What Was The Book That Defined Your Focus?

[gaz973]

What's a focus

 

You should focus while riding bikes.

 

 

[Boozad]

What's a focus

 

You should focus while riding bikes.

 

 

 

[Scrooge]

The one book that defined my focus and unraveled it at the same time is Four Color 386. Given my board name, it's not too hard to know who my favorite character is and FC 386 is the first issue of US in his own series.

 

It focused my synchronic collection to March 1952, a task I have yet to complete

 

It unraveled my focus by opening my eyes to the wonders of the Atomic Age and a deep-seated addiction for comics from the '50's.

 

[RockMyAmadeus]

The thing that defined my focus was this:

 

 

And, since I will collect just about anything printed in comic book form, with the possible exception of Archies, I guess I don't really have any other character or book specific foci.

 

I will say, it was Killing Joke that made me want to read anything else Alan Moore had ever written. and I got that wayyyyy early...like early spring 1990.

[universal soldier]

Easy answer for me.

 

 

I just remember being floored that they killed her off.

 

 

[Norrin_Radd]

What defines my comic focus is Batman The Animated Series.

 

 

In 2001, I purchased the first Batman archive and I've been reading Batman comics ever since.

 

I read many other titles and characters, but I always come back to Batman. About every quarter or so I re-read my favorites and find great new stories I haven't read before.

[dupont2005]

Hard to say. I started reading whatever wan in the bargain bin. Old Archies, christian comics, and 80's black and whites made up the bulk of it.

 

During the Death In The Family story arc I got my first "new" comic. Batman #428. After that I bought mostly current superhero stuff from the Big 2. I did get introduced to some greaat indies at that time too though. Elfquest, Cerebus, Usagi Yojimbo, and so on. I had a fair amount of indies in my collection as a kid. Then I quit reading comics altogether. When I picked it back up I think Ralph Snart Adventures is what got me to purchase a comic book again. I had just googled it and it happened to be right when Marc started vol. 8. At first my focus was on black and white indies from the 80's. Then I started buying any non-superhero indies I could find cheap on Ebay. Now I am concentrating on completing my favorite series and runs, or trying to. I still buy new indies I had never heard of all the time.

[RockMyAmadeus]

During the Death In The Family story arc I got my first "new" comic. Batman #428.

 

[hockey&comicsguy]

Rangers Comics #26

 

I wouldn't say my focus is really all that focused. But that book got me into Fiction House and GGA and more broadly, into Golden Age altogether.

[BaltimoreLauren]

My first "collectors" book was Life With Archie #2. Got it when I was 12, and I can still remember the thrill of opening it for the first time, reading it, smelling it, and just being excited about having it.

[batman_fan]

For me it was this book. My brother's friend brought over a box of his old comics for me and this Batman was in that box. I watch the cartoons and Adam West show but this book got me going on Batman

 

[universal soldier]

I can still remember the thrill of the first time, and just being excited about having it.

 

[jimjum12]

For me, this will be a long round about answer....as it will be about what "un focused" my collection. In the mid 90's I had " outgrown " the common SA books that had filled my youth with joy. I had " graduated " to GA and I was busily amassing a decent run of GA Batman books that had Joker covers, of which I had quite a few. I had a real nasty drinking problem(among other things) and had started plowing through most of my books to fund my fast lane escapades and ultimately got my third DUI which landed me in jail for 4 months. When I got out all I had left of my collection was a stack of assorted SA books and a restored 7.0 Batman 11. It just so happened that an OO collection had just surfaced and the LCS owner selling them was an old friend who convinced the owner of the books to let me make time payments on about 50 that I thought were either soft in the guide or tough in high grade. I chose a bunch of pre hero Marvels, and D.C. War and Hero books that I thought had investment and resale potential. While shopping the books around, I saw a VG copy of FF 20 at half guide that I used to round out a trade deal. After I got home I pulled it out to read it as I hadn't looked at one in years....and the wave of nostalgia OVERWHELMED me. I decided to try and put together a sharp mid grade run of FF 1-35 and I was off to the races. I had managed to put together 2- 33 when I chanced upon a CGC 9.0 FF 20 with a BIN on eBay. (remember the VG 20...) and I was smitten by the high grade bug. Unfortunately, I also saw an ASM 13 in CGC 8.5 on eBay shortly after and won that. I immediately realized that there was no way I could put together runs at these grades....and realized that after putting together and then liquidating runs over the years that there were certain books that were my favorites, why not just go after my icon books in the best grade I could afford. I had also started missing some of the GA stuff and decided to include all ages in my quest. My list of favorites keeps morphing and I sell books that just don't quite "do it". I no longer have the FF 20 but still have more FF's than anything. For me it was a great decision and I love my small collection of books. A very meager group compared to many, but they each bring back a flood of memories of my years of collecting and it was that link to the times and friends I've met along the way that I found I treasured the most....not actually the books themselves. At my income level the collection will never be complete, but it's the journey I'm after. GOD BLESS...

 

-jimbo(a friend of jesus) (thumbs u

[jimjum12]

For me it was this book. My brother's friend brought over a box of his old comics for me and this Batman was in that box. I watch the cartoons and Adam West show but this book got me going on Batman

 

 

What a cover...one of m fav's. The OA to that one would be so cool.GOD BLESS...

 

-jimbo(a friend of jesus) (thumbs u

[esquirecomics]

I started selling as a dealer in 2004 in order to be able to continue to buy the books I wanted for my own personal collection. Because acting as a dealer would likely, and indeed did, allow me to purchase a wide range of very cool books all of which I would want to keep as my very own I decided I would need to focus on just one title as my primary collecting interest (i.e., would not be for sale).

 

I had purchased this issue of More Fun #54 to sell but was so captivated by it, and particularly after researching the fascinating history of the title, I chose to pull it from my active inventory and decided this was the one for me.

 

 

As a result, this is where I am so far in my More Fun collection:

 

EsquireComics' More Fun Collection

 

Of course, I still collect other books as well. The primary focus exercise didn't fully work.

[HD]

It was really a series that changed my opinion about comics—the Dark Phoenix story arc in X-Men. It was the first time I looked at the medium as something more than pure entertainment.

[jimjum12]

I started selling as a dealer in 2004 in order to be able to continue to buy the books I wanted for my own personal collection. Because acting as a dealer would likely, and indeed did, allow me to purchase a wide range of very cool books all of which I would want to keep as my very own I decided I would need to focus on just one title as my primary collecting interest (i.e., would not be for sale).

 

I had purchased this issue of More Fun #54 to sell but was so captivated by it, and particularly after researching the fascinating history of the title, I chose to pull it from my active inventory and decided this was the one for me.

 

 

As a result, this is where I am so far in my More Fun collection:

 

EsquireComics' More Fun Collection

 

Of course, I still collect other books as well. The primary focus exercise didn't fully work.

 

That book has always been on my dream list....I hope you never sell it in a weak moment...it would definitely be near irreplaceable. GOD BLESS...

 

-jimbo(a friend of jesus) (thumbs u

[jimjum12]

It was really a series that changed my opinion about comics—the Dark Phoenix story arc in X-Men. It was the first time I looked at the medium as something more than pure entertainment.

 

It was Alan Moore's Swamp Thing that did that for me. GOD BLESS...

 

-jimbo(a friend of jesus) (thumbs u

[bryan91]

For me it was the Death of Superman run that got me into buying comics. I had always loved Superman, and watched all the movies, cartoons etc. Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman was my all time favorite TV series and probably still is.

But even so I still had never bought but 5 or so Superman comics. So when I heard about the Death of Superman my interest got peaked and I had to know what was going on. I started purchasing every book in the run, and was hooked. But once the run ended I unfortunately quit collecting.

Well needless to say I am back and in full collecting mode. When I started out again I kind of went crazy, but now I am more focused and I am loving this hobby.

[Rook]

I've had issues with keeping focus, so no books really define my focus. I collect the Punisher and I really love Steranko covers, but if I see a cover that for some reason I find striking, I go after it. On the other hand, there's been a book that got me into collecting, which was The Punisher #39, and then the book that reeled me back in from extended hiatus, which was the Civil War #3 (Turner cover). Hopefully that wasn't too much of a derailment.