Heroes Con - Forum Report

[chrisco37]

The skinny (for those that don't want to read my long-winded report:

 

I was finally able to attend my first Heroes Con this year. I must say, it was a very good show! Shelton and the guys put on a great comic show that reminds me of the Baltimore Con in terms of the overall experience. A had a few issues with it, but it was well organized and a very fun show to attend, especially for the very cheap price of $20 for a 3-day pass. I'd give the show a solid 8.0-8.5 rating.

 

The Meat (here begins my "long-windedness", read on at risk of boredom):

 

 

Friday

I was able to get out of work early on Friday and arrived at the show around 11:45am. I parked at the Westin hotel next to the Con Center as the public lots were full already. Cost me $16, expensive for Charlotte but still cheaper than most major city parking. I had made plans to meet up with Arex and was dialing him up on my phone when I walked into the show. Didn't even need to hit "send" as he was right at Harley's booth, which was the first booth I saw when I walked in. He had a few Bronze GL's that he was trying to trade out in an attempt to upgrade. Exchanged "hello's" and I checked out Harley's booth. As usual, Harley had some nice books and a good wall display. I had a few books on my list for the show and asked Harley if he had any of them. One of the books I was looking for was ASM #17. Harley had only one copy, a 9.0. I checked it out, but at $950 was way above my entire Con budget, so I passed. Too bad, as it was the only copy at the whole show that I would have considered buying as it was the only copy that wasn't tanned out. Oh well!

 

I asked Arex if he had seen any fellow forumites. As it turned out, he had and he introduced me to Steven (King of Rulers), who was standing right there. Steven is a really good guy and I'm glad I got the chance to meet him and hang out with him throughout the weekend. The three of us began walking around checking out some of the dealer booths. We stopped at Dale Robert's booth. Dale probably had the best selection of HG books at the show, but I felt he was (to put it nicely) "extremely aggressive" (1K for a Batman #232, 9.4!) with his pricing. So aggressive that I didn't even bother checking out most of his selection as, even with negotiations, prices would have been more than I was willing to pay. We all made some comments to one another about the high stickers. More walking...

 

Next stop was a nice surprise as an old friend, Marc Nathan, was set up at the show! I figured he'd be in Philly, but he said he wanted to attend a "comic book show", so he came to Heroes instead. Chatted with Marc for a bit and asked him about the B'more Con for this year. He gave me a flyer and I told him I was going to do my best to try and make it up this year. Guest list looks great (as usual) and he said he was working on a getting a super-surprise big-name guest to the show. He wouldn't tell me who it was though. Must be a good one though as Jim Lee is on the guest list already.

 

We made our way over to Wild Willy or Wacky Willy (he sells discount trades), something like that and I made my first purchase, Volumes 5 and 6 of the Cerebus phone books. $30 for the pair. More walking. Went towards the back of the room to where all the artists were set up and started checking it out. To my surprise, we walked to Eric Powell's table and there was no line! Score!!!! He had some portfolios with some Goon art for sale and I eagerly pawed thru them. Unfortunately, the few inked pieces he had were in the $600-800 range and I just couldn't bring myself to buy them. However, he also had pages from the Goon Noir series that were pencils only and were in my range!!! I snapped up a great one that had the Goon on it for a mere $100!!! Eric even did a little quickie Goon sketch at the bottom of the page. Success! My show was already made!

 

We walked around for a little while longer and ended up running into Wally (nerfherder) and Mike (Banner). It was good to finally be able to meet those guys as we've all been posters here for awhile, and it's always good to put faces with names. Metting up with members is always the highlight of any Con for me. It was about 1:30 by then and a few of us were getting kind of hungry, so we decided to have a little impromptu forum lunch at Hawthornes Pizza (best pizza joint in Charlotte). Arex, Wally, Steven, and myself (Banner pussed out and didn't come ) went over and had a blast. Pizza, wings, mussels, and beer (none for Steven as he's a youngster); a perfect meal. Great conversation and company and the highlight of the day for sure. Topped it off with a tasty cigar that Wally had brought down. We took a few pics (hopefully, Wally will post). Good times and a nice little break from the show.

 

Arex dropped us back off at the show (he had to jet to a wedding) and we went back inside. I headed back to Wacky Willy's and bought a Jonah Hex trade for $8. Walked around some more and ran into Dexter Vines who signed my Batman/Superman page. Talked with him for a bit and found out that Ed McGuinness wasn't going to be at the show until Saturday, so my page would have to wait to be signed by him. Walked around some more and found a booth that was selling hardcovers for 50% off and picked up the ShockSuspense (#1-6) collection for $25. Made my way over to Bedrock City's booth and introduced myself to Richard (MrBedrock). Had a nice conversation with him (and many more thru the weekend) about the boards and Bangzoom's books. Turns out, richard is a big fan of the Goon as well, so he appreciated my pickup of the Goon page. We chatted about how great Satan's #%@! Baby was.

 

Time dragged on and I spent the rest of the day wandering, not buying anything else. I stopped by Astonishing comics booth (Steven's command center) and Steven introduced me to Bill (he checks out the boards sometimes, but doesn't post). A really nice guy who I talked with throughout the con and who let me drop stuff off at his booth so I didn't have to carry all my *spoon* all day.

 

Show began winding down, and I jetted soon after 7:00pm and headed home for a good, much needed night of relaxation and sleep. My biggest regret on Day 1 is that I was unable to meet up with Zonker (who Banner said was there).

 

End of Day 1. Day 2 to follow once I feel like writing some more.

[tilleycs]

Thanks for sharing, looks good so far. Post some scans of your new finds so we can all turn green w/ envy.

[BlowUpTheMoon]

Yeah, I'd like to see the Powell artwork.

[chromium]

What no clandestine meeting with Chuck in the men's room this time ?

[drbanner]

Thanks for the report Chris, sorry I missed out on good Pizza, but I wasn't there long enough to spend half the time hanging out, drinking beer, and smoking cigars!!

 

I only went on Friday and the show seemed as busy as usual, although there weren't as many vintage comic dealers this year as there have been in the past. There were, however, lots and lots of artists, toys, DVD's, games, etc.,. One dealer had a "new collection" with some nice BA books, but the books were all "encased" in double backing boards and you couldn't look at them without taking them out of the box and trying to slide them out of the boards. I don't understand why some dealers make it so difficult to look at their inventory? Anyhow, by the time I finally found something interesting I come to find out it's priced at like 3X guide (raw) so I just gave up on them. No CGC this year, and no PGX either...

 

As others noted, the prices for many of the quality items were beyond reasonable, so I came away with a pretty small haul. That said, I'm always happy to add a few nice items to the collection!

 

[chrisco37]

Part 2 of my Report:

 

When we last left our hero (that's me!), he was just settling in for a much needed night of rest. I woke up early on Saturday morning and had a few chores to do before I started off to the show. Doors opened at 10am, and I made it there around 11am.

 

My 1st stop was forumite, finecomics (Jeff) booth to meet up with Marc (Sal). Chatted with Marc a bit and checked out Jeff's wall display and thumbed thru a few of his dollar boxes. I forgot to mention in Part 1 that the show was great for dollar/50-cent bins, not so great if you were looking for reasonably priced HG. Lots of Silver at the show, lots of copper, lots of Bronze, minimal Gold (in fact, I only saw 2 copies of Cap #1 at the show, and no copies of the other "Big 5"). Also, for those that may be interested, Heroes had the best collection of "talent" (NO, not artists/writers/creators) that I've ever seen at a show. No other show I've been to is even close. So, that was nice.

 

After chatting with Sal for a few, I immediately went to stand in line for Ed McGuinness. There were already a few people (maybe 10-15) in the line and Ed was not there yet. I recognized one of them as Kris (thecollector). Said what's up to him and we began talking. Heard thru the grapevine that Ed's plane wasn't even landing until 12:00, so we figured we'd be there for quite a bit. I was there soley to get my page signed, and Kris was there doing his "Sig Series" bit. We weren't sure if Ed was doing sketches at that point, and I just can't stand waiting in line for long stretches. Kris and I eventully worked it out so that he would get my page signed when he got the books signed. We exchanged phone 3's, and I told Kris if he got bored or wanted to wander, to give me a ring and I'd come hold his place. It worked out beautifully as Kris was able to go get a bunch of other Sig stuff done while I held his place. I'll tell you one thing, I'm not jealous of the Sig Series reps one bit. Kris worked his tail off getting those sigs. Ed finally showed at a little past 1:00pm and my page was signed. I was thrilled as that was my main goal for the whole show. Big props to Kris! He did a really cool Cap sketch on a Fallen Son book for Kris as well. Kris showed me some pages he picked up while I was holding the line spot and he also told me that John dell (inker on USM) had some pages for sale relatively cheap. I only have one Spidey page, so I headed over to check them out. I ended up getting a really nice action page from USM #97 of Spidey battling the Scorpion-clone for the nice price of $120.

 

Did some more wandering, dropping by the finecomics booth every so often for smoke breaks with Sal. Discussed having lunch that never materialized. Walked around some more and decided to do some box scrounging. Picked up a few 64-page EC reprints (1990's) for $3 a piece for some reading material. Checked out some 50% off boxes filled with mostly copper and modern drek. Pulled out 4 copies of ASM #258 to stash away. Headed back over to Eric Powell's table to check on possibly buying another page from Goon Noir. Chatted with Eric for a minute about Satan's @#!$# Baby and then asked him if he was going to ever do an Atomic Rage One-Shot. He said he'd actually considered it before, and may do it since the Satan book was such a success. I really hope that happens.

 

After that, I headed over to Bedrock's booth to talk with Richard some more and give him the good news regarding the Atomic Rage. We had a good discussion about GL #76 (probably my favorite book to discuss)and talked some more about some current threads and issues here on the boards. Richard had a nice set up and some sweet books. I noticed he had a (Saga) Swamp Thing #21 on his wall and asked if I could see it. It was a nice copy (9.4-9.6) and, although I already have a 9.6, I bought it anyway for $20. I mentioned you can't have enough copies of the book that's the pre-cursor to Vertigo, and Richard agreed with that sentiment. Showed him the ASM's I picked up and he said that was another good book to have a few copies of, with the movie out and all, especially for the price I paid.

 

Headed across the room to Astonishing's Booth to say "What Up!" to Bill and Stephen. Bill said Stephen was out and about trying to sell a few killer GA books he had brought to the show with him. I chatted with Bill a bit longer and pawed thru his boxes. He had some really nice HG Bronze and copper books. I noticed that he was missing an ASM #258, so I gave him one of my copies to throw into his box in order to fill my kharmic quota for the day . I also noted to him that he had a Wolverine (mini) #3 (in 9.4-9.6 raange) mis-marked at $10!!! I shoulda bought it. He thanked me for the ASM and I went across the aisle to Brett's comic Pile as I noticed they had a few copies of WW #199 on the wall, including a graded 8.0.

 

I asked if I could see the 8.0 and they grabbed the raw copies as well. The raw copies were stickered at $50 and $35 (IIRC), but were mid-grade to lower-md at best, so I passed. I asked about the price on the 8.0 as there was no sticker on it. One ofthe guys grabbed an OS and then quoted me a price of $140. I don't follow the market on this book, but I knew there was no way that was even close. I passed. Later on, I check guide and it's $85 in 9.2.

 

I went off looking for Stephen who I found at Munchin's booth. They were trying to work out a deal for one of Stephen's books. I overheard Munchin giving Stephen all these different scenarios of ways to sell the book, pricing, etc...He went on and on until I couldn't take it anymore and I told Stephen I'd meet up with him later.

 

More wandering around and checking out overpriced modern OA. Debated with myself on whether or not I should pick up a Superman/Batman page from Dexter (these were priced very fairly), but ultimately did not. A few more smoke breaks and good conversations throughout the day with Sal rounded out the con.

 

After the show, I had plans to meet up with Stephen and Bill at the Westin hotel for the Art Auction. Throughout the Con, artists were doing pieces for the charity auction (most did paintings). There were a few great pieces done and a bunch of other nice stuff. The best pieces, IMO, were an Adam Hughes Obi-Wan painting, a Craig Hamilton 300 (Leonaidis?) painting, and a nice Don Rosa Scrooge. I went back to my car and dropped off my stuff and headed over to the hotel. The lobby was crowded, so I headed over to the bar to grab a beer and something to eat (I hadn't eaten all day). After I finished I headed over to the auction room and found Stephen and Bill. Grabbed another beer and waited for the auction to start. Met BigMike while we were sitting and chatted with him for a bit. Finished my beer and, my kharma paid off when Bill bought me another for giving him one of the ASM's. The auction still hadn't started (we'd been there for about an hour) and I decided I couldn't take it anymore (as I had a party to attend that evening anyway). I said my good-byes, thanked Bill for the beer and told them I'd see them in the morning.

 

Headed on out and drank many more beers in the hours to come. Passed out at around 1:00am to prepare for the final day of the show.

 

Part 3 coming soon.....

[chrisco37]

What no clandestine meeting with Chuck in the men's room this time ?

 

Chuck wasn't there this year. I assume he was in Philly.

[Wally's Comics]

Eventhough I couldn't find the dreambooks I wanted to buy in the condition I wanted

AF 15 CGC (4.0/5.0) and ASM 1 CGC (4.0/5.0) I had a great time this show...

 

Met some really cool folks from the boards and shared somedrinks

and grub at a local bar while smokin' some fine Montecristos (l'll post some links later)

 

As far as the comics go:

 

- got almost all of my ASM Annuals I need in one day - all I need is #1 and 2

for the complete set in VF—up

 

- I snagged a sweet deal on a CGC ASM 23 in 8.0 for way under guide! Woot!

 

my fav deal was getting this from Harley under GPA, it has a little grease pencil on it

but that doesn't bother me too much.

(I reminded him that this sat on Comlink for awhile, so he knocked a good amount off the price)

 

 

- As a wrap up I scored a dump load of bronze readers.

 

 

 

 

[sterlingcomics]

By pure luck I was there Saturday...didn't let anyone know so couldn't meet up with board members...had to rush b/c wife and kids were there...and didn't find anything I needed. The end.

[Foolkiller]

What no clandestine meeting with Chuck in the men's room this time ?

 

Chuck wasn't there this year. I assume he was in Philly.

 

He was not in Philly -- I never saw him -- and I thought he was supposed to at Heroes Con this year.

[Anfield Fox]

Killer books, nerf and banner

[Wally's Comics]

Killer books, nerf and banner

 

thanks man,

 

I've been looking for a 9.0 of that 1st Gwen Stacy, Harry Osborne

and Professor Warren for awhile.

 

 

 

[Zonker]

My biggest regret on Day 1 is that I was unable to meet up with Zonker (who Banner said was there).

 

 

Sorry Chris, I got the impression that nerf was the only one of the 3 amigos to make it back to the con after lunch. Next year for sure!

 

 

Here is my significant purchase at Heroes Con this year: an Adams Detective cover I've had a heck of a time finding with anything close to a white cover at a reasonable price:

 

 

As others have said, Heroes is rich with the dollar/2 dollar/5 dollar boxes. This year I had fewer mid-grades runs I was looking for to complete than in years past. But I did pick up a stack of GI Combats from the Archie Goodwin period that were nice except for being subscription copies. They're currently undergoing the poor man's pressing process: sandwiched between Volumes A through JO of the Encyclopedia Britanica!

[Ze-man]

By pure luck I was there Saturday...didn't let anyone know so couldn't meet up with board members...had to rush b/c wife and kids were there...and didn't find anything I needed. The end.

 

Best con report ever.

 

I think B. Bob wrote one awhile ago that was close. But I think this one is close to the best.

 

[Ze-man]

Nice report Chrisco, as you avatar might say.

 

Vedy Nice, High five!

 

Ze-

[chrisco37]

Part 3 - Sunday "The Final Chapter":

 

I woke up with surprisingly a minimal hangover courtesy of the previous evening and read one of my EC reprints I had picked up from the first day. Screwed around for a bit and then headed back up to the Con. Arrived at around 11:30 (again) and (again) headed over to finecomics booth to say hey to Sal and set up our smoke break plans for the day and to drop off some trades I had promised to let him borrow. Talked about having lunch (again) that never materialized.

 

Went over to Astonishing booth to see Stephen and Bill and get the skinny on the Art Auction. Stephen said the Hughes piece went for the most $$$, around 5K. He said there were a couple of other big $$$ items, but also some bargains. Neither he or Bill won anything though. They said the auction didn't get started for another 30 minutes after I had left, so I was glad I bolted when I did.

 

Got back to wandering the Con floor and stopped over at Crazy Ed's booth to check out some wall books. Hadn't really planned on buying anything but, after speaking with Ed (this guy is a wheeler and a dealer), he and I came to agreement on a pretty nice copy of ASM #27. He called it a VF-/VF, I think it's more like a F+ with really nice eye appeal. In any case, I was happy with the purchase as the color breaks are only at the spine and the FC inks were nice and wet. The book also had an arrival date in red ink, but it was up in the "Spidey box" and did not interfere with the cover at all. I was happy to add an early Goblin appearance to my collection and this book is now the oldest ASM I have.

 

Went back to see everyone and show off my purchase. They all agreed that it had nice eye appeal, so that made me feel even better. I still had a few bucks left at that point and decided to go back to Wacky Willy and buy Vol. 7 of the Cerebus phone books. Got it for $13, so for $43 total, I ended up getting 3 Cerebus trades, which is a nice bit of reading for a rainy day. I had also brought along my Goon: Nothing but Misery trade to get Eric Powell to sign. He wasn't there at first, just a sign at his table that read, "Not a Good Role Model". So, I continued wandering around. Stopped by Marc Nathan's booth again and chatted with him for a bit. He had just gotten in some of the WW - Philly exclusive books (they had a Hulk cover). I thought maybe Donut had sent them down to him, but someone else had brought them down to Marc.

 

Meet back up with Stephen along the way. By this time, Powell was just getting in and setting up. There was a guy ahead of me that asked about sketches, but Eric was only doing them thru CBDLF (you could buy a "sketch card" for various artists and they would do a sketch for you. They were only about 3x5 or 4x6, so I didn't get one). I handed my trade to him and had him sign one of the fake ads for The Atomic Rage. To my delight, he did a quickie head sketch of the Rage next to his sig. Took him about 10 seconds, but still cooler than just a sig.

 

Strolled on over to Bedrock's booth to say hi to Richard and noticed that he had a WW#199 on his wall (I missed it the previous day). I checked it out and it was a sweet, sweet copy (much nicer than the copies I had seen the day before). Stephen checked it out and thought it was real nice too. Richard had it marked at $50, but gave it to me for $45 without me even asking. We chatted some more and then headed off. richard let me leave my books at his booth as I didn't have a box to stick them in and I didn't want to carry around a grocery bag all day.

 

My con budget nearly spent, I decided I wouldn't be buying anymore wall books and decided to do some box-digging over at finecomics. Ended up finding a few EC Reprints (1970's!), a Spidey #363, and some ASM's in the #420's for $1/book. I'm not big on box-digging, but there are some really nice things to be had if you want to take the time to look. I'll probably do some more of that in the future. Went out for another smoke break with Sal and we ran into Richard again. We had a real good talk with him about the Houston market and his stores, gave Sal the lowdown on the Satan book, and headed back to his booth to pick up my books.

 

It was around 3:30 by then, and I was tapped out and tired. Made my rounds and said my good-byes to everyone and headed out for an early dinner with the woman.

 

All in all, a great show!!! I wish there had been a little more selection of reasonably priced HG and artwork at the show (I'm sure Philly and Heroes on the same weekend diluted the dealers between the shows). I got some good deals though, loaded up on some great reading material thru the weekend, got my Supes/Bats page signed, and picked up some nice art. Best of all, I got to meet some more boardies. Had a blast and am looking forward to Heroes next year.

 

Sorry I don't have any pics to accompany the report(s). No digital camera and no scanner. I'll try and (eventually) get some scans done of the art and books I picked up.

[sterlingcomics]

Best con report ever.

 

 

I saved the best material for the Heroes Con thread in Comic Events...there's even some kool pix in there.

[Sal]

sweet report, Chris.

 

my report;

 

set up Thursday.

 

worked at my real job Friday.

 

got to the con Sat. Waited in line for an hour for Barry Kitson to arrive, so I could hand off Pirate's sketchbook, ultimately moving on when he was delayed to 12:30 or so.

 

Worked the finecomics booth. Gaped in utter amazement at the stuff people are looking for.

 

Met Chrisco. Hung out. Tried to go back to Kitson's line and explain that I had a sketchbook for a guy who had bought a cover and pages, and that I should be able to drop the book off, as per their prearranged agreement. Kitson disagreed, and suggested I wait in line like everyone else. I suppose that's fair, but oh well. Sorry, Anthony. I tried.

 

Took smoke breaks with Chris.

 

Chatted up my friend Mike, who had been transporting artists and guests from the airport and back all day Thursday. Come to find out he had dinner with Barry Kitson, Jerry and Mrs. Robinson, and someone else who I don't recognise.

 

Tried to sell Kris some books off of his wantlist, but jeelzy-pete he had some unusual requests, and even the esoteric wonderland that is finecomics could not fulfill his requests.

 

Ate dinner with finecomics, boardie Elijah Snow and his girlfriend. Highlight of the evening was Snow's girl putting in her dessert request and asking the waiter if they had any *spoon*, which I am sure he heard but did not understand. Still cracking up over that one, Justin.

 

finecomics and I went by the Convention Center again and got in Harley's card game with Dale "Six Dollar Raise" Roberts, Richie Bedrock, Harley, Harley's assistant, Crazy "call every hand" Ed and a Tennessee dealer named Mark, whose last name I never got. Fun way to drop a Grant, tell you what. Rich took what might be one of the two worst beats I've ever seen when Crazy Ed called Rich's all-in, and then pulled a Jack on the river for a straight, beating Rich's hand.

 

Sunday, my day pretty much mirrors Chris's, only with more actual labour and less buying. As he says, the highlight of any Con for me is to be able to meet and hang out with people from these boards. Certainly isn't watching some dude dressed up as Ultimate Cap walking around all day, along with a troupe's worth of people in random furry outfits.

 

I didn't buy anything this year. Yay for me.

 

Thus, no pictures or scans. Deal with it like I know you can

[sterlingcomics]

Gaped in utter amazement at the stuff people are looking for.

 

What stuff would that be?

 

the highlight of any Con for me is to be able to meet and hang out with people from these boards.

 

I agree. A shame my stupid work schedule didn't allow for this.

[Wally's Comics]

Yeah, I went by Crazy Ed's booth on Friday...

 

I got to remind myself to stop doing this...

 

I just feel so dirty afterwards.