scburdet

Without boring you with the details of how I arrived here, I need to figure out if I should complain to the seller (in brief, this was not the exact book photographed in the listing). Defects: 1. sizeable printers crease on the back cover, the shorter line also appears to be a printer crease. Neither of these is a crease crease IMO 2. Right bottom corner has a cut of some sort. At first I thought it was a gripper hole, but I don't think so. Could have been some kind of production issue from cutting, but inconclusive. The little pieces of paper could easily get pulled off 3. Two spots of discoloration, dark spots above Colossus and lighter brown spots to the left of Wolverine. Could be some drippy ink from printing, an ink transfer or something else. Again inconclusive. Neither appears to be a substance.

7.0/7.5

8.5/9.0 pressed. Marvel Maniac uses the mycomicshop grading guide I believe. The CGC guide says date stamps are OK 9.0-9.8 depending on how obtrusive they are. Any "normal" distributor date stamp is unlikely to impact the grade. There are examples where someone went nuts with the stamp, or put it somewhere that impacts the aesthetics significantly where the grade would take a hit.

My first impression was that this could squeak a 9.0. On closer inspection, it looks like there might be some light foxing in the bricks above Spider-Man, and then some lights spoiling of something on the BLBC so I'm much less certain. If it's like foxing, I'd bet on 7.5ish. It would be useful to inspect in really closely in hand.

4.5/5.0. Wouldn't be completely shocked by a c/p + SA ASM bump though

2.5/3.0

pressable to 7.5/8.0

I saw them. The cumulative length looks like the 6.0 range, but they're on the back cover. There are several instances in the CGC guide where they state a different penalty for front vs. back cover damage. The section on tears says they are on of the easiest defects to quantify, and then provides no details on how they actually quantify them. Whatever the ink loss around the title is the biggest aesthetic defect. The 7.5 is more like a aspirational upper limit b/c it's the kind of book one can see a grader giving every allowance conceivable. Based on observation, I believe there is both an objective & subjective component to CGC grading. The latter is clearly unknowable, and objective standard are left intentionally opaque.

2.0 seems right. I'd only grade if you prefer slabs to an alternative storage. I don't think it enhances the value.

According to the CGC guide, a detached cover can grade 2.5-5.0, but typically not above 4.0. 3.0/3.5 based on the other creasing

That little bit of tearing around the bottom staple may hurt depending on how it looks in-hand. 8.5/9.0

4.5/5.0

My guess is that the spot is an uncleanable stain. Around 7.0

7.0/7.5. The color chipping around the title probably ends up hurting more than a small back cover tear.

I meant buy it for $20. A good offer for sure

4.0/4.5 I don't think the tape will lead to a markdown, there's enough creasing and the taped piece out, would be treated more or less like the piece is missing.

for $20.

Beauty

Sweet! Nice book

Doing better on @Every Day A Story's grading contest than the GA-biased CGC contest!

Love this book. Albeit, the cover trumps the internal art & story by a mile

Grading 15 Golden Age comics in a row

9.2/9.4

around 9.0. Probably can't go above 9.4 with a tear if everything else is perfect