Image #1's speculation is different from 90's The Reign of Superman......

[NewWorldOrder]

because?

 

(j/k)

 

Image has done an absolute amazing job (especially Kirkman) in introducing new iconic characters and story-lines unlike Marvel & DC.

 

However it seems every new Image title #1's especially when paired with either a decent credible writer or artist is instantly an eBay flipping splurge bid-fest. Which many of us here take on the part of hoarding these new issues which adds to facilitating the speculating of these books.

 

Walking Dead (1st ballet---no debate there)

Chew

Invincible

ToT

Saga

Peter Panzerfaust

Revival

Bedlam

Nowhere Men

 

anymore I am leaving out?

 

Do you guys feel many of these current and future Image titles are all hype with no long-term sustainability or is Image becoming the Marvel of the 1960's with their innovative creative thinking?

 

Walking Dead made it long-term for sure as without question Walking Dead #1 is the Amazing Fantasy 15 of the modern age in terms of most important mixed with most valuable. The real question is will the others like Sage and ToT be 1-2 year wonders or something much longer. I am looking forward to a possible discussion if any of you boardies want to chime in.

 

So I am just playing Devil's advocate here.

 

Please leave your wallet at the door.

[Balham's Finest]

It's a bit of both, in my opinion. Most of the titles you have listed are not just hype, but have great stories and/or art - and you missed out Manhattan Projects, which is both a quality read and a speculation hit at the moment too (first issue, anyway).

 

The thing is, for every one of those titles, Image are also pushing out some rubbish - most of which, thankfully, seems to be confined to mini-series.

 

For your other points - early indications are that Saga #1 RRP could overtake Walking Dead #1 in terms of importance and value - but that will depend on Saga maintaining its quality over the long term (I think it will). Saga will WAY outlast Thief of Thieves in any event - at least it should!

 

Two questions:

 

1) what are you playing devil's advocate in respect of?

 

2) what is a "first ballet"?

[Katchoo]

My answer is...

 

I don't care how long any of the current comics go for so long as awesome stories continue to be told.

[THB]

7,000 copies to 100,000's of copies. Print run will always be the diff. And while the Death/Return of Superman is maligned it was a fun popcorn movie kind of read. And IMO no RRP variant will be a more important modern key than Walking Dead #1.

[mysterio]

There were more people buying comics in the 90s before that bubble burst, and people stopped reading and buying in droves after that. This is why the bigger Marvel titles could routinely sell 6 figures in the 1990s and no title approaches that now that I am aware of.

 

7,000 copies is definitely a lower print run, but what happens if only 6,000 people want them? How many folks are out there that will pay increasingly higher prices for a book that is less than a year old, no matter what tricked out cover it has? When does the music stop on some of these books and then we see how badly gravity kicks in? And how far would those prices drop before we establish a true market value? How many people on this board own 50 or more copies of some of these books, and how might that skew a perception of demand? There is nothing wrong with hoarding/flipping, and I have done some myself, but this is called speculating for a good reason.

[krighton]

there will come a time when comic prices will be too high and people will decide not to plunk down the $4 or $5 a piece for them....yesterday i was in B&N and saw that LOCUS magazine had raised their price to $7.50. I decided not to buy it. Enough is enough.

 

Rising prices in the US are certainly to blame but with that comes decisions and i don't have unlimited funds to pay for every single item i might want.

[Mike's Rack]

There were more people buying comics in the 90s before that bubble burst, and people stopped reading and buying in droves after that. This is why the bigger Marvel titles could routinely sell 6 figures in the 1990s and no title approaches that now that I am aware of.

 

7,000 copies is definitely a lower print run, but what happens if only 6,000 people want them? How many folks are out there that will pay increasingly higher prices for a book that is less than a year old, no matter what tricked out cover it has? When does the music stop on some of these books and then we see how badly gravity kicks in? And how far would those prices drop before we establish a true market value? How many people on this board own 50 or more copies of some of these books, and how might that skew a perception of demand? There is nothing wrong with hoarding/flipping, and I have done some myself, but this is called speculating for a good reason.

I agree, pigs get fat hogs get slaughtered. I'm banging that drum lately.

[comicsnyc22]

I just don't see what print run has to do with how good a story is, or how well a company is doing? Batman is a great book from DC an has a huge print run.

[jjoseph7772]

But part of his question was speculation. By speculation i assume he means value. Its obvious a books value goes up when in demand if there are less rather than more of that book to be found.

[Mr. Hog]

When I was a kid, I was all about the comics, but to your point I was dissuaded by bad art and bad writing, not by the print runs. Even when as a college student I changed my focus from illustrating comics to illustrating for magazines. Fast forward 20 years and the school I went to that didn't offer a single comic class now has the biggest comic library of any university in the US and offers classes specifically for comics. So it's clearly thriving at the moment.

 

Here's what I wonder... Newsweek was the first big mag to stop production... Others are following as people move to digital media. The kids that collected comics then have the say so in what movies are being made now - they're also the ones buying the comics. I rarely see kids at my LCS. Once we start fading, our kids who were influenced by the movies may not have the desire to collect paper comics... does that die with other printed magazines?

 

Also, without raising prices and with increases in production costs, does a book fall back on paying lesser artists and writers? The funny thing is the creator/owner model books still have lower costs vs the megastore behemoths and while the art is usually pretty good in the latter, the writing is very hit or miss. I just don't know... I will say though, if the death of Spiderman by a thousand variants didn't pop the bubble, the awesome writing and artwork at books like Image and Valiant wont die (for now anyway).

[ThoseBackPages]

2012 > 2013

[buddymagoo]

2012 > 2013

 

What's with the doom and gloom? 2013 could build on 2012 and be another great year for the comic book industry. At least I hope so.

[ThoseBackPages]

2012 > 2013

 

What's with the doom and gloom? 2013 could build on 2012 and be another great year for the comic book industry. At least I hope so.

 

No doom and gloom here Brother. i expect more great reading from Image in 2013

 

Just no Saga or PP "money zoomers" in 2013

 

as always, just my opinion

[the blob]

there have been image duds from a speculation standpoint in the last few years. you're just not remembering them.

 

on that list, I'd saying Invincible 1 is actually a bargain (ok, it was a bargain, it seems to have heated up a lot lately, but I dunno, it seems like 6 months ago you could find #1s a lot cheaper) as this is a legit series that has been around a long time. dunno what the print run of #1 was though.

[songsaboutclouds]

It's a bit of both, in my opinion. Most of the titles you have listed are not just hype, but have great stories and/or art - and you missed out Manhattan Projects, which is both a quality read and a speculation hit at the moment too (first issue, anyway).

 

The thing is, for every one of those titles, Image are also pushing out some rubbish - most of which, thankfully, seems to be confined to mini-series.

 

For your other points - early indications are that Saga #1 RRP could overtake Walking Dead #1 in terms of importance and value - but that will depend on Saga maintaining its quality over the long term (I think it will). Saga will WAY outlast Thief of Thieves in any event - at least it should!

 

Two questions:

 

1) what are you playing devil's advocate in respect of?

 

2) what is a "first ballet"?

 

3) what is Sage?

[NewWorldOrder]

Well one point here I would like to make is the low print run on issues is only noteworthy if demand outweighs it.

 

There are countless books out there that have low print runs, and yet I could own every single copy.

 

The perfect storm is low-print run mixed with high demand.

[Nexus]

As I posted in another thread, I believe the closest parallel to the Image of today would be the independents of the '80s. Not the junky fly-by-night B/W books that tried to capitalize on TMNT, but legit publishers with full lines of quality work by respected creators. Included would be:

 

First

Eclipse

Pacific

Comico

Capital

Dark Horse

 

Only Dark Horse is still around. And virtually none of those formerly "hot" creator-driven titles (MAGE, NEXUS, BADGER, AMERICAN FLAGG!, JON SABLE, et al) have any meaningful monetary value today.

 

Image may be my favorite publisher going. But I also suspect that very few of their titles outside of WD will still be relevant 20 years from now.

 

On another note, I worked at 20th Century Fox in the early '90s. At the time, they were big on comic book acquisitions. This was when WATCHMEN was to be directed by Terry Gilliam. Anyway, they made a deal with Dark Horse and obtained the rights to just about everything in the catalog (an early proposal had Bill Murray as Concrete). If that was today, I suppose every title that got optioned would be selling for ridiculous amounts on eBay. As it turned out, only two (that I remember, anyway) actually made it to the big screen: THE MASK and MYSTERY MEN. Does anyone care about MYSTERY MEN? So I am amused when I see all the excitement over MIND MGMT. Everyone thinks WALKING DEAD...how many think MYSTERY MEN? MM may be a great book (I haven't read it), but don't count on the inflated value holding for very long.

[NewWorldOrder]

 

Image may be my favorite publisher going. But I also suspect that very few of their titles outside of WD will still be relevant 20 years from now.

 

 

That is my thoughts as well.

 

WD and if they can pull off Saga so far I see long-term potential.

 

All the other are still very much suspect.

[carter3175]

How much longer do you guys realistically see WD going?

[SuperBird]

The main difference I see is that characters/stories that continue past their creator's departure have long term value (eg; all the Marvel and DC hero stuff) whereas finite series that end (eg; Sandman, Preacher) lose value when the story ends. With that as a guide, I don't see any of these, including Saga, holding long term value.

 

Walking Dead #1 might be an exception, due to the low print run, similarly to Cerebus #1.