Wednesday is upon us, the best day of the week. Unless of course our comic shops let us down and don’t order some of the books we desire.
Anyone else notice Midtown has all their Amazing Spider-Man title pictures all mixed up? This week looks a wee bit more exciting for me than last week so I’m going to dive right into my picks and then hurt an artists or writers feelings when I tell you people to avoid their book with my drek of the week.
DC/Vertigo Pick
I think the only thing DC has going for it this week is the few Mattina covers coming out.
So it was really a tossup for me.
Ultimately I went with the Justice League America #29 over the Suicide Squad
(both available on eBay).
This is a long term hold, one for the personal collection to be honest. I don’t see these heating up anytime soon. Like Anthony mentioned in his spec video, retailers and shops have caught onto Mattina covers just like the Artgerm’s and so on.
Grab it, stash it.
Marvel Pick
I’m an idiot and claimed this was the end of the story arc a few issues back.
Now I can say it’s the real conclusion of the smash hit story arc for Avengers. So how’s it going to end? What smashing conclusion will Marvel provide to end this surprising run in Avengers #690?
Could be great, could be a dud. Hopefully Anthony can find us some spoilers so we’ll know if we need to grab more than a copy or two.
The description makes it sound like Avengers is ending but we all know that’s not going to happen. What does Marvel have up it’s sleeves? We’ll just have to wait and see. Unless there’s a death or new appearance, don’t see this being a huge spec hit or long term value hold.
Indie Pick
This is a no brainer pick.
Stabbity Bunny #4 hits shelves this week and it’s my indie pick.
The previous issues have sold well in the secondary market. This one likely won’t be a huge spec hit but should not be passed over, especially if you’re collecting for the personal collection.
I expect this one to be possibly a little easier to get as I’m hoping most shops are catching on in ordering a little heavier on this title from but you never can tell.
Grab a copy or two. One goes in the PC while the other one you hold to possible sell later to pay for both copies.
Small Publisher Pick
I started watching Rick and Morty but have not finished yet. But Rick and Morty is hot.
Their stuff sells, most of my shops can barely keep back issues on the shelves.
So this weeks small publisher pick goes to Rick And Morty #37, which is the homage Pickle Rick cover.
Classic cover. Expect most fans to seek these out, they won’t last long. Midtown has already started limiting them to 1 per copy.
My other pick for small publisher goes to Mega Man Mastermix #2.
I don’t care if the price tag is $7.99. It’s the size of almost 4 comics being 80 pages long.
I love Mega Man, loved him since the 80s. Just brings back some fond memories from my early days.
Just like issue #1, this will be slim pickings and likely a smaller print run.
If you’re like me and are a long time fan, grab a copy and stash them. I will be going for all 3 covers. I’ve actually been trying to downsize my collection and dumping off a huge chunk but these are the types of books that are getting stashed into my long term personal collection boxes.
Now on with the dreaded avoid pick, every writer and artist worst nightmare when it comes to selling their hard work.
Besides the few Black Mask books (sorry, it’s just a given now), I’m going to go out on a limb here today and tell people to avoid all the Marvel variants this week. After reading some comments in a few recent topics (thanks Alana for the spark), this goes beyond the store variants I pretty much avoid but I think goes along the same lines.
It’s just getting out of hand if you ask me. This pump and dump by publishers to sell more copies of a book to people to boost overall sales numbers is just starting to become sickening for me.
Sure I like the occasional variant, if a book has 1 or 2 alternate covers but when I’m browsing the list of new books and a new title has more covers than I can count on one hand, this is ruining the industry in my opinion. Some might benefit from it but it’s a cash grab for the most part.
If you buy a variant for $29.99 cause you love the art work on the cover, good for you. Buy what you like but if you expect such cover to be worth $29.99 or more 6 months, a year or 10 years later, you got another thing coming. The only time a high ratio variant holds it’s value or more is if there’s a first appearance involved. History doesn’t lie, go do your research before buying any variant above cover price.
That’s all I got this week.
Im glad you didnt include DCs B cover variants in your drek, Poyo. Their 2 cover, cover price system is awesome , imo. And I agree, Marvels Variant frenzy is sickening. The flavour of the month variants they do are just ridiculous for the most part. And those are just the tip.
Yup. Like I said, 1 or two variants not that bad. When its 4 or more…. I’m just sick of it.
I think only #1 issues should get incentive books since shops usually order higher on #1s anyways so it rewards the shop owners. But I dont need a 1:10, 1:25, 1:50,1:100 for every issue of Spider-Man that’s for sure. DC did a really bad job with incentive variants with those ugly 1:100 b/w covers then they toned it down to where only Harley had 1:25 variants every issue and now they do none at all which is great. I also like the free secret variants like the first Young GuNs variants nice freebie variants for shop owners to make a couple extra bucks.
The biggest problem with the incentive variants now is store exclusives, when a store orders their 7000 copies of a book for their exclusive variant cover they are getting stacks of incentive variants and drowning any market there was going to be anyways.
Yeah. I’m just done with the incentives tbough. I rarely if ever buy ratio variants over cover price. If my primary shop doesnt get them and set them out at cover (which they dont upcharge any variants), I dont bother anyways.
Totally agree that Marvel has gotten out of hand on the variants. Just way too many. It could actually kill their Fresh Start relaunch before it gets going.
I dont buy crazy ratio variants. Its just condones Marvels bad behavior. And as Poyo said they dont hold their value. See one you like? Wait 6 months. Then check the price.
My LCS had the Young Gun and Venom variant for Amazing #798 marked up to $8. I said no way. Went to another shop and got them for cover. The way God intended.
Certainly the frequent reboots and relaunches along with the dozens of variants for new #1 books is just Marvel catering to comics being the collectors market instead of locking in long term readers with ongoing evolving story lines and plots written by great writing.
Sometimes I think, am I part of the problem as well? Because I know if I can get a variant for cover that’s selling for $20 or more, I’m gonna buy it to try and flip, so it pays for my other pickups. Perhaps in this mix of collectors world vs reader world, I’m my own worst enemy. I’m contributing to the wants of variants while also deeming they are destroying the industry.
Hmmm.. if it does explode, there’s always stamp collecting I suppose. 🙂
The current incarnation of the Variant Artificial Temporary Price Bump is nothing more than a hybrid off shoot of the pre-melt down mid 1990’s market grab .. which came close to killing the Hobby ..
It’s an existential crisis man.
We could make the argument that if Marvel didn’t have a ton of variants you wouldn’t be flipping them.
Thanos and Avengers weren’t really about variants. They were well written comics that introduced new concepts. People were digging them. Others wanted to see what the fuss was about. But since it was underordered(I really blame the retailers) there’s short supply. Hence the $20(or more?) Per issue.
I want Marvel to do more of that. New, fun stories with talented creators. Not an 18 part return of Wolverine with tons of variants.
Will Marvel ever get it together? Not with David Gabriel working there.
I’m all for better writing. If publishers went back to their roots of why they’re making comics in the first place, it’s telling great stories with great writing along with art that accompanies it. Better writing will win over more readers creating more buyers than even top notch art on the interior.
Sadly I don’t usually pick up Marvel variants now to flip. I accumulated a bunch of higher ratio variants in the past and made the mistake of holding them too long (just happy most if not all I only paid cover price). It’s all too often a Marvel variant loses value before it gains value.
The hobby was never in danger of being “killed”…just corrected, like the stock market. I see the next correction coming, probably would have happened already if it wasn’t for all the movies….good movies like Marvel has been pumping out keeps stocks high.
I guess killed is a strong word to describe it with. We all know the industry isn’t going anywhere anytime soon.
I’m not so sure about the movies keeping the comics popular. Out of most if not all the people I know outside of CHU, none read comics but love the Marvel movies. I’m sure they help some but not every movie goer is seeking out comics after they watch a movie.
One has to realize, the most popular Marvel comics each month hit around the 100k print run mark (that’s counting all the variants and a guesstimate average of the better months). I’d say most Marvel titles are likely 50k print run median average. It would be impossible to know how may duplicate copies are being sold to the same buyer as well, whether they’re a collector or flipper. So even if one could say 50k print run went to 50k actual unique people, that’s a far cry from say the amount of people who and saw Black Panther.
Domestic sales put Black Panther at $682,494,914. If the average movie ticket is what, $15 (that’s probably more than average as well), dividing 682 million by 15 puts the number of attendees around the 45 million mark. Black Panther #171 in March had a print run of just 24k.
Tell the legions of Retailers that went bust back during the ’90’s meltdown .. and the Publishers that bit the dust .. remember Jim Shooter / Defiant .. ?? Malibu .. ?? Eclipse .. ?? Eclipse in particular, since they had third place in market share back then .. and, were an early champion of Creators Rights ..