Megacon

[AlexH]

Anyone have an update from the show?

[kryptonitecomics]

I'll be there tomorrow and I'll post my purchases and info about the show!!!

[AlexH]

BUMP

[JiveTurkeyMoFo]

I was there yesterday, albeit very briefly, and found it to be the best yet of the three Mega-Cons I have attended. There was a much better selection of high grade silver and bronze then in my first two years (nothing really jaw-dropping, mind you), and several of the dealers I spoke with said they were pretty optimistic about the weekend just based on the first few hours of the show. However, I would doubt that there were more then a dozen really decent places with back issues. A lot of new comics, A LOT of toys, video dealers, even several T-shirt dealers. Still, I was pleased....I just wished I hadn't been called away at 3pm because I couldn't make the Forum dinner. I didn't even get to see Steve B at the CGC booth!

 

As far as acquisitions, I bought a CGG Marvel Team-Up # 10 9.4 from fellow Forumite QualityComix. A handful of high grade reprint issues, and some misc. books..nothing to write home about.

[NoImSpartacus]

Just back from MegaCon. Great show. I was there all day Friday from the start and Satuday all morning. Much to buy and alot of good deals.

Business was brisk in all of Golden Age, Silver, Bronze, and modern issues. Many dealers (about 8 with dollar books on their tables and under.

Some great deals.

Examples- A run of Kull the Conqueror 1 thru 16. One dollar each all in vf or better condition.

Chaos Effect Omega Gold $ 1.00. Alpha Red $ 1.00. Armorines Gold $ 1.00 all bought with pre unity keys like Magnus 11, Solar 10, etc.

I dont believe there were great deals in golden age but in Bronze their were lots of deal. Especially if you bought in a lot.

4 or 5 heavy dealers with racks spanning close to 20 feet or more. All laden with heavy golden age books. Caps, Subs, Supermans, Det. etc.

Gaming was doing a nice business as I sat and observed many of the gaming tables from 50 feet away. One gent did a great business just with tables full of dice.

My best pick ups of the day were 2 Batman 232s. One slabbed In 8.5 and the other a "Readers copy" coming in at a vg plus or Just under fine.

I went to drop off 42 books( $ 945.00, I had to bite my touque to do this) to get graded but I believe Steve was busy so I never got to see him. Struck up a nice conversation with one of his assistants who was competent and a nice guy.

The show had great attendence with a line maybe 1000 people long at opening if you didnt have pre bought tickets.

Nobody seems to like superhero costumes anymore. Its all Anime costumes from what I noticed. Correct me if Im wrong but I saw no spiderman or even a Darth Vader.

I can say that comics are alive and well in Orlando, Florida. Lots of business and everything moving across the board depending basically on your tastes.

Met Marc Singer of Beastmaster fame and V. A true gentleman. Also met Angela Cartwright of Lost in Space. She is still a beauty and very nice.

I went specically to drop books but also to look for golden age. I didnt see any deals there but there was plenty to choose from if you wished to spend retail on the piece. I saw much silver change hands but I do not collect it myself so I can be representative in opion regarding it. Bronze was moving briskly with many people diving into dollar bins looking for them and there were plenty to be had.

 

Good collecting, Jeff

No, Im Spartacus

[Cody_Starbuck]

I stopped by yesterday since I was going to Orlando anyway to see the Orlando Magic/Atlanta Hawks game. I thought that the show was pretty cool with a decent selection of comics. I picked up a few back issues that I was missing and I dropped $30.00 at the CBLDF's booth. I also got to meet Walt Simonson.

 

One thing that was funny to me was my wife's reaction to some of the attendees. She had never been to a comic book convention, so she was a little freaked out!

[Ian_Levine]

Just back from MegaCon. Great show. Business was brisk in all of Golden Age, Silver, Bronze, and modern issues.

 

Yes but did anybody have a Buzzy 70 ?

[Aces]

Or a nice mid-grade Fantastic Four 11?

[kryptonitecomics]

 

Ok folks I am back from the show and I thought I would go ahead and post some pics so you can all get a good idea of what you missed out on!!!

 

I posted the same pics over on CPG so if you frequent both boards, these are the same pics

 

 

 

Me with Italian Porn Star Aria Giovanni

 

 

Me with Steve and Paul from CGC and a friend on mine from work ]

 

 

 

My friend being arrested by storm troopers.....do I have to admit that my brother is the one on the right[:I]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I will start a different thread with the pics of the books I picked up to lessen the band width hit for dial up folks[8D]

 

FYI- If I don't look too thrilled, it's because I came down with a case of food poisoning on Wednesday and I haven't fully recovered[]

[drice6900]

FYI- If I don't look too thrilled, it's because I came down with a case of food poisoning on Wednesday and I haven't fully recovered[]

 

Actually, you do look pretty thrilled by the porn star...

[EggsAckley]

I picked up a copy of The Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers #1(First Print), a high grade romance DC 100 pager and some new books/mags to read, Submitted a few books while there. The staff at the CGC booth were their usual personal selves and a good time was had by all.

[sfilosa]

MegaCon Report:

 

Preface:

1) I have not been to a national show in about 10 years.

2) I collect high-grade Silver/Bronze (9.0 or better) and Gold (8.0) only. I prefer CGC books.

 

The Good:

 

Missed the forum dinner but met Steve Borock at a dealer's table. Talked to him for about 10-15 minutes. He has a passion for comics that is incredible. If there is just one reason to believe CGC is good for the comic collecting hobby, it's because of him.I did not ask him any specific questions but during our conversation, he made several comments that I found interesting.

 

1) He sees CGC as "the best insurance policy". I take that to mean that he sees CGC as a way to take most of the risk out of buying books (the opposite of buying raw book say on eBay). He doesn't necessarily see it as "an opportunity" to make money buying raw books and slabbing them for a huge profit.

 

2) "Collecting should be fun" and "collectors don't want to lose money". Basically, the easiest way to make collecting not fun, is to get ripped off, by paying for one thing and getting something else (overgraded/restored books).

 

3) He in general, does not grade economy (and that would imply modern) submissions. He is behind on the standard submissions and continues to see lots of very nice books being submitted. He believes "almost all nice books" will eventually "get to him". But he told me about several major collections that he knows it will be a long time before they get CGC'd.

 

Once again, great guy and I will definitely try to make a forum dinner sometime, so I could ask him some specific questions.

 

The Bad:

 

Maybe 10-12 true Gold/Silver/Bronze Age dealers. As a collector who use to go to national conventions and see 50 or more true back issue dealers, I was very dissappointed.

 

I honestly don't believe I saw one CGC 8.0 or early Silver-Age book. There was an extremely limited supply of CGC books and most were CGC 7.5-8.5 late Silver-Age books that you see on eBay all the time.

 

When I asked a few of the dealers if ANY of their wall books were 9.0's or better, I either got:

1) "do you mean CGC 9.0's"?, which meant NO

2) CGC is not very consistent, which meant NO

 

There was one seller with a lot of very nice raw high-grade books. I believe his name was Dale Roberts. He literally had 30-40 long books of high-grade Silver/Bronze Age books. I looked through a lot of books and many would be close to 9.0's, some would grade more like 8.0's. But, there were very little sure 9.4's. And the problem was not that his prices were outrageous (they were not). But as most of us know, 9.0's rarely sell for guide (which is where his prices were at after a small discount). In many cases, I can get late Silver-Age CGC 9.0's for close to guide, so why would I even consider taking a chance on a raw 9.0. Still, I did buy three books (which is all I bought at the entire convention) and it you are looking for nice high-grade books, but not ultra-high grade, I would definitely recommend his books.

 

Well, I hope others who went had more luck filling holes in their collection.

[kryptonitecomics]

Graham Cracker Comics is where I bought most of my books, they had a nice selection of GA books!!!!

 

I agree that the CGC count was low as they take up a lot of space so most dealers didn't bring a large quantity of them.

[sfilosa]

Graham Cracker Comics is where I bought most of my books, they had a nice selection of GA books!!!!

 

They did have a nice selection of GA. I only looked at one or two books from them so it is possible that I missed on some gems. The few Silver-Age wall books they pulled down were not in the 9.0 range (which I asked for) and priced rather high (in my opinion).

 

Unless, I'm going to get a real bargain buying unslabbed books, I willing to wait for a nice CGC copy.

 

Glad you got some good stuff.

 

 

 

COLLECTORS/DEALERS NOTE:

 

While I realize that dealers intentionally mark their books up and are usually willing to come down somewhat on the price, when the price is DOUBLE OR MORE of what I'm willing to pay, I'm not interesting in even discussing the book. I saw a few Pre-Hero Marvel's that were close to being in the grade I might consider. Then I looked on the back and the prices were like $350.00. These are the same books that when they sell CGC'd in a confirmed grade go for around $180-200. While it's possible they will come down a lot on the price, I do not want to have to ask if they will drop the price in half (or more). Just don't have the patience.

[JiveTurkeyMoFo]

Graham Cracker Comics is where I bought most of my books, they had a nice selection of GA books!!!!

 

They did have a nice selection of GA. I only looked at one or two books from them so it is possible that I missed on some gems. The few Silver-Age wall books they pulled down were not in the 9.0 range (which I asked for) and priced rather high (in my opinion).

 

Graham Crackers had the same overgraded raw FF # 19 (for $900) that I passed on last year....talk about waiting for the right sucker to come along.

[hobbes]

Thanks for the pictures! I was hoping someone that went would share a few pics. Glad to see the show was a success.

[cd4ever]

My Megacon observations. Keep in mind I've only been to one other convention in my life and that was in London 15 years ago. Mostly what I remember from that was meeting Frank Miller, how scary Alan Moore looked and what a jerk Mike Baron was.

 

I had a blast at Megacon. A pretty decent selection of bronz/silver back issues. I bought about 25 books, many HG Supergirl Adventure books between 382-402. Some DC Specials I'd never seen before (Super-Gorillas issue) and filled in the holes to complete my HG full Iron Man run. Oh,and got that elusive Superman 123 in about F/VF. Nice price too. As stated earlier, Dale Roberts had a great selection of quality books at ok prices. I think he's coming to KC Planet Comiccon next month, I hope so. Everyone was very helpful and friendly.

 

Dropped some books off to be graded at CGC. Nice guy helped me (no idea who), friendly service.

 

Now the two things that I really loved about megacom besides all the comics and which I didn't really expect...1) the FREAKS!!!! I just loved watching the people and their costumes. I took dozens of pics of these people. Some were great, some were scary ugly, but all entertaining. I've always said, you can never have too many pale, hot, goth chicks showing their cleavage!! It was a people-watchers delight. 2) The other thing was the independant artists section. These were some very talented people, extremely eager to tell you about their books and their art. Sure, they wanted you to buy their work, but even if you didn't they were still very kind. I did buy several of these indy books. Some were ok, some had room to improve. One book in particular called RummbleStrips by a girl named Joanne Ellen Mutch was excellent. I bought 3 issues of it and read them all Saturday night in the hotel and loved them. Sort of Stranger In Paradise-ish but witha sci fi edge. Very funny, I recommend it and I'm not just saying that cause she was pretty.

 

Another highlight was meeting and chatting with George Tuska. It was his Iron Man books that first got me hooked on comics in the seventies. I have most of those old issues memorized and I loved his version of shellhead. And I told him so and he and his wife were so kind to me. I really think they were moved by my fanboy-ish behavior. And the prints they were selling for 10 bucks, his wife insisted I only pay 5. And he personalized it for me and let me have my picture taken with him. It was really a great moment. Way better than those clowns from Lost in Space who would barely acknowledge you until you slapped a 20 in their hand. George and wife (sorry I never got your name), thank you!

 

All in all, as a con near-virgin, I loved it and it pretty much convinced me to head to san diego this year. I imagine it will be the same, only bigger, better anf freakier. Now I just need to convince the girlfriend to go....or maybe not. I don't think she's into goth chicks!

 

 

[sfilosa]

Glad you had a great time and got some books that you wanted.

 

Once again Dale Robert's really had a very nice selection (I mean box after box) of solid VF to NM- raw Silver/Bronze Age books. What was so impressive was that there was really no junk. Not VG's mixed with VF's. Just VF's or better.

 

I'm already regreting not buying more.

 

My main highlight was talking to Steve Borock and if that hadn't happened I probably would have considered the convention pretty much a waste.

[JiveTurkeyMoFo]

In my experience, Mega-Con is much more "freak-infested" then San Diego ever was. I went on Friday this year, and it wasn't so bad. Normally I attend on Saturday, which looks for the most part like a Halloween costume party on acid. But hey, you can't argue with some of those revealing costumes!

[qualitycomix]

Be careful about buying any black cover books from Dale. That's all I'm going to say about that.

 

I brought some nice books to the show, although not my best stuff. I didn't know how many high grade collectors there would be this year.

 

All in all, sales were brisk and I enjoyed meeting collectors I had only corresponded with via email or on the phone.

 

I did bring some early high grade slabbed Silver. I guess you didn't make it over to our table Steve?

 

I'll definitely be back next year and will bring more stuff.