Wednesday Open Forum

Wednesday

Wednesday, the best day of the week, new comic book day. It is like your birthday in the middle of each week (well, one where you buy your own presents.)

We open things up to hear from you. A free for all.

The 196th edition of the open forum!

How about them spoilers this week?

As always we also want to hear about your weekly pickups.
So, What were your pick ups?
What had disappeared off the shelves?
What was sitting on the shelves?
What back issue deals did you grab?

71 thoughts on “Wednesday Open Forum”

  1. continuing the the theme from last week…..overstreet came out last week….
    edge of spider verse #2—spider gwen….9.2….$4.00
    incredible hulk #92— planet hulk…9.2…$5.00
    runaways #1….first series 2003….9.2…$4.00
    these are some examples from the guide which are way under priced. these prices are at least 2-3 years behind, maybe more. overstreet is great. but i have always said…..OVERSTREET CAN BE CONSISTENT AT BEING INCONSISTENT. but i am not losing sleep over this.
    if you youtube my channel RUSH DIEHARD you will see my top 100 silver and bronze age keys from 8.5 and up. retirement is set early. hope for many of you as well.

    3. I just picked up Incredible Hulk #92 – #106 a few months ago for maybe around $35.

    5. In Overstreet guides, modern comics that become hot tend to be underpriced. Stores don’t always update prices. Small cities with one store carrying a big back issues selection tend to retain more bargains than large cities with more competition from other speculators. In the past, I brought the following comics at cover price. Walking dead 27. New Mutants 98. What if 10, Catwoman 70, Avenging spiderman 9, Marvel super heroes 8 and Captain Marvel 17.

  2. What’s up guys ? I took last week off from comics because I got hurt at my job. So I guess I’m back to like 90% so I’ll be getting out tomorrow to get some comics. I know I want Venom not sure what else.

  3. Went with the following:
    JL Dark 1 Capullo b & w variant (1st app of upside down man + Capullo cover +Tynion= goodness)

    Teen titans 20 reg covers: even with a large print, this is still 3 new characters. Not a fan of crush, but do like djinn. May take awhile to be worth anything, so more of a long term play here.

    MGDD 33: 1st app of Devin Dinosaur+low print +cartoon = nice spec

    Venom 4: cates kills it
    Asm 2
    WW51: artgerm cover is great
    Infinity wars prime Perez cover: sold out at midtown for awhile, requiem scene with Thanos looks amazing (not spoiling it, but I think Anthony is posting later tonight about it)

  4. Been keeping pretty busy lately. Have a ton of jobs on my honey-do list that ain’t gonna do themselves! Plus side is I’ve learned how to hand a fresh door! Had to cut the holes and hinges.
    I found a bunch of differnt modern age minor key issues in some old long boxes at a flexible market. Nothing too crazy, but all worth more than I paid.
    Also got a toys r us exclusive x 23 Funko for $5 because it’s head was crooked, I just twisted it back. You can’t even tell.

    This week’s pick ups are:
    A walk through hell #3
    Action comics #1001
    Deadpool assassin #4
    Detective comics #985
    Doomsday clock #6
    Pestilence story of Satan #3
    Redneck #13
    Dr aphra #22
    Teen Titans #20
    Amazing Spider-Man #2
    Flash #51 variant
    Hellblazer #24
    Silencer #7
    Venom #4

      1. I’m behind on reading this series but yes, the cover art for these has been killer.

      2. Well, the first volume was better so far but this new one is still good. I mean it’s only been a few issues so there’s time.

  5. After months of sea Ching Found a New Avengers 8 (first black order) in the $2 bin. It’s VF/NM, but why not for half cover?

    Also snagged a Batgirl 20 (Middleton) sitting on the shelves…cover price. Love

      2. Been selling them for $30-$35 sealed. 1st print was not a high print run. Although I seem to find it in most Newbury Comics and occasionally at other bookstores. It’s a $12.99 price tag… it a bad flip if you can find them sealed. Not too many on eBay either and they’re all in the $30+ range still.

  6. Just picked up a copy of Thor God of Thunder #6 in NM-. Just my regular pull for me this week as I am recovering from SDCC. I have sold some exclusives which has helped.

      1. in a g plus group im in said stores should have in this week and it was awesome …. his words

    2. Batman Damned promo book came out last week, according to the LCS I spoke with. They showed me their copy. It is am oversized promo version of the book. It has full interiors by Bermejo but no word bubbles in it. It does look pretty sweet.

  8. went to the LCS the other day and found:
    Thanos #13 x 2
    Thanos #15
    ASM #795
    Teen Titans #12
    Metal #12
    and another 3 books. total cost me a around $52. i figure the Thanos 13’s alone cover the cost for all 9 books if i decide to sell.

      1. Nice is right! You and the 6 or 7 other patrons there will strike gold until the doors close!

      1. Total vacuum. Its in Kenya. So they bring in comics every 3 months or so in bulk. Always cover As (not many) and rarely any variants. So if I miss out on anything when ordering stuff online i sometimes find them when they bring in their shipments.
        A month or two ago i found a Totally Awesome Hulk #22 first print for almost around $6.
        I need to find some cash, go back and keep digging through their boxes.

        1. Damn. They only bring in comics every three months? Good hunting on your pick ups and yes, Ido grab some cash and head back.

    3. Man, must be nice, my LCS goes to ebay and mycomicsshop to check prices before he sells 🙁

      1. Those are absolutely the worst shops. I have found a few of those in my area, and refuse to even enter them any longer. Would rather take my business elsewhere.

      2. My shop only checks prices for ratio variants, ashcans and that sort of thing. Everything else goes onto the rack with an occasional limit 1per customer sign on really hot issues.

      3. If the market crashes again it will because of LCSs like this one. And there are a ton of them now doing this.

        The LCS has to realize they are the primary distributor for the collector and speculator. This is their position/role in this Bull market and the Bull market will keep going if the LCS owners accept this. If they don’t and push comics, in particular, new comics or new releases, based on EBay prices then we’ll have a market correction and a Bear market. They will bring about LCS closures and possibly their own.

        The Direct market is at risk with the online retailers like Amazon doing well and the publishers are already looking to break into the retailer market again.

        Speculators have been driving this current market and cutting them off is cutting off the new and large base of consumers that the LCS has acquired during this 7-8 year run.

        It’s similar to what happened in the 90s with Wizard magazine driving speculation and prices. Once the comic shops back then began selling new releases at Wizard prices or even falsely inflated prices, the market began to crash.

        Of course I think this market is much healthier than the one in the 90s with respect to print runs as 50,000 compared to 500,000 is a huge difference, nevertheless, the potential for false inflation is there and many LCS owners are greedily jumping out of their roles as “retail” distributors and transforming into secondary market speculators.

        It’s not enough for them to run a solid direct market business, they want the additional revenue generated by the collector’s market.

        Pulling stock of new releases and inflating prices to EBay prices will be the new trigger for a market downfall. There are stores that try to sell raw copies of key issues such as ASM #300 at a 75-150% markup based on CGC spec/ROI as well and this is another problem waiting to bring down this boom. Greed always gets in the way of a good thing, it’s human nature I guess.

        It won’t be as big as the drop in the 90s but it will knock players out of the market.

        That will be a good time to invest as well but many people will lose out on their investments depending on what price point they purchased a book at.

      4. All very true Krypt. I’ve lived through the 90’s crash they’re was a big crash 2008-2011 as well as the economy was in the toilet, I was a buyer at this time and boy was stuff cheap. But then the movies starting chugging out the economy returned and boom $1 binners are now $100-$1000 WINNERS. The difference between now and the previous comic crashes is the barrage of comic book related media. It’s not just hey this character is in a movie so the book gets hot, these movies are now having global audiences creating global collectors. Every year more comicbook tv and film make their way around the world and one more person starts collecting and obviously they want their fav characters first appearances like we all do. Only thing is there’s never going to be more copies of key 1sts to cover the new global collector demand that has started and will continue to grow. This makes comics economy much brighter than it has ever been in the past when it comes to classic or well known characters. When it comes to the spec book of the week it may be money now but from the one year later articles most decline heavily. Only way to pull it out of its funk is a media announcement which doesn’t happen as often to fresher newer characters so far. A good example of this is first Silk was hot at first $20 and eventually found its way all the way back down to cover and the variant for $10-$15 over time, then movie news hits and it goes scorching.

      1. As the Owner of a LCS for 40 years, that info is simply wrong .. the bursting of the Market Bubble back in those days was Speculators buying up large quantities of books and stashing them, later attempting to dump them into the Market .. all of the Old School Shops back then were not in the spec business .. at least, all that I knew .. we had no Internet / Spec sites, etc .. Wizard / Comic Buyers Monthly / were as current as it got, with Overstreet being the Bible .. in addition, cover prices were much less than now ..

        Add to that the Publishers cranking out Foil / Holo / Embossed, etc Covers in order to fuel the Spec greed ..

        What LCS owners lobby for, at least those that are in this for the long term, such as me, is for the Market to expand .. that’s what sells more comics .. With the exception of May, 2018, caused by Dan Slott’s Amazing Spider-Man #800 topping 410,000 copies at a $9.99 cover price, monetarily, the Market is still down month by month for the last 18 months on new, cover price books ..

        The Market is not expanding, IOW .. lastly, I leave a book on the rack for at least 2 months at cover .. if a book remains unsold and then heats up after 2 months have passed, I have the right to sell at Market Price .. customers had their chance to get it at cover .. why is this wrong .. ?? No one talks about the books shops buy and support, with no returnability, that end up in Buck Bins at a loss .. Shops have the right to attempt to make that up in a fair way .. I believe my method is fair .. the LCS are the folks taking the risks here .. and trust me, it’s risky ..

        If the market continues to shrink, that is what will cause the downfall of the Hobby ..

        1. 2 months is being generous as well. Honestly I’d be okay if you sold hot books after a week has gone by for secondary market prices.

        2. I would say old school shops were in the speculator market. They were ordering hundreds of copies of books (like image titles) that didn’t have the base to buy it. Shops were hoping they could sell the copies to people speculating and trying to “get Rich” or pay their kids way through college on books. It wasn’t just Image books, but for an example that is what I used. So yes, many shops did speculate and it didn’t help that Diamond was allowing them to put the books on credit in order to order more copies.

      2. Well, that’s just my way of doing, what I think, is fair .. I’m not wanting to drive off long time customers, some of which are the kids / grand kids of very long time customers .. in the Long Term, which is what a Quality Shop should think about, we are not in the Spec Business .. which I agree with Krypt on .. I order to attempt to sell out, that’s the goal .. I’ll take a chance on material I think has strong, longer term potential and order more than I think I can reasonably sell .. sometimes I’m right, sometimes I’m wrong ..

        I don’t cotton to shops that these days that mark Cover A / B that they bought at wholesale up on day one because of Internet Chatter / eBay .. it’s a natural disaster waiting to happen, IMO .. I don’t want an old or new customer coming back at me 3 weeks later and saying “You ripped me off .. I could have got this on eBay now for $X.XX .. ” .. they won’t be back .. and, as you know, in many, if not most cases, the Heat does not last .. I’ll not stand for short term gain vs long term loss of Customers ..

      3. Anthony :: With all Due Respect, that’s generally untrue .. I went through the ’90’s era and other busts and stayed profitably open .. you had Speculators that would come in and Pre-Order multi copies, sometimes in the hundreds .. I can’t speak about other Shops other than those I knew at the time, however, these “Customers” would pay up front .. at least, most of us required that back then ..

        Now, when Shops started springing up like weeds in every Podunk town from Coast to Coast after “The Death of Superman” hoping to “Cash In” .. that’s a different story .. they also died like weeds ..

        1. Uncle Willie, and no disrespect to you because I know you run a good shop, the ones that sprung up because of Diamond pushing new accounts and making it seem like it was easy and extending credit to new shops, that’s the ones I am talking about. The old school ones survived and many are still around.

  9. So, we get 5 possible 1sts or hot books for todays speculators. Big day if the market is responsive to these books.

    -MG&DD #33, 1st Devin Dinosaur
    -Infinity War Prime #1, 1st Full Requiem
    -TT #20, 1st D’Jinn, Crush & Roundhouse
    -JLD #1, 1st cameo Upside Down Man
    -Venom #4, Symbiote God stuff!?

    Great time to be alive.

    1. It’s the newest gimmick to sell more books turn out new characters every week, they know the speculators and the people like myself that only buy and collect 1st appearances will eat it up.

      1. If writing stories with new characters is a gimmick, then it has been a gimmick the whole time that super hero comics have been published. You could probably have to go back all the way to the 70’s or 60’s to find a week of comics that did not have ‘new’ characters in them. That long time writing practice is now being exploited, to a degree, by speculators. Having said that, the only reason speculators can use that to their benefit is a direct result of the general comic collector wanting that 1st appearance. And 1st appearances have always been the hen that ruled the roost. This is nothing new, Alana, it just has much more exposure now.

      2. I know I got 4-5 books listed above today at the LCS Its been a good 6 or so months since I’ve bought a single book anywhere. So they got me to give em money this week.

  10. After a quiet few weeks it’s an expensive one this week

    Infinity Wars #1 – Hildebrandt Cover – After being underwhelmed by previous Marvel events I have high hopes for this. With the Infinity Warps coming I
    I predict this will be a great series for spec peeps & those who like a good story….Now watch Marvel balls it up!

    Amazing Spider-Man #2 – J Scott Campbell Cover : Was in two minds about this but it’s a cool cover and never pass on a JSC ratio variant

    Teen Titans #20 – all 3 covers. No quick flip for me. Going to hold these cos I think they could be sought after in years to come.

    Moon Girl #33 – The Save Our School arc started well and looks to be a lot of fun

    Champions 19 & 20 – 2nd print – Managed to pick these up at cover. Nice Snowguard connecting cover

    SDCC Covers – X-23 #1, Magic Order #1, Beneath The Dark Crystal #1, Venom #3, Sonic #7

    I think I have enough money left to eat!

  11. Picking up:
    Saga 54
    Rick & Morty 40
    Justice League Dark 1

    Maybe:
    Teen Titan 20

    Notes:
    Glad to see Monstress win some awards. it has surpassed Saga as my favorite current read.

  12. Big week of pick ups:
    Doctor Aphra
    Teen Titans #20-Shirahama variant
    Amazing Spiderman #2 (J Scott Campbell for $25)
    Infinity War #1
    Hillbilly
    Venom #4

    Visited 3 stores and saw 2 copies of Teen Titans #20 Crush Design variant for $35-$40 and passed. All the Hildebrandt Infinity Wars variant that I saw had spine issues or printer defects, so I left them.

    Still picking up Analog #1 1st prints and Skyward #1 1st prints for cover (X2 for each) and also scored Lost City Explorers #1 and #2 for cover.

    Good hunting everyone!

  14. i bought venom #4,infinty prime #1catwoman #1 blank cover archie meets batman 1966 #1 and i even scored a sweet copy of new mutants #98 from a friend that is moving for # $50 and i am submitting it for grading asap spiderham is hot. prices for daredevil #254-260 are all over the map. i loved the shazam trailer as well as titans . and if anyone wants a autographed copy of teen titans go to the movies #1 autographed by craig sipes please email me at comicpimpvip@gmail.com i have ten spots open so email for priace love you guys blind adam out

  16. I didnt get any books today. I went snorkeling instead with sea turtles. 🙂

    1. My daughter ran into a turtle while body surfing a month ago in front of the house.

      1. We saw them like 5 feet from shore near Paia on Sunday. Like 5-6 foot size ones. It was pretty unreal cause we dont see stuff like that along the Gulf. I love it here, its going to be hard to leave tomorrow.

          1. I bet we tourists annoy them too. I really dislike people visiting Austin…. They all wanna do the crud I checked out or did years ago.

      5. Biggest problem with tourists here in Kihei is they drive so slow. 30mph on S. Kihei rd. most tourists go 15-20 mph and stare at the ocean while driving. Meanwhile people that live here have to get to work behind someone doing half the speed limit.

        1. Oh those people annoyed me this past week as well. I can drive and look at same time.

          I was surprised by the low speed limits though on the 4 lane roads though… 45mph is too slow. In Austin we have some or most highways at 75mph now. Our 130 Toll has some limits at 85mph on most of the stretches.

        2. Oh and I got stuck behind some doofus going around 10mph after picking up dinner last night. Of course it took way longer so most of our food was cold by the time I got back. 🙁

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