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Moon Knight vs Shang Chi
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17 posts in this topic

Hello all!

A group of us were sitting around the table Saturday night, with some convention-appropriate overpriced Mexican food, and over the course of several rounds of frosty beverages we discussed the (insane) convention pricing on various titles. The two that really stuck out were Moon Knight #1 and Marvel Special Edition #15. The price of Moon Knight #1 is doing silly things considering Werewolf by Night #32 is MK's first appearance & Marvel Special Edition #15 is Shang Chi's first appearance. Now WWBN #32 can be (depending on condition) in the $10k club, but MSE #15 looks like it's around $3-5k top end after the movie announcement bump. Now I'm not saying that a film bump is everything since Tomb of Dracula #10 moved up some after the Disney+ Blade show announcement, but not unreasonably; though that may change again with another bump if/when Wesley Snipes cameo is confirmed. Still, it seems like MSE #15 isn't moving up the way other titles are, and I was wondering if ya'll have any guesstimates as to why.

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Moon Knight is a straight up super hero title. Costume, later powers - the entire super hero thing. MOKF was Marvel cashing in on the Kung Fu craze of the 70's.  Shang-Chi had a nice long run and plenty of cross overs in various titles. But ultimately Shang Chi was a martial artist only and feels a lot less super hero'ish. 

I suspect that is the why of the difference in values.....

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1 minute ago, Tony S said:

Moon Knight is a straight up super hero title. Costume, later powers - the entire super hero thing. MOKF was Marvel cashing in on the Kung Fu craze of the 70's.  Shang-Chi had a nice long run and plenty of cross overs in various titles. But ultimately Shang Chi was a martial artist only and feels a lot less super hero'ish. 

I suspect that is the why of the difference in values.....

Bingo. But I posted a lot today and I'm beat. Thanks for sharing my perspective.

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I think I’d marvel would have used maybe a different actor or was a real legit martial artist that could act like the two guys in mortal kombat that may have helped. The trailer looks ok but they are going way to crouching tiger hidden dragon with all of the rope work as opposed to doing legit martial arts like enter the dragon or an old school action film. Just my two cents on it. I love MMA/ martial arts and was really hoping to see a legit fighter and bad play the character who can act. Iron fist was terrible because the actor in my opinion. 

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On 7/19/2021 at 1:50 AM, Mmanick said:

I think I’d marvel would have used maybe a different actor or was a real legit martial artist that could act like the two guys in mortal kombat that may have helped. The trailer looks ok but they are going way to crouching tiger hidden dragon with all of the rope work as opposed to doing legit martial arts like enter the dragon or an old school action film. Just my two cents on it. I love MMA/ martial arts and was really hoping to see a legit fighter and bad play the character who can act. Iron fist was terrible because the actor in my opinion. 

If the fight scenes in Shang Chi are like Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon instead of at least like the "Ip Man" movies or legit martial arts scenes, this movie will tank at the box office.  Most likely the value for Special Marvel Edition 15 will drop like a rock as well. 

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On 7/19/2021 at 9:27 AM, musicmeta said:

If the fight scenes in Shang Chi are like Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon instead of at least like the "Ip Man" movies or legit martial arts scenes, this movie will tank at the box office. 

I'm just not sure that's true. 

As someone who has watched Asian Martial Arts movies since the mid-70's, I would absolutely prefer legit martial arts scenes - I'm not a big fan of the wire work in Chinese Fantasy movies - but the truth is... 'Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon' is a superb film, that was a huge box office success. For whatever reason, audiences were not turned off by that aspect of the film.

Ip Man is more the classic style that appeals to the people who like fight scenes in movies, but that style hasn't really ever, in pure form, translated into box office success in the U.S. Believe me, I'd prefer it 1000% more than the other, but I just don't know if a definitive statement could be made to say that one or the other will make the difference in the success of the movie. For an individual sure - but who knows how mainstream audiences will react?

In all actuality - and this is no diss to Donnie Yen, who has grown over 30 years as a movie martial artist, as an actor and a performer (I've been a fan since the early 90's - I still love 1991's 'Crystal Hunt' - a silly movie that I can't help but enjoy and his other early work like Tiger Cage, Tiger Cage 2, In the Line of Duty 4, and of course 'The Holy Virgin vs the Evil Dead'!), BUT... I'll take Sammo era Jackie Chan fights over those any day...

(All of the clips in this are from 1988's Dragons Forever, probably still my favorite Jackie Chan film and this doesn't even include the BEST fight in the movie...). I'd love to see Shang Chi fight like this!

 

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On 7/19/2021 at 6:27 AM, musicmeta said:

If the fight scenes in Shang Chi are like Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon instead of at least like the "Ip Man" movies or legit martial arts scenes, this movie will tank at the box office.  Most likely the value for Special Marvel Edition 15 will drop like a rock as well. 

I don’t believe it will tank but it definitely won’t be one that’s a classic  like enter the dragon. 

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On 7/19/2021 at 6:25 AM, Wolverinex said:

Absolutely.  Marvel Spotlight 28 > Moon Knight 1.  Pick it up if you can find it.  

Yeah...I had a 9.8 and sold it a few months ago on eBay. Anything that you pay $4 for in 1986 and then get pressed and graded in 2018 for $30 and then sell it for $3500 is a good day. I'm an old veteran collector from the '80's and all the multi copy stuff(10 or more) that I bought at Comic World in Winnipeg has been going up like crazy. Just wish pressers weren't so busy so I could get more than 25 done every 6-8 months. I know I can...but my wife just doesn't realize there's gold in dem der long white boxes. HA!!!!

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On 7/19/2021 at 7:31 AM, Prince Namor said:

I'm just not sure that's true. 

As someone who has watched Asian Martial Arts movies since the mid-70's, I would absolutely prefer legit martial arts scenes - I'm not a big fan of the wire work in Chinese Fantasy movies - but the truth is... 'Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon' is a superb film, that was a huge box office success. For whatever reason, audiences were not turned off by that aspect of the film.

Ip Man is more the classic style that appeals to the people who like fight scenes in movies, but that style hasn't really ever, in pure form, translated into box office success in the U.S. Believe me, I'd prefer it 1000% more than the other, but I just don't know if a definitive statement could be made to say that one or the other will make the difference in the success of the movie. For an individual sure - but who knows how mainstream audiences will react?

In all actuality - and this is no diss to Donnie Yen, who has grown over 30 years as a movie martial artist, as an actor and a performer (I've been a fan since the early 90's - I still love 1991's 'Crystal Hunt' - a silly movie that I can't help but enjoy and his other early work like Tiger Cage, Tiger Cage 2, In the Line of Duty 4, and of course 'The Holy Virgin vs the Evil Dead'!), BUT... I'll take Sammo era Jackie Chan fights over those any day...

(All of the clips in this are from 1988's Dragons Forever, probably still my favorite Jackie Chan film and this doesn't even include the BEST fight in the movie...). I'd love to see Shang Chi fight like this!

 

For me it’s more then just fight scenes. I feel like real martial arts are used less and less in movies unfortunately. I’d like some Jackie chan but am really hoping for enter the dragon type of vibe. I know it’s not going to be bloodsport, kickboxer or a chuck Norris film but it would be cool or maybe even a jet li film. That mystical stuff was a joke if they can’t do it right like iron fist.

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On 7/19/2021 at 9:53 AM, Mmanick said:

For me it’s more then just fight scenes. I feel like real martial arts are used less and less in movies unfortunately. I’d like some Jackie chan but am really hoping for enter the dragon type of vibe. I know it’s not going to be bloodsport, kickboxer or a chuck Norris film but it would be cool or maybe even a jet li film. That mystical stuff was a joke if they can’t do it right like iron fist.

Yes, Enter the Dragon vibe would be awesome.  Quality of the fight scenes over quantity if they do them right.  Still need some creative fight scenes but really need a great story that flows well.

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On 7/19/2021 at 7:57 AM, musicmeta said:

Yes, Enter the Dragon vibe would be awesome.  Quality of the fight scenes over quantity if they do them right.  Still need some creative fight scenes but really need a great story that flows well.

I agree 100%

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I think the Shang Chi film will do ok box office in the USA simply because it has Marvel in front of it. Post-pandemic box office, I’m betting it does a little under Black Widow(ish) numbers. However, I also think it will absolutely crush the foreign market, posting surprisingly big numbers.

However, will the box office numbers & increased character recognition bump the value of MSE #15 the way the Disney+ announcement of Moon Knight has done for those books? Again, I’m not sure. 
 

Is there anyone here who does a lot of foreign sales? I’m wondering if MSE #15 isn’t seeing a ton of action here (USA), but is seeing a lot of international shipping action. 

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On 7/19/2021 at 11:09 AM, SuperBird said:

There were warehouses full of MSE15, which accounts for the lower value. 

Even so the book has still gone up exponentially. I forget how many years ago I bought it but I have a slabbed 7.5 or 8.5 I bought here for 50$ 

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On 7/19/2021 at 2:13 PM, Mmanick said:

Even so the book has still gone up exponentially. I forget how many years ago I bought it but I have a slabbed 7.5 or 8.5 I bought here for 50$ 

oh yeah I don't think anyone is debating that it's gone up in value; just the reasons it hasn't matched other BA 1st appearances like Ghost Rider and Moon Knight. 

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