Qalyar

I don't collect much that reaches back to the Golden Age anymore. This book counts, if you squint a little, as it dates from 1955. Since copies were distributed for several years, this is arguably more of a Silver Age book, but, hey, it was printed before Showcase #4! Technically correct is the best kind of correct.

Anyway, these were given out to people who toured Nestle's Fulton, NY production facility.

I'm gonna say 7.5 or 8.0 depending on how CGC evaluates that yellow bit. FC UL color breaks, BC LL tick, BC UR crease that refused to press out. Possibly some corner rounding, it's tough to tell with the limited-contrast background.

Still, definitely a nice copy of a famously tough multipack exclusive.

Protector, the character introduced for the New Teen Titans anti-drug specials, has had a couple of cameo appearances in real books, so I think technically those must be either canon or at least canon-adjacent.

Fun fact: That character only exists at all because of a licensing conflict. Keebler co-sponsored the anti-drug PSA, which was otherwise going to feature Robin. However, at the time, Robin was licensed out to Nabisco for an advertising campaign and so obviously couldn't appear in a work paid for by their competitor!

For the record, I've had no response at all to my efforts on Tuesday to inform them of this.

HiBid is sort of a meta-auction site that allows smaller auction houses to operate online without needing their own online infrastructure. This auction is being held by Port City Auctions, and it's frankly pretty stark how different their terms and conditions are from a more respectable operation, like Heritage. Port City explicitly makes no warranty of authenticity for the material they auction and does not even permit returns and refunds in the case of proven inauthenticity (or for any other reason, for that matter).

I suspect that Port City does not care that they are auctioning a doctored book under false pretenses. There's still some time left in the auction, so maybe I'll be pleasantly surprised. They still have time to pull this thing.

On 2/22/2023 at 7:34 PM, Lazyboy said:

That, along with The Death of Captain Marvel that Ken Aldred mentioned earlier, is part of the MGN series, not actually a one-shot.

I know they have numbers as part of the MGN series, but I still feel they're one-shots. There's nothing that connects the various MGN books; they each stand alone except for the "series" number assigned for marketing.

Like how the Marvel Super Specials are just (mostly) individual (mostly) film adaptations. They've got numbers, yeah, but the numbers don't have anything to do with each other. 

But YMMV, surely.

I'll go 6.0 here. There are eleventy-seven spine ticks, and the LR corner is munged up a bit, but the book looks otherwise sound, so I think it might claw its way out of the 5s.

Fun fact about the entire Cocaine Comix series: One of the people responsible for putting it together (and a -script/collaboration contributor himself) was George DiCaprio. You may have heard of his son, Leonardo...

On 2/21/2023 at 5:22 PM, shadroch said:

It's a GRR reprint that has a price sticker on it. The B&W Spash on the inside cover makes it  obvious.  

Also the Golden Records advertising back cover!

The cover price at upper left and the square issue box at upperish right have both been fraudulently created, both are pretty amateur efforts.The issue number box is comically inept, and they forgot the "IND." at extreme upper left when they doctored on a cover price.

I've notified their auctioneer; hopefully, this will get pulled.

On 2/20/2023 at 12:39 PM, THE_BEYONDER said:

I’m curious about the posts on the fake slabs.  Have these guys figured out how to tamper with these tamper-resistant cases, or did the buyer not inspect the posts properly?

Agreed. I'd like to have seen better photos of exactly what went on. The label is, upon close examination, fake. But that doesn't answer how the case was compromised (it's far less likely that they custom-built fake cases de novo).

I will note that all of the major coin certification companies have had forged slabs of varying degrees of quality. It's a problem, but it's not the end of the world. I do strongly suggest that CGC annotate the lookup record when counterfeits are known for a given serial number. @CGC Mike

On 2/17/2023 at 4:17 PM, Ant-Man said:

That's a pretty sharp Superman 123 GitD cover for a book that spent time in the dollar bin gulags (also probably the lowest FMV of the four, even it it's the coolest looking).

Hey, I know what book that is!

I can't answer what might be done with regard to those copies from a pressing standpoint, but I can confirm that not all copies are assembled with that much misalignment. I have to assume that the hand assembly and linen-cord binding conspire to produce a lot of variation in cover/body positioning.

CGC does not recognize any* of the sticker-based variants (such as the DCU stickers or the various Image newsstand sticker shenanigans). Sorry.

*except the Wizard Authentic Editions, kinda. Don't ask, I didn't do it.

CGC's history of consistent label practices with Wizard Authentic Editions... isn't great. I'd assume regular copies, mislabeled. But it's also possible that they briefly opted to not deduct for the sticker and forgot to label swap due to the sig. Or that they really, really overgraded a couple copies.

Or that they're just Registry errors.

Until (unless?) we see them, it's pretty impossible to know. Regardless, I'll echo the observation that nearly all Wizard Authentic Editions look like they were handled by someone who wanted vengeance for all those Scantron forms they were prevented from folding, spindling, or mutilating in their youth.

On 12/1/2022 at 3:53 PM, seanfingh said:

My guess is resto - to me it looks like the marker was added to cover up the doodling. And because they appear to have tried to "color match" the marker, it appears to be intentional. Sorry.

Agreed entirely. Also, I feel like irrespective of what was doodled or not-doodled or whatever, red marker on a red field is always going to get a resto flag.

On 12/1/2022 at 1:40 PM, ComicSpa said:

I know. I personally feel these grades over the last year are higher than they should be. Makes you think twice about buying a book that is encapsulated. What are we really getting?

In general, I've felt the last year or so of grading has actually been fairly tight most of the time, but it's clear that they're penalizing some types of defects much less harshly than I would have expected. In this case, that surface scuff.

On 11/30/2022 at 8:15 PM, ComicSpa said:

Results are in

Congrats. That's certainly not what I would expected with that color rub. No grader's notes, sadly; I would have liked to have seen how they described that defect.

I'd go 7.0 here, but regardless of technical grade, that's a fantastic book.

On 11/30/2022 at 1:57 PM, Get Marwood & I said:

I wonder if some of their graders have read it?

For the sake of argument, mostly, that Ghost Rider does have 3 punch holes and "moderate creasing to cover" vs. 2 holes and only "slight" additional defects on the TTA 36.

The grader's notes include mention of the binder holes, so it's not like this slab was switched at birth or anything. I wouldn't have expected a 4.0 here, and I do think they were harsher on binder punches in the past, but I guess it's not an entirely implausible grade.

On 11/30/2022 at 8:57 AM, lostboys said:

 

Ive never read a comic online but I do make sure that I have either a low grade - readers copy, a reprint/facsimile or a TPB for every graded book or series that I own.

 

I've never understood the argument that encapsulation is bad because it prevents you from reading the comics. It prevents you from reading that copy, sure.

I have a digital copy of one book in my collection (because it was primarily distributed that way; physical copies are rare), but for everything normal, I'm the same way. If it goes in a slab, I keep a reader or the TPB. I think the only exceptions are a couple of scarce promotional items, and it's not like I collected those for their gripping story anyway.

On 11/29/2022 at 11:26 PM, Domo Arigato said:

Regular CGC label link.

Custom CGC label link

Not quite sure what that they're doing.......but they have the following message in the "pictures" on these listings.

Edit: It almost looks like they're trying to use these listings to advertise them.....and then sell them off of Ebay.....but they have a huge Ebay feedback rating. 

 

Then, the descriptiong for the one with the regular CGC label has the following:

 

And this is in the description for the one with the custom CGC label:

 

Looks like ebay finally noticed and purged all of these... for now.

On 11/28/2022 at 8:15 PM, Axelrod said:

While I can understand the votes for UF #4 and even Hulk #181, those books at least have something going for them, and "value" is as much a function of demand as supply, so the fact there are thousands doesn't matter as much.  

But modern variants?  Books with literally nothing going for them other than a "different" cover and an artificially manufactured scarcity to pump value?  I am stunned at some of the prices going for some of these.  The acetate-gate thing was just the tip of the iceberg.  I feel like literally zero of these books are going to be worth anything 20 years from now.  

How many "variants" from the 90s are worth anything today?  All those X-Men #1 covers?  

A few 90s variants do okay, although certainly not IH181 / ASM300 / UF4 kinds of money. In part, that's because interest in 90s books overall is generally low. But a very partial list of variants that still command reasonable money might include:

• Adventures of Superman 500 Platinum
• Batman 457 2nd print newsstand
• Black Widow 1 DF variant
• Danger Girl 2 Ruby Red
• Gambit 1 Gold
• IH 377 3rd print
• Marvel Collectible Classics Spider-Man 2 Black Costume variant
• Sailor Moon 1 Pink
• Spawn 1 B&W
• Spider-Man 1 Gold Walmart exclusive
• Spider-Man 1 Platinum
• Vengeance of Vampirella 1 Blue
• Wolverine 145 Nabisco variant

On 11/25/2022 at 10:14 PM, Big Brother said:

As I wrote earlier, it doesn't have to be a million dollar book. It could be any comic worth thousands of dollars. If people can counterfeit American money, don't you think someone could counterfeit a CGC case and label? But hey, if you want to buy comic books that you can't read, go right ahead.

Is it possible? Yes. Several of the coin certification companies are aware of counterfeits of their slabs. However, there's been no evidence so far of any even remotely credible counterfeit CGC slabs, so the burden of proof is really on those making doomer arguments about the likelihood of that occurring.