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The Absolute Hardest to Find 80's books.
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I've only ever seen one copy of the Love & Rockets B&W prototype #1. According to the OSPG, only 800 were printed.

 

Of course, now that I wrote that, I checked eBay and there's two copies for sale in the $500 - $600 range. :P

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Don't forget about the Turtlemania books. The regular edition had 3,000 copies, but the Silver only had 100 and the Gold only had 10. To my knowledge, only 2 of the Gold copies have surfaced since they were originally distributed.

 

I have a problem with these and the MM Blue/Golds. Other than being signed and numbered, they are no different from the regular copies (in fact, they are regular copies.)

 

That's like considering the Dark Knight S&N A/Ps as "rare", but they're identical to the regular 4,000 S&N run.

 

Don't get me wrong, they're awesome...but they're rare by virtue of signature(s), not any special aspect of the book itself.

 

The 3D/2Ds, however, are legitimate variations from the originals.

 

Not many people here on the boards get to say this to you with concrete proof, RMA, so forgive me for indulging in this moment a bit...

 

You're mistaken.

 

Ok, all joking aside, I know nothing about the "MM Blue/Golds", but the Turtlemanias are, in fact, different books aside from just the signatures.

 

The normal book has a white cover:

turtle1.jpg

 

The silver book has a grey cover with Eastman and Laird sigs and they're hand numbered out of 100. Archon Turtle recently had his graded and they even note the color of the cover on the label:

100_3067.jpg

 

Finally, the Gold is the easiest one to tell the difference. It's got a gold cover and a sketch to accompany the sigs and numbers on the back.

SOLO%20FRONT%20SCAN%20W%20(2).jpg

SOLO%20BACK%20SCAN%20W.jpg

 

I borrowed the first two images from the TMNT thread and the Gold Turtlemania from Danny M's CAF gallery, although I believe the book may belong to Archon Turtle now. I hope the owners don't mind. :foryou:

 

Sweet! I have only owned a regular, and I *think* I have seen a silver, which doesn't look much different unless they're side by side...I think...but I've never seen the gold (for obvious reasons), so I just assumed they were all the same.

 

In fact, some dork sold me a Turtlemania regular that had a forged "4/10" and sigs on the back, which he said were forged, and I agreed, but I guess I just made the assumption that the regular "golds" were just like that. Now that I know they're not, I will file that away.

 

Thanks for the info!

 

New knowledge = :cloud9:

 

P.S. The Miracleman #1 Blues/Golds are, in fact, nothing but the regular #1, signed by Alan Moore or cat yronwode and Dean Mullaney. They are called blues and golds because the certs for the "signed only by cat and Dean" were blue (and not numbered, but most likely limited to 600) and the certs for the "signed by Alan Moore & numbered" are yellow "gold" and limited to 400.

 

I have, in 20 years, never managed to own one, though if I just wanted to throw money at one, I could. Too many people want too much money for them. Someday.

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Thirded. I thought I was good when I finally found an uncut # 2. Then I remembered about these. Didn't he appear in three issues of the newsletter?

 

And I'm the guy who finished his Tick 1-8 first print set in 1990 by heading up to Boston and going to New England Comics itself. Didn't even think to ask about the Newsletters.

 

ooooh, is your uncut graded?

 

Mine's not, but it's headed there someday.

 

I bought it for $12 off eBay from a seller who didn't know what it was, and just advertised it as a regular first print. I think my high bid was $150 or thereabouts.

 

:cloud9:

 

And yes, the Tick #2 Uncut counts. It's pretty darn rare.

 

 

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If you get into mini-comics, some of the XEX graphics books (which were off-set printed, not photocopied, and frequently had color covers), had print runs of 50.

 

 

Cherry minis.

 

 

I got those as freebies from Dan Fogel at SDCC in the early nineties ( probably ruined as collectables, as he signed them and added word balloons), it seemed like he had more than 50 of each there, but I could be wrong.

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From Ian Levine's thread a while back on promos, this is his take on the Warlord giveaway I mentioned earlier:

 

Overstreet lists a Warlord comic giveaway with Remco in 1982.

There were a set of toys made by Remco for DC in 1982.

However someone on e-bay said none of them came with a comic, and he had the full set.

Can anyone solve this mystery ???

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Very nice. ;)

 

I would daresay, probably the MM 3D/2D is one of the rarest 80's books in existence

 

Ewan can confirm, but I *believe* that only four copies are accounted for.

 

I have 2 of the 3D/2Ds, but they're DNAgents and Laser Eraser & Pressbutton.

 

I have yet to see a 3D/2D MM in person.

 

Oddly enough, according to Eclipse ads from 1988-1989, it's the only one that sold out....they've got to be out there somewhere.

 

The rest of the 3D/2Ds, I suspect, were still in the Eclipse warehouse when it was flooded in '93.

 

And Bronty said there was no attrition of 80's books...

 

;)

 

Todd at New Dimension comics bought out remaining Eclipse comics around 7-8 years ago.

 

I ended up with some of the 2-D comics from him, it was the Three Stooges comics.

 

I didn't think much of it. Although I do remember selling one of them to Al with Basement comics. I think I got $7.00 :sick:

 

You ended up with all Three Stooges, or different ones?

 

Yes, ND did buy out what remained of Eclipse's inventory, then slapped those silly "archive edition" foil on the MMs...and CGC doesn't GLOD them.

 

Which, of course, is ridiculous. The foil was added, in some cases, nearly 20 years after the fact.

 

 

I only had Three Stooges in 2-D, I bought a stack of Three Stooges from him and they came with them. I thought it was a printing error when I had them. He had quantities of all Eclipse comics from some type of archive. He had quantities of the scarce TPB that he auctioned off on Ebay some were bringing three to four hundred each. I could give him a call tomorrow to see if any of the Miracleman 2-d existed in any quantity.

 

 

He wouldn't have gotten any of the MM 3D/2Ds, unless Eclipse held some back (which is doubtful.) They sold those out in the late 80's.

 

If anyone has any of the OTHER 3D/2Ds, I'm interested. :)

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I bought a few of 3D-2D versions from ND Comics in early May. It is a hidden gem that most copper age collectors don't know about. Most assume that Miracleman was the only 3D-2D version produced by Eclipse. As you can see below that is not the case. All are signed and numbered.

 

TOR 1 COMIC 3D 2D

 

DNAGENTS 1 COMIC 3D 2D

 

LASER ERASER PRESSBUTTON 3D 2D

 

BLACK BELT HAMSTERS 2 3D 2D

 

BLACK BELT HAMSTERS 3 3D 2D

 

BLACK BELT HAMSTERS 4 3D 2D

 

NEW WAVE VS VOLUNTEERS 3D 2D

 

NEW WAVE VS VOLUNTEERS 3D 2D

 

It took months of research and years to finally obtain these copies.

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Here's one:

 

029-4.jpg

 

Ian's got one or two, this one's mine, and those are the only copies I've ever seen.

 

I have yet to find a LOSH #45 preview.

 

And the jury's still out on whether or not the Sandman preview actually exists.

 

(By the way..is there anything cooler than slabbing a book that doesn't even exist as a title on the census...? :cloud9:)

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Here's one:

 

029-4.jpg

 

Ian's got one or two, this one's mine, and those are the only copies I've ever seen.

 

I have yet to find a LOSH #45 preview.

 

And the jury's still out on whether or not the Sandman preview actually exists.

 

(By the way..is there anything cooler than slabbing a book that doesn't even exist as a title on the census...? :cloud9:)

 

The preview comics from the 1980's are hard to find but even harder to find any information on. Great book RMA.

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Ian's thread is a treasure trove of images!

 

Here's the Remco Warlord book - apparently this is the only one anyone's ever seen, as it is supposed to not exist. This might be the winner.

 

855999-lostwarlordcopy.JPG

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I bought a few of 3D-2D versions from ND Comics in early May. It is a hidden gem that most copper age collectors don't know about. Most assume that Miracleman was the only 3D-2D version produced by Eclipse. As you can see below that is not the case. All are signed and numbered.

 

TOR 1 COMIC 3D 2D

 

DNAGENTS 1 COMIC 3D 2D

 

LASER ERASER PRESSBUTTON 3D 2D

 

BLACK BELT HAMSTERS 2 3D 2D

 

BLACK BELT HAMSTERS 3 3D 2D

 

BLACK BELT HAMSTERS 4 3D 2D

 

NEW WAVE VS VOLUNTEERS 3D 2D

 

NEW WAVE VS VOLUNTEERS 3D 2D

 

It took months of research and years to finally obtain these copies.

 

Fantastic!

 

What did you pay for them?

 

By the way...in most Eclipse books from 1986-1989, they list the 3D/2Ds for sale for the whopping price of $5.

 

Crazy, huh?

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Another bunch of giveaways from Ian, the 1984 "Flash Force 2000" books. The 4th and 5th ones in the set are - apparently - the only ones existent. Take that with a grain of salt from Ian, BTW.

 

856008-flashforcefive.JPG

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I bought a few of 3D-2D versions from ND Comics in early May. It is a hidden gem that most copper age collectors don't know about. Most assume that Miracleman was the only 3D-2D version produced by Eclipse. As you can see below that is not the case. All are signed and numbered.

 

TOR 1 COMIC 3D 2D

 

DNAGENTS 1 COMIC 3D 2D

 

LASER ERASER PRESSBUTTON 3D 2D

 

BLACK BELT HAMSTERS 2 3D 2D

 

BLACK BELT HAMSTERS 3 3D 2D

 

BLACK BELT HAMSTERS 4 3D 2D

 

NEW WAVE VS VOLUNTEERS 3D 2D

 

NEW WAVE VS VOLUNTEERS 3D 2D

 

It took months of research and years to finally obtain these copies.

 

Fantastic!

 

What did you pay for them?

 

By the way...in most Eclipse books from 1986-1989, they list the 3D/2Ds for sale for the whopping price of $5.

 

Crazy, huh?

 

$10 each.

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Ian's thread is a treasure trove of images!

 

Here's the Remco Warlord book - apparently this is the only one anyone's ever seen, as it is supposed to not exist. This might be the winner.

 

855999-lostwarlordcopy.JPG

 

I have never heard or seen this comic before. hm

 

I really like the cover.

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I bought a few of 3D-2D versions from ND Comics in early May. It is a hidden gem that most copper age collectors don't know about. Most assume that Miracleman was the only 3D-2D version produced by Eclipse. As you can see below that is not the case. All are signed and numbered.

 

TOR 1 COMIC 3D 2D

 

DNAGENTS 1 COMIC 3D 2D

 

LASER ERASER PRESSBUTTON 3D 2D

 

BLACK BELT HAMSTERS 2 3D 2D

 

BLACK BELT HAMSTERS 3 3D 2D

 

BLACK BELT HAMSTERS 4 3D 2D

 

NEW WAVE VS VOLUNTEERS 3D 2D

 

NEW WAVE VS VOLUNTEERS 3D 2D

 

It took months of research and years to finally obtain these copies.

 

Fantastic!

 

What did you pay for them?

 

By the way...in most Eclipse books from 1986-1989, they list the 3D/2Ds for sale for the whopping price of $5.

 

Crazy, huh?

 

$10 each.

 

Excellent. I'll have to hit up ND to see if they have any more.

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I've only ever seen one copy of the Love & Rockets B&W prototype #1. According to the OSPG, only 800 were printed.

 

Of course, now that I wrote that, I checked eBay and there's two copies for sale in the $500 - $600 range. :P

I see that one on eBay pretty regularly. It's not cheap though
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