Final Order Cut-Off is the last day that shops can guarantee their orders for comics. After Final Order Cut-Off, or FOC, these books will only be available to retailers on Advance Reorder. And that is not guaranteed. So here are the highlights for Monday, 6/1/20’s FOC list.
Haven’t done an FOC list in almost three full months. Poyo does his two or three books for the week, but here is a more in depth look at FOC for the week.
MARVEL
EMPYRE AVENGERS #0 – Marvel’s next big event kicks off here. 2 pack John Tyler Christopher cover is great, looks like Pierce Brosnan as Mr. Fantastic.
Thor #5 – Donny Cates goodnesses, Black Winter is here and Thor is lost in it.
DC
Batgirl #46 InHyuk Lee Variant – a great looking Batgirl from a more and more popular artist, his star is on the rise.
Batgirl #48 – There is an Ian McDonald B cover, but I am loving the A cover. Joker War crossover issue.
Batman #93 – How can you pass up the Punchline storyline, the hottest new spec of 2020? Available in the regular cover, the twisted Mattina Variant and the 1:25 Designer Variant
Wonder Woman #760 Adam Hughes Variant – over image has not been released yet but Adam Hughes is doing a cover variant for Wonder Woman. May be worth a blind grab. Joshua Middleton has a cover for it too that is stunning.
INDY/IMAGE
Locke and Key #1 Facsimile Edition – If you missed out on grabbing a first print years ago, or a second print when they slipped out, here is your chance to read Joe Hill’s awesome book that spawned the Netflix tv series.
Sleeping Beauties #1 – Stephen and Owen King, already optioned for tv, a must grab.
Dead Body Road Bad Blood #1 – Justin Jordan returns to his gritty, violent series, Dead Body Road. A reader worth checking out.
Spawn #307 Spawn #307 – Spawn was on fire before the shut down, still worth grabbing and setting issues aside.
That Texas Blood #1 – Neo-Western crime story. The B Sean Phillips cover has me hooked.
Bleed Them Dry #1 – New Vault Comics series, The year is 3333. Earth is in a state of recovery. Vampires are real, and though far less populous, they thrive alongside humans in the Japanese-engineered mega-city known as Asylum. People have come to understand that some Immortals are good, some are bad, and most navigate the world without incident. There is peace. That is
until now. Someone is brutally murdering vampires. And Detective Harper Halloway has been assigned to the case. To solve it, she’ll have to unearth a much deeper truth: The future of humanity has been edited.
Doctor Tomorrow #3 Peach Momoko Variant – Cannot pass up a Peach Momoko cover price variant. She is on fire right now.
I finally finished my 3rd pass through Marvel’s annual variant sale. It will be interesting when these flood the market 10-12 days from now as dealers get the boxes in. I opened the email Thursday about 18 minutes after it was sent and immediately started my blitz through the list. Was too late for the 1 in 200 variants, but was able to snag a handful of 1 in 100s and a ton of 1 in 50s. Most all for $1.00 to $1.25.
I didn’t really have time to rehit the list over the weekend but I did a quick second pass, then did a full two hours this morning going through every item. Amazing to me that there are still LOTS of 1 in 50 variants available for a buck and tons and tons of 1 in 25s. I’ll be curious to see which dealer jumped on all the Marvel Tales 1 in 50 Bartel Virgin variants. There were 9 of those plus the InHyuk Lee Ghost Rider. Knowing that some of those variants probably only had a couple dozen copies in the wild prior to this week, it will be interesting to see how many Diamond just dumped in the marketplace. I still remember the Marvel variant sale where 1000 extra copies of lenticular Thanos 13 sprang loose. Market is still depressed with those.
It’s weird staring at a 1 in 50 variant at a buck and saying “nah, I’ll only take 10”. But I’m not a toilet paper hoarder, so I left plenty behind.
If you don’t mind me asking, how do you find out about these sales? I’m a new comic shop owner and would love to pick some up.
Diamond sent out an email in reference to it I believe.
I’m not a retailer, nor do I get their emails, only seen what’s shared with me but I do recall them having links to News on the Retailer portal as well. Probably a lot of this stuff found under their Daily News section.. if I’m recalling screenshots I’ve seen.
Richard: you need to opt in for emails. you can find this under : My Account / Preferences
With most of the promo sales that are available, there will be HUGE references to it on the Diamond main page. Diamond does weekly liquidation lists (or did before Covid-19) that start every Thursday morning at 11am eastern and run for 2 weeks. Those are progressive sales where normally the discount isn’t great until level 4 or 5, but sometimes they screw up and you will find even level 1 sales that are insane. I have bought $200 statues for $11 net cost of characters that sell easily. But more often, if an item was normally 45% off, the first time they show up on liquidation list they might be 52% off, then the next time they’re 57% off and so on. If they have so much stock that they get to level 6, it’s often 85% off or more.
On the Diamond website, under “Orders” the final two items are Promo Sales and Liquidation Lists. The weekly lists will always be on that bottom tab. They alternate weeks. One week is print. Next week is non-print (t-shirts, statues, etc). Normal promo sales will be on the promo sale tab. This will be things like Diamond’s “Summer Sizzler” and whatnot. Again, well publicized.
The Marvel variant sale is never well publicized. It’s never listed in the promo sales. Marvel sends out a weekly “Marvel Mailer” email and 95% of the time it isn’t even worth reading. It just tells you that this book that used to be due in mid-August is now due in early September, etc. It’s a bunch of updates you usually just don’t care about. But that email is also where they announce these variant sales, and give you a link to them. The link will eventually appear on the Diamond main page as well. Currently if you scroll all the way down to “Special Deals” it’s the second item. But if you wait for it to appear there, the best variants are long gone. There were a bunch of 1 in 200 variants this time and a bunch of scalding hot 1 in 50s and those don’t last long at all. If you scroll back through your emails to last Thursday and find “Marvel Mailer 709” that’s where this sale was announced.
☝️ thanks for the assist for the new retailer. And also, to the new retailer, welcome.
Sleeping beauties is an amazing story too — along with the cool covers — I’m excited to see how they do with bringing it to comics!
Awesome, thanks guys for the info.