Valiants mentioned in the 2003 Overstreet market reports

[joe_collector]

Here ends my conversation on a dead line of useless comics that I read, then sold, when the speculator frenzy was heating up.

 

I was done with Valiant a decade ago, and I'm still done with them today.

[valiantman]

I was done with Valiant a decade ago, and I'm still done with them today.

 

Thank you so much for contributing 27 times to a thread specifically for a topic

you finished with 10 years ago. Would you like to discuss your years of potty-training?

(Or are you not finished yet?)

[Aman619]

JC--I dont go in for the kind of garatuitous (but clever) insult retort just thrown at you.....but he seems to just be saying that th eapre-Unity Valiants are not as plentiful as th elater ones once the hype machine you speak of took over. I reember the first year and they were nice little books that caught everyones imagination by surprise. The first year or so they couldnt have been huge print runs, fake or real cause there was no reason or business plan to go by that expected the all-out-of-reason explosion that Valiants became!! Dr Solar 12 is an example...it was off the shelves the minute it came out.

 

But youre right, by th etime Bloodshot 6 (?) where the next "big" character appears in 2 panels sitting on an airplane and everyone was tipped off to buy a case.....well, that was the beginning of the end. I still got my 12 Harbinger#1s that I should have sold for $125 each!!

[valiantman]

I still got my 12 Harbinger#1s that I should have sold for $125 each!!

Even though they're obviously worthless,

I'll gladly give you FULL Overstreet price for all 12 copies.

I've got my Overstreet right here, and whaddyaknow, they're worth $6 each.

Please take advantage of my ignorance and sell me that trash.

[Aman619]

wellll......oka----

 

wait, if YOU want 'em, I better keep em!!!!! you almost caight me napping!! I should have sold all but one...I realy liked that book...and also "the Good Skin!!" X/O was also very creative.

[valiantman]

wellll......oka----wait, if YOU want 'em, I better keep em!!!!!

Dang it! I almost got a deal.

And next I was gonna convince you that my Bronze Age quarters

are worth TONS more than your modern age dollar bills.

Then we were gonna trade large quantities of those...

 

Man, I just can't get a break.

[awe4one]

The Valiant crash occurred because no one was actually reading the comics and buying due to the speculation frenzy generated by the company and publications like Wizard. Early Valiants were ordered in bulk by at least Rozanski who publically stated he bought "thousands" of copies from the start as he was buds with Shooter and "believed" in the company. This is obviously where some of the "inflated" copies went.

 

The crash occurred when all the speculators tried to dump all their issues (pre and post Unity), granted approximately after Turok #1 was released, and realized there were no buyers left. Everyone was selling. Bingo...heavy crash and pratically worthless within a month despite Wizard and Valiant's front that the market was still hot for these copies. Also, the crash occurred shortly after Shooter left the company giving speculators another reason to dump their issues.

 

Speculators were the ones primarily buying Valiant before and after Unity not readers. The limited number of readers that the line had realized rather quickly that after Shooter left the titles' quality sank like a rock and tried to sell their issues as well to capitalize on the frenzy. They were a month or two late.

 

I wouldn't call Valiants classic...just a very troubling story that illustrates the worst of the early '90s comic market.

 

 

Jim

[Aman619]

were you reading them from the beginning? Ive been reading since 1960 or so, and they were a breath of fresh air. Totally unpredictable and fresh. Each title they added in that first year or so was a winner: there was NEVER a character like X/0 before! Shooter did a great job.

 

I agree with everything you justsaid about the collapse...but if you read them from th estart, you would be only complaining how the hype/success killed the goose... The personality battle between Shooter and Massarsky did not help. Two of the biggest EGOs since EGO.

 

Given the times, the quality may have had nothimg at all to do with their runaway success ...but it was there.

[awe4one]

Oh absolutely....I was there from the beginning and the quality was there. It proved to me that Shooter is a very good writer. XO was by far the best title with Harbinger being a close second. Solar took itself a little too seriously for my tastes but there were some good stories in there (his war with the aliens stands out). Never much cared for Magnus and Rai wasn't very good in my opinion.

 

That's was was so jarring when Shooter left. The titles went from great to [!@#%^&^] in a very short time.

 

And with that said, Valiant is as much to blame as anyone for the speculator frenzy. They facilitated the hype by putting in the unannounced cameos in their titles to fuel the speculators and expending their line too quickly.

 

Regardless, it wasn't the quality that fueled their growth and ultimate failure, it was the speculation angle.

 

And, I forgot to mention in my last post. Early Valiants are found in bulk in quarter boxes. That's how I reacquired the titles after selling my Valiant collection before the collapse.

 

 

Jim

[Aman619]

Im with you on all that!. Especially how you ranked the books. What I said earlier aside, I also didnt care much for Magnus...or Rai. Solar was good--sort of like Watchman's Dr Manhattan in a monthly book...

 

My favorite moment? In that early crossover where Solar said to somebody " ...That's dangerous. I'd better lend you a hand!"

 

...and instead of flying off to battle with whoever, in the next panel, he took off his hand and handed it to him!!! I fell on the floor! It was totally out of the blue!!

[Kevin Boyd]

Well I don't know about you, but I started reading Valiants when the Unity crossover was going on.... liked what I read and went back and sought out the early issues of their titles. And many those issues were going for a premium price long before Bloodshot 1 came out.

 

I also stuck with them and read them during the entire boom and bust of the speculator era. Something was definitely lost when Shooter left. While I grew to dislike books like Harbinger, Magnus and Rai and eventually stopped reading them, I continued to read X-O, Shadowman, Eternal Warrior, and Turok until they were cancelled. I still maintain that EW and Turok were books that improved as the line developed.

 

All of the military-inspired titles left me cold... I never liked Bloodshot, Hardcorps, Armorines, Secret Weapons, etc but I would check in on Solar, Archer and Armstrong, Second Life of Dr. Mirage, Geomancer, the Visitor...

 

I never once considered ditching the line and selling theml, as I still have most of them. The only titles I got rid of were issues of Harbinger after the Pete/Harada showdown in 24, any and all issues of Hardcorps and Armorines, and issues of Secret Weapons when the new team was introduced.

 

Kev

 

 

 

[Ares]

I enh=joyed the early Issues. they were a great read. the problem was as they got more popular their stories went to shiat and I lost interest. They were a great altenative to the big boys. I still dig out my stuff once in a while to read.

[mcd-migration]

Early Valiants were ordered in bulk by at least Rozanski who publically stated he bought "thousands" of copies from the start as he was buds with Shooter and "believed" in the company. This is obviously where some of the "inflated" copies went.

 

Another guy who was investing heavily from the beginning was Greg Buls of Kingpin & then Bulldog Comics. Early on he was supposedly ordering & moving up to 25% of the total print runs. I can't verify exact #s, but I watched him grow from a small time weekend dealer to a huge business on Valiants back. I asume the Valiant crash also crashed him. Shooter (or BWS) had sent him the classic X-O BWS splash page from issue #1 (or 2?) as a thankyou & he was always getting freebies for pushing the books.

[vic6string]

I agree with those of you that say the books were never the same after Shooter left...funny thing is Shooter left to make a whole new lineup for a new upstart company (can't remember the name, but I think the headline book was called Plasm) It was slated to be the next coming of Valiant but it died even before Valiant did.

[joe_collector]

I think that was Defiant, and Warriors of Plasm (nicknamed Warriors of Jism) was their headline book.

 

Ahhh, the days of over-valued [!@#%^&^]... kinda like today.

[FlyingDonut]

Here's an open post:

 

I will pay 1.5X 2003 Overstreet GUIDE in real AMERICAN MONEY (none of that funny Canadian stuff) for ANY(!) NM+ or higher unslabbed Pre-Unity (pre-Unity ONLY!) Valiant. Everybody who thinks they're worthless, here's your chance to fleece a sucker.

[Aman619]

youre kidding right....

we cant sell--Overstreet sez theyre gonna go up again!!!!

whaddaya tryin 'a pull here? eh?

[FlyingDonut]

youre kidding right....

we cant sell--Overstreet sez theyre gonna go up again!!!!

whaddaya tryin 'a pull here? eh?

 

Do the math, my friends. The mighty Donut empire was NOT made on me losing money on books...

[valiantman]

The "board of directors" for Valiant (venture capitalists and non-comic people mainly)

got all excited in 1992 after the success of Unity and the backissue madness

and decided the best way to make more money was to churn out

as many titles as possible, as quickly as possible, with as large a print run as possible.

Shooter disagreed, so they bought him out and handed him a pink slip.

 

Regardless of opinions about Jim Shooter's tenure at DC or Marvel...

There is no doubt that he was the driving force behind the success of Valiant.

 

I'm guessing that FlyingDonut's standing offer of paying 1.5X Overstreet prices

for Pre-Unity (Jim Shooter) Valiant books will probably be valid for a long time.

 

The Pre-Unity Valiant comic books are (1991-1992):

Archer & Armstrong 0

Harbinger 0 (Pink),1,2,3,4,5,6,7 (1-6 should have coupon intact)

Magnus 0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14 (1-8 should have coupon intact)

Rai 1,2,3,4,5

Shadowman 1,2,3

Solar 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11

X-O Manowar 1,2,3,4,5,6

[awe4one]

Another guy who was investing heavily from the beginning was Greg Buls of Kingpin & then Bulldog Comics.

 

Bulldog Comics was the group that took out full page ads in CBG offering insane prices for early Valiants ($90 for Rai #3 and 4 ). Not surprised at all that they joined the fall of Valiant.

 

 

Jim