Journey Into Mystery...and beyond

Thor has always been somewhat of an odd duck in the Marvel stable...great art, great stories, possibly the strongest hero in the Marvel Universe, but virtually unknown to the general public.

Up to a few months ago, only comic book fans would have known that the Norse god of thunder is also a regular Marvel character...and that he tends to speak in Shakespearean English. I guess it was just a step too far, people could suspend their disbelief and accept an angry guy turning green and hulking up, a rich inventor and AA-club member making a 21st century armor and even a guy getting bitten by a radioactive spider...but a 1000 year old mythical Asgardian god that comes to Earth and sounds like Macbeth or even Hamlet...nah that just wouldn't fly.

So for nearly 50 years, The Mighty Thor, to use his full name has been a b-player at best. Which is a shame because there are some very nice books in the series. Most of the top artists and writers loved to work on Thor as there were almost no boundaries. Space adventures, magic, mythical legends, down to earth rough and tumble with the Avengers...it's all happening for Goldilocks. Jack Kirby has even gone on record to say that Journey into Mystery was his favorite series to work on. You can't really get higher praise than that.

So anyway, as most of you know Marvel will be releasing the Thor movie in 2011 and this could very well propel Thor into the limelight and the public eye.
Even if the movie flops, the ad campaigns will reach into every household and hopefully people will finally understand what it really means when it's Hammer Time.

For me it will be a welcome relief as I have tried to get people to start reading Thor (any time period) but almost nobody does...so to get the ball rolling so to speak I've made a little video of the very first Thor covers/comics, when the series was still called Journey into Mystery.I managed to complete Journey into Mystery #83 up to Thor #400 a few years ago and still haven't read them all..but I just might start on them in the coming weeks.

The video on this page is only the TRAILER, if you want to view the full video (and you know you want to) just go to my Youtube channel : ---> Thor's Journey into Mystery full video. Oh and watch it in 480p for more details.

Trailer :

What to collect.

I’ve never collected for financial gain, never considered myself a “comic-investor” or bought multiple copies of a hot new book with the intent of selling them. But realistically almost every GA/SA/BA collector does a little speculating and is hoping his collection will go up in value. Of course what a lot of people seem to forget is that if your collection goes up in value so do the books you still want, and you end up paying more for the books on your want list.

But it’s a lot of fun (and for most also part of the attraction) that if you collect carefully and make informed decisions, you stand a good chance of at least not losing money. In fact a lot of comic collectors use this as an excuse when a wife/girlfriend/friend keeps hammering on how much money they spend on “funny books”. The de facto reply is almost always “yes but this book will be worth x-amount in y-amount of time” or “If I go down the pub every night the money is gone as well and now at least I have something to show for it”

So it’s not surprising that most questions and queries I get, both here and on my Youtube video channel is what books to buy and how much I paid for a certain book. Now as a rule I never divulge how much I paid for a certain book…that’s my prerogative and it’s nobody else’s business. If I get a book way below market value and I post the price, it almost seems like bragging and laughing in the face of the guy that sold it to me…which I think is very uncouth. Also if I paid a significant amount of money I don’t want to be avalanched by mails and messages telling me I could have gotten a small car or end world famine for that price.
Again, it’s my money and mine to play with.

But I’m always very happy to help people that start collecting or are narrowing their focus on what books to get. The general rule is and will always be “collect what you like”. Get the comics you love, the ones that ring your bell or transport you back to Nostalgia Road and don’t put possible future appreciation as your number one goal. Sure it’s sweet when your comic increases in value but if you buy it to never look at it and just keep it in a safe somewhere for 5 years and then proceed to sell it off…then think about investing in gold.
It’s the same low-thrill hobby and you’ll probably do better in the long run.

So, OK you LOVE Silver Age comics and want to start buying and will love the comics for ever…so where do you go from here ?
Well there are two trains of thought here. A lot of people will tell you to always buy the highest grade possible as these will appreciate the quickest and the most. Well these people are 100% correct, but most comic fans I know would rather have 3 nice mid-grade books for the price of one high-grade book. So if you are only interested in high grade books the following advice is not for you.

Congratulations, you’ve made it this far, this means you are ready to buy low to mid-grade books that are fun to own/collect and have a chance of making you some money.
Well for starters you can not go wrong with very early Marvel Silver Age, especially the “Big Two”…Amazing Spider-man and Fantastic Four. Most collectors will always be interested in the first 20 issues (at least) of these wonderful series. They are the cornerstone of the Marvel Universe and are riddled with keys. If you do not overpay then you will make a profit down the road as these keep going up year after year.
Some do it slowly but surely, others take huge jumps at a time (Amazing Fantasy #15).


In fact it will be much easier to unload three or four books in the 2.0 range than one book in the 5.0 range. There are still a lot of collectors out there who want to own a certain book and don’t really care about grade. So low grade books are perfect for 90% of the collectors that just want to build a collection and don’t want to mortgage the house to buy certain issues.

Stay tuned for part 2 next week.

Amazing Fantasy #15 ...part 2

One of the questions I get asked most of all is if I have a copy of Amazing Fantasy #15. Now matter how many thousands of books I show, no matter how many keys I lay out,it always comes down to the KING of Marvel Silver Age books...AF #15 the very first Spider-man.

It's hasn't been an easy question...sure the answer was easy (a firm "no !") but there was so much baggage associated with this question that I could never just answer with a one-syllable reply. You see I USED to own a copy...which was my pride and joy and which cost me an arm and a leg...but something happened to that book... I accidentally tore it apart while reading.
I'm not going over the entire story again, armchair critics, rubberneckers and people who identify with "Nelson" of the Simpsons can read it here : My own personal AF 15 horror story.
The story did have a somewhat happy ending... I had the book professionally restored and I traded it with a friend for a page of original art. We were both very happy with the deal...but I didn't have a copy of Amazing Fantasy #15 anymore.

So why am I revisiting old ghosts ? Well for the next 2 1/2 years I kept looking at the AF #15s for sale, I saw the prices rise and rise each year and saw the chances of me getting another shrink with each passing Heritage or Comiclink auction. And still the question kept coming, both here and on my Youtube comics channel "Do you have an Amazing Fantasy #15"..stinging every time.

When 2009 rolled around I made a decision, come hell or high water I would get a copy this year. I tried to get at least 10 copies that year, but all went for far too much money or just weren't the "right" copy for me. But just when I thought it was all for the birds, I "found" the perfect book just after Xmas. It was about $500 more than my absolute max I wanted to pay, but sticking to my very rigid maximum price had gotten me nearly three years of frustration and empty hands..so I went for it.

Cutting it very close, but by some small miracle I managed to get myself a new copy of the biggest Marvel key, days before the end of the year. In hindsight I don't think I overpaid, book looks fantastic in hand and is by far the best looking book (in grade) that I have seen over the past years (and believe me I saw a LOT of them).
That the book is completely without Marvel Chipping and has OW/White pages is another big bonus.

Nothing left for me to say now, just let the picture do the talking.





And if you are in the mood for a Marvel Silver Age Keys smorgasbord, then take a look at my latest video, featuring, among other illustrious company, the above book.
And before people start mailing me again that the videos are way too small, I agree ...I agree, that's why if you click on the video or just Click here and put it up at 720p (HD picture)

Grey day

Why is it that most of of my rants and raves seem to center about that most lovable of Green Giants, your friendly neighborhood Hulk. I've already bored you how I completed Hulk #102 - #570 and how I'm very close in completing the Hulk run of Tales to Astonish...but the real mother-lode are of course the first 6 Silver Age Issues.

I bought issue #3 about two months ago from my good friend Andy Nutella at Golden Age Collectibles and that sparked me on to get the other 5. Being early Silver Age they are alas not that easy to find or really affordable, so I had to move some things around. Especially issue #1 was a pain in the neck. It's by far the hardest Silver Age key to track down. I'm in the middle of trading one of my original art pages and soon the deal should be done.
It's not as expensive yet as Amazing Fantasy #15 or Fantastic Four #1 but it's far far rarer. The reason for this is of course that it didn't sell so well when Hulk #1 was released in May 1962.

In the first issue, the Hulk was gray because Stan Lee wanted a color that did not suggest any particular ethnic group. Stan Goldberg the colorist had problems with the grey (or gray) coloring, resulting in different shades of gray, and even green. After seeing the first published issue, Lee chose to change the skin color to green.

The original series was canceled with issue #6 (March 1963) due to low sales.A bit surprising as Marvel had put the top team on the book. Stan Lee had written each story, with Jack Kirby penciling the first five issues and Steve Ditko penciling and inking the sixth. Still the character didn't appeal to kids and the book was no more.

Stan Lee, never one to doubt himself, was convinced the Hulk was a viable character and the character immediately guest-starred in most of the more popular comics and months later became a founding member of the Avengers.

A year and a half after the series was canceled, the Hulk became one of two features in Tales to Astonish in issue #60 (Oct. 1964).Kirby and Lee realized their character had found an audience in college-age readers. Stan has always stated he wrote the Hulk for a more mature reader and not for the kiddies that wanted a monster-mash-up.
In fact the real "star" of the book has more often than not been Bruce Banner and not the Hulk.

Would that the original series had simply continued, for those first six issues represent some of the most amazing comics to come out of the Silver Age. During the initial run, the Hulk played as more of a Mr. Hyde to Bruce Banner's Dr. Jekyll, and Banner's noble struggle to control his darker side drove a powerful tale of regret and redemption, gorgeously illustrated by Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko. As with Mr. Hyde, the Hulk possessed much of his alter ego's intellect, and actively schemed against his better half to ensure his survival.

It was only later that the Hulk was "dumbed down" a sad predicament that took almost 25 years and Peter David to rectify. Peter David also turned the Hulk back to his original grey colour during his 12-year tenure on the book.So there you have it, a nice little grey-to-green and back again history lesson. Only thing that remains now are the scans of the 6 books I just picked up.
If you want more info (and visuals !!) on the Hulk books and Tales to Astonish in particular then feel free to visit my Youtube channel as I have a new video up on this very subject (and watch it in HD). Chromiumcomics Youtube Channel

Strange Days

Most people I know who start collection series or long runs almost always go for the "big" titles, Spider-man, X-men, Fantastic Four etc...Typically the very last titles to be collected are series like Tales To Astonish and Strange Tales.

I have to plead guilty as well as both are the very last Marvel Superhero titles I still need to collect/complete. Although I should say "needed" as I just completed the Super-hero run of Strange Tales.

A nice benefit of collecting these titles is that they are cheap compared to the flagship titles. You can buy books that were on the stand at the same time as Spider-man #1 for a fraction of the price and most of the Silver Age books have very cool retro covers. Stories and art may not always be of a high quality, but let's be honest, a lot of "bigger" Silver Age books aren't exactly works of art either.

The reason why I never really got into collecting Strange Tales before was mainly because I didn't really know the series, and like all things, unknown is unloved. Sure I knew that it was fabled for the first Dr Strange stories where Ditko did amazing work and that Steranko did some wonderful things with Nick Fury and SHIELD, but still it remained on the back burner and I only starting collecting them because there was almost nothing else left to collect. But let's make it loud and clear...I was wrong. This is a wonderful series and I should have started on it much, much earlier.

Strange Tales ran 168 issues, from June 1951 to May 1968. It began as a horror anthology in the vain of the very popular EC line of comics, but with the 1954 imposition of the Comics Code, which prohibited graphic horror, it became a more sci-fi oriented comic seemingly featuring a different monster every month.

The anthology switched to superheroes in the very early 60's, retaining the sci-fi, suspense and monsters as backup features for a time. Strange Tales' first superhero, in 12- to 14-page stories, was the Fantastic Four's Human Torch, Johnny Storm, beginning in #101 (Oct. 1962).

But the real magic started with #110...with the introduction of sorcerer Doctor Strange, by Stan Lee Steve Ditko. So this means that Strange Tales #110 is one of the major Marvel key books...first Dr Strange, maybe the only key book where the most important character doesn't even appear on the cover. Very humble beginnings for the Sorcerer Supreme. For many people these issues were Ditko's best work.

Here's Marvel's most understated KEY book ...Strange Tales #110 First Dr Strange.


But there's more...Another giant of comicdom would use Strange Tales as a launching pad, The Human Torch had already been replaced in #135 (Aug. 1965) by Nick Fury, agent of SHIELD.The 12-page feature was initially by Lee and Kirby but soon was taken over writer-penciler-colorist Jim Steranko, under whom it became one of the
ultimate works of the Silver Age. Steranko introduced or popularized in comics such art movements of the day as psychedelia and pop art.





Issue #168 was the last issue in the then series,Dr Strange got his own mag, continuing the numbering (Dr Strange #169) and Steranko took Nick Fury to dizzy heights in the self-named series.

This was the fastest series I ever put together,took me only a few months,but I was pretty lucky. Got all the Fury books from the same seller and most of the #101 - 152 books I got from an original owner collection.
Still needed 9 books missing, the #101 & #102 I won on eBay and the others I managed to snag at Heritage. Alas I don't have all of them in hand at the moment, but I'll pick them up next month when I'm in the US.

Think outside the box

Getting comics halfway across the globe is both an exciting and a maddening experience. Sure you enjoy the anticipation of waiting and hoping this will be the day your little box of treasures arrive. But at the same time you get disappointed if it doesn't arrive on the expected date and you hope and pray it arrives at all...preferably intact.

But as I'm geographically challenged there is no way around, this and my gargantuan yearly shipping bill are the darker sides of collection, but once the box arrives, everything is right in the world again and I temporarily forget all the woes and focus instead on the wonders.

The last 2 weeks I was on pins and needles as I was expecting a rather important package and because of all the non-working days due to Easter, it was stuck in transit somewhere. To make matters worse, it got stuck in customs as well. My friendly neighborhood customs official opened the box, even though the value was below the import-duty threshold. Once he opened and inspected the box he came to the conclusion I didn't have to pay duty or tax and all forms were filled in correctly. But I still had to pay $15 to get my box back, because he had inspected it and all inspected packages carry a $15.00 cost... I have given up trying to understand the logic in all of this.

But once the package was finally delivered I focused on the contents and got that stupid grin again. This time the box wasn't as filled as previous boxes, but it did hold some key books.

I made yet another video showing all the goodies, let me know if you get tired of all these vids and want me to post pics again. I filmed it this time as I seem to get a lot more reaction to vids than to pics, I guess that's Youtube for you.

Here goes...



If you really don't care for videos and want to see which keys I'm talking about (yeah go ahead and spoil the surprise) you can click HERE to see a pic of the two keys (but the vid is cooler)

Oh and as always you can check out the videos in higher resolution directly through my Youtube page Chromiumcomics Youtube page

Goodie Bag

Well for those who thought I'd fallen of the face of the earth, no such luck. I've still been buying and even selling a bit, but all my purchases of the last 3 months have been safely stored in the good old US of A.


But not anymore as I received another of those glorious Priority boxes with all my stuff...alas no video this time, but I did make a group picture and will discuss some of the books in more detail.

Here's a group-shot of the 15 books, just click on it for a larger view.



Now, from the pic you can see that it's all Silver Age or keys and yes some of those books are duplicates. I find that now when my collection is near completion, there are a number of books I like buy in multiple copies. Don't ask me why, I just do. On the one had I buy them to trade or to resell, but to be honest I hardly ever take the effort of listing stuff anymore...if someone wants a book I have multiple copies of, sure I'll sell them, but "push" them on an auction site or large market ? Naah, maybe tomorrow.

First bunch are the JIMs. Thor has always been of the less popular Marvel Heroes, but I've always like him, especially the Kirby issues. Once I finished my Thor series, I decided to go for the older Journey into Mystery books. First Thor of course was in JIM #83 and the series went on till issue #125. With these three issues I'm getting close in completing the series as well. Bought a very nice copy of #83 last year and with these three in the bank I now only need issues #84,#91,#92 & #93 ... which I should get this year.
Again click on the thumbnails for a bigger pic






The three Fantastic Four books are upgrades, I completed the entire series from #1 - #525 about two years ago (or is it 3 already ?) and wanted to get higher graded copies of some of the issues when all was finished. And you can't go wrong with those classic 48/49 issues...first Silver Surfer, first Galactus..what's not to miss. Plus I've always loved the cover to #49...very hard to get a decent looking copy due to the black inks.





More to come later.

Read all about it

You know we internet aficionados have it easy in this day and age when we want to talk about our comic books. It doesn't matter where you live or how socially inept you are, you will easily find someone who shares your viewpoint on a certain book, character or storyline.

Finding someone to argue with about those particular subjects is even easier. We have chat-room, internet forums, newsgroups and the really weird can even start their own blog to ram their views down the world's throat.

Back in the day the only medium available to fans was the letters column in the back of the comics. Most of the comics had one or two pages of "letters of comments". In the beginning these were just your standard "I hate" or "I love" letters but slowly reader participation increased and it became a valid means for creators to get feedback from their adoring (or not so adoring) fans. And let's not forget it was THE place for comic fans to "meet" likeminded people. You have to remember that at the time, they were publishing full addresses and fans started writing each other.

When people ask me why I stubbornly read my Silver Age comics (and not keep them slabbed) instead of the reprints that I also own, I point them to the letters pages, the ads, the editorials..for me they are an integral part of the whole comic book experience and they give me a very cool wormhole into the past and into the mindset of your average comic reader of the 60's.
But what really gets my rocks off is when I stumble onto an old fan-letter written by a fan/kid who later turned into a Marvel/DC mainstay. A lot of famous artists, editors and writers got their first taste of comic publishing when their letter was printed in "Avengers Assemble!" (Avengers), "Letters to the Living Legend," (Captain America), "Spider's Web" (Amazing Spider-Man), or "X-Mail," (Uncanny X-Men).

This week I was reading the first 20 or so issues of Fantastic Four and I was pleasantly surprised how many "names" were scattered all over the letters pages and I thought I'd share a few with you.

Uncanny X-men and Legion of Super-heroes legend, the late great Dave Cockrum was a very avid comic fan and letterhack back at the very beginning of the Marvel Age.
Dave was a young sailor in the US navy and wrote a lot of letters to Amazing Spider-man, Avengers and Fantastic Four.

In fact Dave met and married his first wife through the letter page of Fantastic Four #34. She read the letter and became interested because he was a sailor and a comic fan. Dave and her exchanged letters, met up and got married !

Anyway here's a scan of an earlier letter Dave Cockrum sent in to Fantastic Four #22 from January 1964. Don't you just love it how Dave criticizes the inking on the X-men books.
Enjoy !

Truth or Dare

Sometimes the life of the collector is filled with obstacles, the books you are looking for aren't showing up.Or worse, they do become available but you can't afford them. Stuff gets lost in the mail and those NM comics you just bought turn out to be VGs.
But sometimes there is a nice problem to have ; where do I go next ?

In the beginning it's easy...you have nothing and you want everything. But then you come to a point where you have almost everything you want or can afford.
One avenue to take of course it to stop collecting (yeah right) and the other is to look in places previously disregarded. And this time I looked at Daredevil. It might sound strange, but before this month I had never bought a single DD comic, and the only ones I had ever read was the Frank Miller run in those Marvel trades. I'm ashamed to admit that I own the Marvel Masterwork reprinting the first ten issues, but have never taken it out of the plastic wrapper...and honestly I don't know why.

I can't be because I don't like the series as it's totally unknown to me. Even after watching the movie I had no desire whatsoever to start collecting the title at all. But about a month ago somebody sent me a bunch of comics and included a free Silver Age Daredevil comic. Now because I'm a bit weird when this happens I normally give the comic away as I only want complete series or long arcs and single comics frighten the life out of me. The other option is to actively start collecting the series. So I sat down and read the book...and liked it. I then took a look at some of the covers in the run and liked them even more. So I've now decided to start collecting Daredevil.







I'm shooting for Daredevil #1 - #100 and I'll see how long it will take me. Once I have all of them I'll read them back to back and hopefully enjoy them.
What's the worse that can happen ? If it's really not my cup of tea I'll just sell them on and hopefully make someone else happy in getting the complete Silver Age Daredevil without having to do all the work.

The ones that get away...

The old adage "lose some, win some" seems to have been invented for online auctions. It's the nature of the best, nobody expects to win all the stuff they bid on (thank god) but now and then you can get lucky. I'll ramble on a bit today about the other side of the coin, the stuff I didn't win and which in hindsight should have turned out differently.

Like a lot of online-buyers I'm guilty on lowballing a lot of auctions. You see an item for sale that you wouldn't mind owning and you bid (or snipe) a really low amount. Very well knowing you have 99,9% of losing, but hey you might get lucky, everybody else might forget about it, some freak electrical storm might render all PCs (except yours) inoperative and you end up winning a $500 for $62.86 (the 0,01% at work). Ok, I know this never happens...I know people that bid on 100s of auctions each week using this method and I've never heard of somebody getting a super deal this way, sure you might get books way below market value if you are tenacious enough, but that's about it.

No, what I would like to talk about is missing something you really wanted (you really, really wanted) by a few dollars and not being able to put it out of your mind for weeks. (if I only had bid more, if I only had...). I work with "want-lists". One for my comic collection and one for my original art collection and try not to buy anything that isn't on one of those lists and I have a set rule, I only offer/bid/pay a certain percentage of guide and always stick to it. If I don't get it then the only reason is that it went for more than I was willing to part with, and I'm fine with that.
But I also have a few "grail" pieces, books or art that I just NEED to have (just like air, water and Cadbury Cream Eggs) or my life will have been a wasted one. Once I have a chance to go for one of these pieces, I throw all caution to the wind, lock all my common sense in a little velvet box and let emotion take over and bid, bid, bid.

But sometimes there are higher forces at work and you still don't get what need.

Probably at the top of my comics grail list is a nice low-grade Amazing Fantasy #15. I traded my copy last year and the wound just won't stop bleeding and then only thing that will make me healthy again is a new copy. Alas prices have shot up at 15% for low grade copies (even higher for mid graders), which means the $2500 copy will now almost cost you $3000. So finding the perfect book at the right price is getting harder and harder.

All my key books have been bought under the same circumstance, I go for lower graded CGC'ed books that look better than the technical grade. What I mean by this is that I go for books that have defects that don't jump out at you. Books where the main damage is on the back cover and not the front cover, books that take minutes of studying before you catch the blemishes. I'd rather have a 2.5 book with a bigger piece missing from the back (or from the first page) than a 3.0 book with three little pieces missing from the front cover.

These are not easy to find books, especially since I'm after off-white to white pages. So check all the major dealers and auctions sites every day. Two weeks ago I thought my quest for the grail had come to an end (sound of clapping coconut shells slowly fading) as I saw a 2.5 Amazing Fantasy with OW/W pages up for sale. Front cover looked a lot better than the grade, almost no Marvel chipping and a little moisture damage on the back cover, my ideal book.
The seller wanted $3000 which was a bit steep, so I took a chance and offered a lowball offer of $2200 (yes, I am a cheap bastard sometimes). Less than an hour later he countered with an asking price of $2800..I went to sleep thinking about the offer and when I woke up the seller had sent me a second offer of $2600. Now in hindsight I should have taken it, it was a decent price for a rare book, but I was thinking that the seller probably wanted to sell it fast judging by the speed of his counteroffers so I re-counteroffered (is that even a word ?) with $2400...Now I was pretty sure the seller would split the difference and come back to me with $2500...well he doesn't and counters with $2550. So my turn again and this time I offer $2500, now I was sure he would go for this price, if you follow the back-and-forth on this you see it leading to this price. Trouble is that it was getting later, so I went to bed, expecting an acceptance of my offer when I woke up. No such luck, sometime during the night the seller got back to me with $2525...read it again $2525 ??? What a weird price. So I wake up and see I have a few emails, the first one is his $2525 offer, I said to myself, "ok, I'll accept it, don't want to fight over $25" and then I saw a second mail, sent three hours after the first one...retracting his offer of $2525...and then a third mail saying the item was sold for $2600...WTF ?
Looks like while he was waiting for my reaction to the $2525 (I was sleeping !) somebody else offered him $2600 and he took it...Aaaaaaargh.
Now if he had accepted the $2500 the auction would have ended and we would have set up the deal...or if I had decided not to sleep that night I would have been mine for a lousy $25 more.

Moral of the story, don't try and squeeze the lemon until there is no juice left anymore...oh and don't go to bed...ever

Keys leaving Home

First of all my apologies to The Beatles for the that terrible pun on one of their finer songs..but I've been sick and lost a lot of braincells and basically it's a miracle I could come up with that one. And with that you know the reason why it took so long for me to write the end to the previous blog...flue, the human kind. But I'm back now and I hope you are too.

Anyway as stated previously I traded my Amazing Fantasy #15 + my X-men #1 for something else, now what's worth about the same as these two keys ? (And probably worth more to me or I wouldn't have traded) ? Tough one ! Not a lot actually. Sure there are more valuable books, but these (Detective Comics #27, Action #1) are worth about 20 to 50 times as much...and nobody is going to give me that.
I couldn't think of any other Silver Age book (or a combo) either..so don't feel bad. But I never said I traded it for a book right ?
Both books went to a good friend and fellow collector who gave me this in return :

Yes, an original Watchmen page. I feel very privileged and lucky to get my hands on this as they are impossible to get. Not a lot of pages about and those who have them usually hang on to them.
Always wanted a Watchmen page with both Ozymandias and Rorschach, and not a lot of those around. Happy I was able to pick up this page which features 3 of the main protagonists (Ozy, Rorschach and Nite-Owl ). Now this might sound strange and even a bit pretentious, but a Watchmen page is not my grail piece like the AF #15 was. But too much had happened with my copy and it would always bring back some unpleasant memories and obtaining a Watchmen page was a once in a lifetime chance especially for one living so far from the rest of the collecting community.

When I got home with my page the first thing I did was go to my HC shelve and slide out my Absolute Edition of Watchmen. I bought this when it first came out and it had remained unread and still shrink wrapped (hey they go up in value and these command a premium don't you know) as I used my TPB copy to read the story.
I removed the shrinkwrap and opened the oversized HC. I flipped to the page I now owned and a warm sense of joy (or maybe capitalism ?) came over me as I now fully realized that I was the only one in the world who owned of this particular page of this masterwork. I then started reading the series again, probably for the 8th time in the last decade and fell in love with it all over again. Damn fine book, damn fine page.

One is the magic number

Short and sweet entry this time. Just wanted to share this picture with you. Last week I pulled my Silver Age number 1s for a photo op.
Why I did it I'll explain later, but at the moment I just want you to take a look at the pic and look at the number 1s...and think about when #1 isn't #1. Confused ? Read on.

I put my nine most important (Silver Age) first issues in the picture, but only 6 of them have a #1 on the cover...but I assure you they are all "first issues". So what's up .
Well Fantastic Four #1, Avengers #1 Amazing Spider-man #1, Iron Man #1, X-men #1 and Silver Surfer #1 are self explanatory, but what about Amazing Fantasy #15...why does this Marvel Uber key carry the number #15 ? Well because it was the 15th issue in the series that spotlighted various new heroes/concepts and nobody had any idea that this Spider-man character would stick. Well he did and because of this we are stuck with this strangely numbered issue as the first Spider-man issue.

And what about Hulk #102...In 1964 the Hulk became the backup feature in Tales to Astonish (sharing the book with Giant-Man) and when in 1968 Marvel finally was able to renegotiate their distribution deal they seized the opportunity to expand their monthly titles and gave the Hulk his own book.
Tales to Astonish had run tot #101, so it seemed logical to continue the numbering on the first Hulk issue and so it came to be that the first issue of Hulk V2 was issue #102

Same thing with Captain America. Tales of Suspense had run to issue #99 when in 1968 Marvel could finally give both heroes (Cap and Iron Man) their own books. Cap continued the TOS numbering and started at #100. For some reason they didn't follow this logic with Iron Man and the first Iron Man issue got a #1 on its cover. But it could have easily (and logically) been #100 as well.

But why did I pull the issues and take the pic ? Why now ? Well mainly because this is the last time these books were all in my possession Two of the books in the pic have left my collection. I no longer own Amazing Fantasy #15 or X-men #1. I didn't sell them, I didn't lose them and they didn't get stolen. Nothing like that...I traded them.
To find out why I was prepared to do away with these two super keys, and more importantly what I got in trade...tune in next week

Slated for cancellation

When I finished collecting the Amazing Spider-man series a few months ago, the most asked question I got (apart from "how much did it cost") was "Will you be getting Amazing Fantasy #15". At that time I couldn't really answer it because well, in my mind I had completed the task and more importantly AF15 was and is the most expensive Marvel book.

But after a few months I decided to see if I could swing it, I knew it was going to be expensive, but I planned on not buying too many books this year and maybe, just maybe I would then be able to get an AF15 at Christmas, just like the Christmases before when I got Avengers #1, FF#1 and finally ASM #1 respectively.

Next to the price, availability was a problem too, not too many of these books around, Spider-man #1 isn't that common, but there are at least 3x the amount of that book floating around compared to Amazing Fantasy #15.

A third problem was the condition of the book. I've always tried to buy expensive books that look better than the given grade. Maybe hard to understand, but let me give you an example. A book can look like a VG (4.0) but has a water stain on the back cover that takes the book down to a GOOD (2.0). The water stain is there, it lowers the grade, but it's a defect that isn't too bad aesthetically and it's on the back cover. Trouble is that a lot of low and mid-grade copies of AF#15 have Marvel chipping ("A bindery (trimming/cutting) defect that causes a series of chips and tears at the top, bottom, and right edge of the cover. This is caused where the cutting blade of an industrial paper trimmer becomes dull. Dubbed "Marvel chipping" because it can occur quite often with that company's comics from the late 50s and early 60s")
And as Marvel chipping is considered a factory defect it doesn't factor in to the grade of mid-grade books. Thus you can buy a 4.0 book that looks like a 2.0...quite the opposite of what I want.

Take a look at this AF with the very common Marvel chipping...


So things didn't look to good, but I had originally planned to start looking for a nice one around Winter 2007 with the intent of getting one as a Xmas present to myself...but an opportunity arose and I couldn't turn it down.



I got this copy from a fellow collector by accident really (no seriously, read on). He never put the AF15 on sale, but I was close to buying his Hulk #1...we went back and forth for a while and I told him I didn't really want to buy it as it would mean taking money out of my AF15 kitty...2 minutes later he told me he had an AF15 as well and if I was interested he would sell it to me.
Ten minutes later I had bought it...It was exactly the book I wanted, a 3.0 that looked better than the grade, almost no Marvel chipping and a fair price. Granted it was more money than I had ever spent on a comic book,and it was half a year too early but this is THE Marvel key after all. For me it's still FF#1...but for most comic collectors the first appearance of Spider-man is the holy grail

And to think the Amazing Fantasy series was slated for cancellation and issue #15 was the final one. Because it was the final issue, nobody really cared what was going to be in it. With nothing to lose, publisher Martin Goodman allowed Stan Lee to experiment with a new kind of superhero — one who would be a teenager, but not a sidekick, and who would have everyman doubts, neuroses and money problems...
This "far-out" idea proved to be golden and gave birth to Marvel's flagship title...Amazing Spider-man...which only started a long (especially for the fans who had a taste of Spidey in AF15 and wanted to read more) 6 months after Amazing Fantasy #15 was issued, sold a boatload of copies and got the most letters from readers in years.
Now let's just hope the success of the the third Spider-man movie that came out this week will make my copy of AF#15 even more valuable