Heritage 2013 February 21-23 Vintage Comics & Comic Art Auction

[Overthetopinc]

No question about it the spidey 3 Mcfarlane cover was a steal. That cover is worth 50k all day. I know I know its worth what it sells for. In all the years watching auctions there is some stuff that for whatever reason when that gavel slams down its a bargain. This is one of those. If I was flush I would have been all over it expecting to have to spend 50k to take it home. I am sure whoever won it is tickled pink about it and if you ever see it come up for resale it will make my valuation of it look cheap. The more I think about it the more I regret not making a move on it =(((

[jick]

In my opinion, McFarlane art can go the way of the Mark McGwire baseball he bought back in the day. It may sell for less in the future, especially when more "key" covers come out to the open market and final hammer prices are much less than that.

 

I am surprised that not many mentions here yet of The Dark Knight Returns final page. I think it went relatively cheap when you consider:

-Dark Knight is perhaps Miller's most well-remembered work

-It is the final page of that work

-Miller art from that issue sold for $440k

 

Now this one just comes in at $46k or a tenth of that. If I was filthy rich with disposable income, that would be a "steal" for me.

 

[Bronty]

^ so almost 50k is a steal now? Seems like a very healthy result to me. The sale price of that splash makes everything look cheap, but thats neither here nor there.

 

That page had some nice dialogue/narrative but no action, no character in costume... Which are significant points. I thought it did quite well indeed

[Rodey]

Congratulations to all you winners!

[jjonahjameson1]

AsM #303: 77k

Marvel Tales 233 (with X-Men): 45k

SpM #3: 33k.

 

Whatever happened with McFarlane market? Any theories?

 

What do you mean? I think these are very strong prices, given the recent glut of supply.

 

Well, SpM #3 cover raised almost the same than the splashes from AsM #322 and from #319 (both of them), and half the SpM #2 cover.

 

I would expect more according all the huge income of fresh cash coming from the comicbook market to this hobby.

 

Edited to add: Congrats to Enrico and the new owner of the mythical AsM #121 cover!

 

. With all the ridiculous hype surrounding them, I would have thought folks would be discussing how 'cheaply' the Watchmen covers sold for.

[Overthetopinc]

Hello Jick,

In my opinion I dont think anyone cares about yours. =)

All kidding aside there will be no more "key" covers coming out. If one or two do in the next couple years that will be a lot. The ony thing I can see is a wizard cover or two which would be from the same collection and they are not key covers. As far as values if people knew what is paid and offered for "key" covers by Mcfarlane you would think I was lying. Covers sell for a lot more then these did at different times over the last 5 years. He only did so many covers so there is not a good chance you will see many more for public sale in the coming years.

thanks,

Matthew

[bluechip]

Another uneven set of results came from the Romita ASMs. Everyone (myself included) was very impressed with the 121 result, but if that stuff is so important why did a half splash of Gwen's funeral sell for only 6.5k?

 

Actually, most people I've spoken with were NOT very impressed by the #121 result. Don't get me wrong, they will of course acknowledge that it's the 4th highest OA sale Heritage has ever had and that it's a huge amount of money no matter how you slice it. However, it's kind of like a company reporting blowout record earnings of $2.86/share when some of the optimists were expecting $3.50-$5.00+ a share. I mean, there was A LOT of talk about the cover challenging the McSpidey #1 ($358K), DKR #3 splash ($448K) or ASM #328 cover ($657K) and instead the cover would have had to climb another 129% just to equal the latter. I was on the record stating that the cover would likely sell for "between the high $200Ks to mid-$300Ks". As it turned out, it was closer to the lower end of my forecast (and my forecast was by no means among the higher/highest ones).

 

I personally think $287K for the #121 is a fine result, and a healthy one to boot. $657K for the ASM #328 cover was not the sign of a healthy market; it was a sign of clinical insanity. Furthermore, that insanity was contagious, because everyone started playing the game of, "well, if the ASM #328 cover is worth $657K, then these covers are worth a million, and these covers are worth $750K and these covers are worth half a million and these 75 covers are all $250K and these 200 covers are all now 6-figure items..." I'm sorry, but that's just making a mockery of the transitive property.

 

I'm glad that the #121 sold for a healthy, but not-too-far out of the realm of reality, result, so people can now start benchmarking other values to that sale instead of the DKR #3 splash and the ASM #328 cover, both of which were not only aberrations, but both clearly less important pieces than the #121 cover. Some of the wildly fanciful valuations at the ultra high-end will now have to be brought back down to reality (possibly even halved) because, while their prospective valuations didn't look insane next to the #328 sale price, they now look wildly overvalued after the #121 sale. I think that's a good thing for the overall health of the hobby.

 

It's an iconic moment in Spidey history for some. For others, it reminds them of why they stopped buying it. It's definitely historic and very well known. But in regards to how much eye appeal it has, one should not totally discount the Butt factor. As shown by the way some foreign pubs opted to go with a redrawn full frontal view.

 

[Bronty]

I wouldn't exactly use that revised cover as evidence the original didn't work That revised cover is so incredibly obtuse the "death of Gwen Stacy" tag at the bottom completely ruins the entire concept of the cover.... the whole point of that cover was, hey lookee here kid, someone spidey knows is going to die... can you guess who, from amongst this wall of mug shots?

 

By putting the name of the person who is going to die RIGHT THERE, WTF is the point of the mug shots? . Talk about some art director not getting the point. That revised cover is like an invitation to your own surprise birthday party... sorta ruins the concept!

 

At least with the original you had to flip the cover to figure out who died.

 

 

[Brian Peck]

More like invitation to your own wake...

[Bronty]

If you were going to invite the reader to a wake (which is fine and would be a good concept) then you wouldn't structure the cover this way with the "guess who" mug shots.

 

My point is the foreign 'fix' of this cover has made it, at least conceptually, worse not better.

[Ferran Delgado]

The funny thing is that this spanish edition included #121 and #122. So if you are going to spoil it, at least use the #122 cover which grabs more attention. As said, this structure has no sense with the spoiler, even if it could look better with a frontal shot.

 

The main evidence that these classics are so good is that we, spanish readers, got marked by them in spite these awful editions. You should see the interior of the comic, translation and lettering sucked!

[bluechip]

If you were going to invite the reader to a wake (which is fine and would be a good concept) then you wouldn't structure the cover this way with the "guess who" mug shots.

 

My point is the foreign 'fix' of this cover has made it, at least conceptually, worse not better.

 

Agreed. But the spoileration comes in the caption. They could've done that with the original cover. They changed the art because they thought the frontal view was better. Interesting when you consider how so many of the "hombre arana" covers added lots of extra female boo-tay. But Spidey-butt? No, gracias.

[delekkerste]

By putting the name of the person who is going to die RIGHT THERE, WTF is the point of the mug shots? . Talk about some art director not getting the point. That revised cover is like an invitation to your own surprise birthday party... sorta ruins the concept!

 

 

Even without the spoiler tagline, I like the original cover layout and execution better. Whatever turning Spidey sideways adds to the cover is more than offset by killing (1) the sense of momentum of him swinging towards the mugshots, (2) the clenched tension of his pose and (3) his anguished cries and his Spidey sense going wild.

[buttock]

So we're all in agreement. They both stink.

[lb jefferies]

More biggies:

 

http://comics.ha.com/c/item.zx?saleNo=7076&lotIdNo=12006

[Bronty]

nice.

 

(spidey 324 sabretooth cover)

[Bronty]

some others:

 

- watchment 4,5,6

- ross villains piece - companion to the heroes piece that sold so well 60k+? in this last auction

- frazetta durango kid, miller daredevil pg w/kingpin (no pics yet)

- FF 57 - doom/surfer page (no pic)

 

[drdroom]

Time to start a new thread?

[Koa]

First off, the hulk is being punched in the stomach.

 

Second, Mcfarlane's work is more well known today than he was while working on spider-man. Kids are still growing up with the mcfarlane brand. Mcfarlane (along with Frank Miller ) aren't just bound to the comicbook market. People are buying the artist, not the storyline it's associated with in his case and I think that makes Mcfarlane is one of the artists with the best chance to grow past the numbers his work has sold for recently. Even AMS 328, in the future. clinical insanity or otherwise.

 

 

The death of gwen stacy is a classic story and since the new movies seem to be going that direction i think it will continue to be a huge defining moment in the spiderman saga, but 121 is not Romita's best cover by a long shot. It's the interior pages I'd want. The splash of Spidey holding Gwen stacy and cursing the goblin would be worth much more than the cover, to me.

 

I want to see what AMS 50 sells for.

[comix4fun]

First off, the hulk is being punched in the stomach.

 

 

 

Are you picking on Todd's recollection of anatomy, or are you picking on the Hulk for having his stomach next to his ball sac?