Death of Superman and Reign of Supermen - all issues and variants 13 13

[Brandon Shepherd]

On 10/3/2022 at 6:08 PM, Cpt Kirk said:

Has anyone seen a graded version of the error variant of the Platinum Superman 75?  If yes, I would love to see that image. I believe the error is that there is no serial number printed on the back cover.  Here's the comic book I'm talking about, courtesy of @glynn and son cgc graded comics

 

I have not. I didn’t even know there was such a thing. That’s a sharp looking copy.

[Onewhois]

Thank you. yes this is a rare find. Now there is two copies known to have the same ERROR. I have search for this kind of error for years. this one here just happen to be found at SDCC 2022 . Crazy as SDCC was I should have just dropped by the CGC booth. Thats on me.  

Now the issue. I call CGC up today. I ask about this ERROR getting a Blue Label to be told that in fact it would get a green label. Yet we have the Superman #500 Platinum out there with a Blue label. I Have nothing to do with why or how this edition is this way. So it would be awesome to here for CGC Mike on this subject. 

So I did mention this is the second one. I have the first one. its sadly graded by the other company. it would have been Blue label However I got it signed by Dan Jurgen at the Tampa show. We even chatted about this. he was kind of taken back and said he didn even know about this kind of error. So now there is two !!!.... 

I really like to hear from CGC Mike about this ERROR. and why it will get green Label. I have included here the images of the Superman #500 Platinum ERROR that clear states on the Blue Label. 

[thechon]

I took a look through my collection this weekend. Some of these came from my LCS back when the first prints flew off the shelves. The others came from the Toys R Us sets.

[Brandon Shepherd]

On 10/10/2022 at 7:45 AM, thechon said:

I took a look through my collection this weekend. Some of these came from my LCS back when the first prints flew off the shelves. The others came from the Toys R Us sets.

Those are beautiful! Congratulations.

[Iconic1s]

On 10/10/2022 at 8:45 AM, thechon said:

I took a look through my collection this weekend. Some of these came from my LCS back when the first prints flew off the shelves. The others came from the Toys R Us sets.

Wow!!  Very cool, amazing job hanging onto those and looking after them!

[valiantman]

On 10/3/2022 at 9:07 PM, glynn and son cgc graded comics said:

Thank you. yes this is a rare find. Now there is two copies known to have the same ERROR. I have search for this kind of error for years.

In your search, did you find any copies of Superman #75 Platinum with both the number and a letter ("A") on the back?

I only know of one, and it was autographed (possibly the meaning of the "A"?) by Breeding.

Edited October 14, 2022 by valiantman

[Vfactor1]

On 10/10/2022 at 9:45 AM, thechon said:

I took a look through my collection this weekend. Some of these came from my LCS back when the first prints flew off the shelves. The others came from the Toys R Us sets.

Congrats! That is a nice set of books for sure!

 

V.

[Joshua912003]

Got these back last month. Thought I would share. I was really hoping for a 9.8 on my death of Superman book. 

[ADAMANTIUM]

On 1/9/2023 at 9:14 PM, Joshua912003 said:

Got these back last month. Thought I would share. I was really hoping for a 9.8 on my death of Superman book. 

Still nicely done and present well! Main thing that no mechanical error occurred, that you don't need to send back to cgc; alth9ugh it would be free, hassle free is even better! Solace!

[Joshua912003]

The poly bagged edition was in rough shape. I had to have it pressed. Wish I would have pressed Superman 75 newsstand edition. I really thought the big book would have gotten a higher grade. 

[Iconic1s]

On 1/9/2023 at 9:14 PM, Joshua912003 said:

Got these back last month. Thought I would share. I was really hoping for a 9.8 on my death of Superman book. 

 

All of those are really nice but that blue ink on Superman 75 looks super sweet!!  Congrats!!

[Joshua912003]

Thanks guys! I was excited to get these books graded. Getting them signed was just a bonus. 

[Cpt Kirk]

Here is a recent discovery of a new variant from the Death and Reign of Superman.   It was pointed out to me by @kenaran, who has an uncanny knack for finding the rarest of the rare.  The "Eastern News" is not a sticker, the book was printed this way.  The only newstand issue that we have seen of this "deluxe" version before now is a stickered copy (the stickered newsstand version is also shown below for reference... it is a newsstand sticker that is placed over the Direct Sales UPC).   I believe these can still be found on ebay.

[kenaran]

It was a bit of a fluke I found it.  To be honest it was about 2 years ago.  The first one I found was not in the best shape, and that cardstock cover tends to highlight flaws.  It took me about a year to find a NM example.  Haven't been doing targeted searches for a while, but I have noticed a total of 6 on ebay in the last two years, including what is now @Cpt Kirk 's copy.

I'll also point out that I was thinking the 'EN' on those stickers may be 'Eastern News', but the picture shown throws some cold water on that.

[onlyweaknesskryptonite]

On 3/27/2023 at 9:56 PM, Cpt Kirk said:

Here is a recent discovery of a new variant from the Death and Reign of Superman.   It was pointed out to me by @kenaran, who has an uncanny knack for finding the rarest of the rare.  The "Eastern News" is not a sticker, the book was printed this way.  The only newstand issue that we have seen of this "deluxe" version before now is a stickered copy (the stickered newsstand version is also shown below for reference... it is a newsstand sticker that is placed over the Direct Sales UPC).   I believe these can still be found on ebay.

On 3/28/2023 at 6:50 AM, kenaran said:

It was a bit of a fluke I found it.  To be honest it was about 2 years ago.  The first one I found was not in the best shape, and that cardstock cover tends to highlight flaws.  It took me about a year to find a NM example.  Haven't been doing targeted searches for a while, but I have noticed a total of 6 on ebay in the last two years, including what is now @Cpt Kirk 's copy.

I'll also point out that I was thinking the 'EN' on those stickers may be 'Eastern News', but the picture shown throws some cold water on that.

Although I have spent a lot of time trying to find more information about these "EN" barcodes, the specifics have eluded me. 

The closest "educated guess that I could offer is that the "EN" represents the European Norm for barcode quality grading (EN 1635) which was published in 1995 . Not to be confused with the EAN European Article Number.

The EN 1635 has been withdrawn and replaced by ISO/IEC 15416 around 2000. 

[Qalyar]

On 3/28/2023 at 6:50 AM, kenaran said:

It was a bit of a fluke I found it.  To be honest it was about 2 years ago.  The first one I found was not in the best shape, and that cardstock cover tends to highlight flaws.  It took me about a year to find a NM example.  Haven't been doing targeted searches for a while, but I have noticed a total of 6 on ebay in the last two years, including what is now @Cpt Kirk 's copy.

I'll also point out that I was thinking the 'EN' on those stickers may be 'Eastern News', but the picture shown throws some cold water on that.

In fact, I believe that EN sticker is Eastern News.

You'll note that the stickered barcode -- 70992 30410 -- matches the barcode on the Eastern News printed copy (and what a crazy discovery book that is!). The change in the first 5 digits represents a change in (for comics) distributors. You'll note that the normal (e.g. non-deluxe cover) newsstand barcode still begins with the normal 61941. A similar situation occurred with various Image books (best documented with, but not restricted to, Spawn), where two parallel distribution systems for a short period of time resulted in newsstand copies with two different barcodes for the affected issues.

It's impossible to tell so far whether they stickered some books for Eastern News distribution, then printed bespoke books once they got their production in hand, or whether the printed books came first and the stickers were used to make up the remainder of the shipment.

What's interesting to me is trying to figure out just who was distributing these. Eastern News was a late-1920s/early-1930s distributor of nude magazines that was merged into Independent News in 1932 to avoid bankruptcy. Independent News got into comic books and ended up becoming Detective Comics Incorporated; eventually both entities co-existed under the National Periodical Publications umbrella. That's all well and good, but Independent News (much less Eastern) stopped existing as a going concern by 1970. As far as I'm aware, there wasn't any "Eastern News" comic distributor operating in 1994. So unless I'm mistaken about that, my guess is that this was part of an experimental effort by DC to re-launch in-house distribution (presaging what they've actually done recently). If that's the case, these probably went only to a couple of test-market retailers, making them likely quite scarce, and meaning that figuring out what other books may exist with this variant is going to be another ongoing forum project!

[onlyweaknesskryptonite]

On 3/28/2023 at 12:59 PM, Qalyar said:

In fact, I believe that EN sticker is Eastern News.

You'll note that the stickered barcode -- 70992 30410 -- matches the barcode on the Eastern News printed copy (and what a crazy discovery book that is!). The change in the first 5 digits represents a change in (for comics) distributors. You'll note that the normal (e.g. non-deluxe cover) newsstand barcode still begins with the normal 61941. A similar situation occurred with various Image books (best documented with, but not restricted to, Spawn), where two parallel distribution systems for a short period of time resulted in newsstand copies with two different barcodes for the affected issues.

It's impossible to tell so far whether they stickered some books for Eastern News distribution, then printed bespoke books once they got their production in hand, or whether the printed books came first and the stickers were used to make up the remainder of the shipment.

What's interesting to me is trying to figure out just who was distributing these. Eastern News was a late-1920s/early-1930s distributor of nude magazines that was merged into Independent News in 1932 to avoid bankruptcy. Independent News got into comic books and ended up becoming Detective Comics Incorporated; eventually both entities co-existed under the National Periodical Publications umbrella. That's all well and good, but Independent News (much less Eastern) stopped existing as a going concern by 1970. As far as I'm aware, there wasn't any "Eastern News" comic distributor operating in 1994. So unless I'm mistaken about that, my guess is that this was part of an experimental effort by DC to re-launch in-house distribution (presaging what they've actually done recently). If that's the case, these probably went only to a couple of test-market retailers, making them likely quite scarce, and meaning that figuring out what other books may exist with this variant is going to be another ongoing forum project!

The reason I strayed away from the idea of them being from Eastern News and ended back at my though of the European Norm, was as you stated the first 5 being for distributors and from previous found other "EN"  barcodes some have the same first 5 , while others do not.

 

[Qalyar]

On 3/28/2023 at 2:12 PM, onlyweaknesskryptonite said:

The reason I strayed away from the idea of them being from Eastern News and ended back at my though of the European Norm, was as you stated the first 5 being for distributors and from previous found other "EN"  barcodes some have the same first 5 , while others do not.

 

The first five are not necessarily unique per publisher/distributor relationship, though. You also see that with Image, where the Spawn EANs vary periodically. For these EANs that aren't based on an ISBN, there's a certain Wild West element going on.

I still think, in light of that book with the printed Eastern News barcode, that these are all part of the same distribution program. Are all of these books reasonable close together in terms of their release dates?

[onlyweaknesskryptonite]

On 3/28/2023 at 2:19 PM, Qalyar said:

The first five are not necessarily unique per publisher/distributor relationship, though. You also see that with Image, where the Spawn EANs vary periodically. For these EANs that aren't based on an ISBN, there's a certain Wild West element going on.

I still think, in light of that book with the printed Eastern News barcode, that these are all part of the same distribution program. Are all of these books reasonable close together in terms of their release dates?

That does make sense.  Yes so far all of these are in and around the death of superman. 

[Qalyar]

On 3/28/2023 at 2:36 PM, onlyweaknesskryptonite said:

That does make sense.  Yes so far all of these are in and around the death of superman. 

If there had ever been a time for DC to experiment with rekindling in-house distribution, I'd say the Death of Superman era was that time.