHoppus182Very nice pickup Doc! Adorable floof you got to go with your comic too!

@Namtak Very nice! I have the Ultimate #1 White, regular, FCBD, & KB Toys in my "Submit to CGC in 2022" box. Such a fun book, and it displays great as a wall hanger.

Hello all! I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving, and didn’t break the bank on Black Friday or Cyber Monday. I figured I’d check out my LCS on Buyer’s Remorse Tuesday & see if anything fun & exciting was left. Turns out they had a restock in progress. I picked up my Secret Santa gifts, and grabbed some goodies for me without racking up a bill that would put a hurt on Christmas. Some ASM 300 cover swipes, to feed the addiction. 🤣 Gleason webs 2nd printing. Venom 1 & ToyBiz ASM 252 reprint. House of Slaughter 1 & ASM 400. Excalibur 1 & Momoko Black Knight. Deadpool 1 & Spider-Man 6 signed by Todd McFarlane. *Ahem* Fairyland & Chicken Devil 1. Chicken Devil is a delightful read; very into this book. Justice League & Booster Gold 1; these are Christmas gifts for a friend. New Mutants 100 3rd Print + ASM/Venom holofoil. Venom FCBD & Strange Academy 1.

Wrapped, boxed, and shipping out on Wednesday.

I am so stumped on what to pick for my recipient. Gotta consult the LCS resident expert over the weekend.

@ADAMANTIUM Ugh. Lost my reply. Darn. Anyhow, Tick #1 has the full rainbow of Issue 1 printings: Black - 1st, White - Special Edition 1st run of 5,000 copies, Red - 2nd, Yellow - 3rd, Orange - 4th, Pink - 5th, Red w/ White Dot - 6th, White w/ Red Dot - 7th, 10th Anniversary Black w/ Logo - 8th, Blue - 9th, FCBD - 10th. The special edition white is expensive, but I see them at conventions. I’ve never seen a yellow or blue in person.

@Jesse-Lee The Marvel Freddy books are fantastic finds! Well done! Are you a Horror fan in general, or Freddy specific? The modern DC/Wildstorm Freddy books are also quite hard to come by; let me know if you dig them; I know a guy who has the Freddy Vs Jason Vs Ash set & is willing to let them go.

Hello all! Happy Thanksgiving! I hope everyone has a good day, with great company, bountiful feast(s), and lots of rest before the comic shopping…er, Christmas season, begins. 😁

Yay red Tick! I have the black & white; haven’t found a red one yet. I’d like to get the whole rainbow of printings & re-issues, have them framed up for a display.

@Shawn Everidge @sckao Thanks! I have a 19" deep, 1.5" tall, wall-length wood board as a base for the Funko Pop wall. This provides a level surface for them, and the carpet underneath acts as a vibration dampener, so as I'm walking around the room and/or shuffling comic or LEGO boxes, it doesn't cause anything in the way of tilt or collapse. No adhesives or anything like that. Most of the collection is in Funko brand hard shells (formerly called "Stacks," but now marketed as Protectors). The original Stacks versions weren't the best when it came to quality, the molds of the three pieces didn't always line up right or lock together properly, but the new Protector version are a lot better, and they are compatible. When stacked, they are stable to about seven tall, then they start to lean a little bit. I'm lucky in that the space allows me to put them against the wall, keeping the first row completely aligned; and it stays ok from there. As you can see on the left, the majority of my X-Men are not (yet) in protectors, and there's a little air gap thingy going on. That's because the case diameter eats up a small amount of space, so in that spot I can get two columns of cased Pop's, but three of uncased. Its a bit weird, and I'll be changing it up once I get cases for the rest of them. On the far right against the wall I have the jumbo sized Overwatch Pop's; Bob, Wrecking Ball, and the various D.Va & Reinhardt variants. Those eat up space that can be allocated to more standard size pop's, so when I get the display shelving up, the oversized Pop's will probably take up residence on those.

@LudaTokeMost are in Funko Pop Stacks/Protectors; as I think the hard cases stack quite well. Because they are in plastic hard-shells, there hasn't been any issue with warping or whatnot. Now the oversized pop's stacked up on the far left, those do get some box wear from being stacked on top of each other; but I don't like the quality of the larger size protectors. Hopefully someone comes up with a hard shell for the six & ten inch ones at some point.

I'm in! I've enjoyed the last couple years; always something interesting & everyone has been a good sport.

Hello all! I’ve relocated everything to another room in the house (again), and have everything but the long & short boxes moved in. I like the space arrangement (for now), and will be pillaging my way through IKEA after Christmas for fixtures/displays for the small mountain of Star Wars LEGO I have to re-assemble. At least I have the Funko wall up. Anyhow, here’s the WIP.

Hello all! Picked up an awesome set. NOW Terminator: The Burning Earth, Alex Ross first published work. Book 1 is signed.

Hello all! More original art from the always awesome Atom Todd (https://atomtheartist.com). After framing up his Venom & Carnage Face-Off piece from 2019, I commissioned a Spider-Man & Green Goblin version. The pencil & ink originals are on their way home, and he’s starting on color digital prints. Very, very happy with these! Can’t wait to see how the color versions look. Will be framing them up in the same way. I’ve got the wall space to hang these in a series of three, but I’m not sure what to do for the third set. I’d like to keep it in the spider-family, but I don’t feel like Miles or Gwen have a really well established & unique arch-enemy. I suppose Gwen/Daredevil would work, but it doesn’t feel right. Maybe I’ll go for Agent Anti-Venom & Jack-O-Lantern, what with Halloween coming up…

Some OA back from the framers! Baby Yoda’s First Halloween by Kelly Williams & The Earpire Strikes Back by Skottie Young.

Hello all! Its been a slow week, only one pickup; the PIAB GITD Wanda Maximoff. Good looking Pop, lots of attention went into the sculpt on this one. I *should* have a bunch more to show you, but 'tis the season for shipping errors apparently. First, a box chock full of Disney Stitch Funko Pop's that I purchased for my wife's birthday were stolen by UPS. Not "delayed," not "missing," I mean straight-up taken. The tracking showed them reaching the distribution hub the next town over, then they disappeared. This is not the first time we've had goodies disappear upon reaching that UPS location, and I'm sick and tired of UPS packages that manage to arrive at the house showing up with the a corner peeled back, where someone decided to evaluate if what's in the box was worth stealing. Of course, dealing with UPS "customer service" (yes, it belongs in quotes) is like taking a day trip to the 10th level of Hell, so I figure that's a bunch of money I may have well set on fire + my plans for the wife's birthday present are hosed. Second up, PIAB is having shipping issues again. I have three orders with items that didn't make it, but are listed as "shipped." Customer service has always done right by me, even though they take 24-48hrs to respond via e-mail, so I'm hopeful it'll get resolved. I did manage to score a complete set of Infinity Warps Pop's, so that's another Marvel set down. Trying to figure out what to do next; either clean up some of the older/outstanding sets, or focus on new pickups. Def. want to find one of those blacklight Carnage's though...:D

I finally bagged a Blacklight Venom! Many thanks & much love to Brad’s Toys in Las Vegas (https://www.bradstoys.com). The website is a bit dated, but when looking for specific Funko Pop’s & other toys, they have always come through for me when calling in. Now all I need are Blacklight Spider-Man, Hulk, & Carnage. 😁

I don't have massive bankroll, so when buying a collection, I end up working on the lower end of the sales spectrum. As such, I rarely find great keys or runs; but most sellers are upfront about if its been picked over or filtered out. From my experience, if its a bunch of raw books in cardboard moving boxes, I can expect lower quality, but its probably not been picked over. If its all in new/clean bags & boards, its been picked over, keys & runs removed, and I'm looking at a pile of dollar bin charcoal starter. The best/worst scenario are boxes full of yellowed/sticky old bags that haven't been touched in decades: the books are/were protected, but nobody wants to put in the time/effort/gross-factor of going through it. There are always good books in that kind of mess, though it usually gets a "I don't know what's in it, I haven't gone through it" from the seller. So its a question of being willing to deal with it.

@ADAMANTIUMBuyer is doing an X-Men themed bedroom re-theme for his kid & asked if I had anything "good." The kid is 10, so he wasn't looking to spend for keys as wall decor, but wanted something graded + a bunch of reader copies for the kid to actually read. Was happy to oblige. @LordRahlLoL! I know; I have a bunch of the things. They move though! Raw, graded, doesn't matter, they still move, and quick too.

I just sold a set of X-Men 1 connecting covers, all 9.8, for $200/each. Based on reading the comments here, I don't know if I should feel bad about it, or if I found the guy who was born during that legendary minute. I have four more 9.8 sets, so I'm not complaining either way, it just feels weird.

@umyeahwhateversThank you for the data! I'm pretty sure I'm priced out of grail-level keys; I don't have the means to spend tens of thousands at a time. However, given the popularity of comic books, I'll keep reading & collecting new books, and who knows, maybe I'll get lucky. TWD & The Boys worked out alright & those books aren't all that old, so I'll light a candle & say a few Hail StanLee's in the hopes that Ice Cream Man, Cross Over, & The Silver Coin get picked up by (enter streaming service here) soon.

I didn't buy it, but I saw one. Looks like a nice display piece; but as I was admiring it my LCS owner said, "(sotto voce) Don't do it, its way overpriced."

Checked out a neighborhood garage sale & found a big blue box of LEGO. As soon as I opened it I went “I know that color…” They wanted $20 for the box. Not a problem! Going through it now & my suspicions have been not just confirmed, but exceeded! Original UCS Imperial Star Destroyer. Haven’t dug to the bottom to see if the instructions are in here yet, but I’m too happy to care right now. $20. Life is good.

In its original incarnation Blade was being considered/planned for a feature-length Disney+ exclusive. From what I’ve read, the powers that be at 500 Buena Vista are uncomfortable with putting a Rated R property on Disney+, so they went to theatrical release. Makes sense from a brand & financial perspective. Black Widow’s performance is likely a pandemic related aberration, but the dual release format appears to have done no favor to the box office numbers. I’m sure they’ll recover some with Digital sales in a couple months, but purely from a cash standpoint, Blade doesn’t seem like something that would push new subscriber numbers enough to justify skipping box office cash