Picked up some great back issues this past weekend:
X-Men #6
X-Men #10
You mean the X-Men series that began in 1963? That would be quite a find!
Or do you mean the X-Men series that began in 1991? That would be... rather less impressive.
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I remember in the 1990s researching the background of the X-Men in order to appreciate the later "X-Men" stories. I got the latest issue of Professor Xavier and the X-Men every month for the 18 months it ran. And later I got The Essential Uncanny X-Men which reprinted the first 24 issues. I was surprised to learn at the time that an issue of X-Men - #10 - first introduced Ka-Zar. Somehow, that character seemed more like an "Avengers" kind of thing.
And for that matter, I don't think I realized that the Sub-Mariner was a mutant until I read Professor Xavier and the X-Men #7, which was a retelling of X-Men #6.
Mind blown.
Seriously, this was an original? Not a reprint, or something? If you don't mind me asking, how much did this set you back?
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"Only" 3.5. For the most valuable X-Men issue of all. I can't even think of an exclamation to express my awe. You've been describing the most impressive-sounding comic book collection of any private collector I know. (Okay, admittedly, I don't personally know very many.)
Typically, I would try to think of some talking point about an issue you mentioned. But anyone reading this post who needs an introduction to X-Men #1 must have stumbled upon the wrong thread by accident.
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Yeah, I couldn't believe my luck when I walked in the store a week ago and they showed it to me. As soon as I got home that Saturday I discussed it with my wife. I didn't dare make a purchase like that without her approval. I like breathing and being among the living too much.
Anyway, they held it for me so I could pick it up yesterday.
As soon as I got home that Saturday I discussed it with my wife. I didn't dare make a purchase like that without her approval. I like breathing and being among the living too much.
Yeah, I was wondering what your wife might think.
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Original first edition of 'Superman' comic sells for $9 million, breaking record
HOLY CRAP!!! That's a new record.
And now I'm debating which of my other personal "holy grails" I should ask my store to look out for. Maybe a Detective Comics 225.
I've never seen the first Martian Manhunter story. But in my copy of The Greatest 1950s Stories Ever Told I have a reprint of "Escape to the Stars" from Detective Comics #228 in which John Jones nearly finds a way home, but of course, misses the chance.
Now I'm looking at My Comic Shop and Mile High Comics, and... whoa! I had no idea 225 was so valuable.
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And now I'm debating which of my other personal "holy grails" I should ask my store to look out for. Maybe a Detective Comics 225.I've never seen the first Martian Manhunter story. But in my copy of The Greatest 1950s Stories Ever Told I have a reprint of "Escape to the Stars" from Detective Comics #228 in which John Jones nearly finds a way home, but of course, misses the chance.
Now I'm looking at My Comic Shop and Mile High Comics, and... whoa! I had no idea 225 was so valuable.
Until this past weekend, I was iffy about spending that much….
Yeah, though. The value shocked me as well. I know he’s one of my favorite characters, but didn’t think he was THAT popular.
I know he’s one of my favorite characters, but didn’t think he was THAT popular.
My feelings exactly.
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For roughly twenty years, I've been wanting to read a story that was sitting right there all that time in my bookcase. During this past extended Thanksgivings weekend, I finally read it!
Months ago, on this thread, I mentioned getting some of Roy Thomas' The Savage Sword of Conan material. (Here's a link to that post.) I said maybe one day I would write about it.
So why didn't I? One major reason was that it was too long for me, and I couldn't get through it. It was Volume 19 in the Dark Horse reprints of the original Marvel series, reprinting the Conan stories of Savage Sword issues 191 through 201. Another reason I didn't write about it was that I knew if I did so, I'd feel compelled to ramble on at great length about my history of reading Conan, to explain the reasons I felt I had to get a hold of that volume. I already related that history in this post back in 2016; how could I expect anyone to read that information again? But I want to mention a few little points from that history to set the stage for my more recent reading experiences. And now that I've finally achieved my goal after all these decades, I just HAVE to write about it.
I remember, back in 1992, getting into Conan comics, at first just for inspiration for a fantasy role-playing campaign I was running. I had no idea at the time that I would eventually call Roy Thomas' Conan material my favorite fantasy comic of all time. Every month for almost two years I picked up the latest issue of Conan the Barbarian, The Savage Sword of Conan, and Conan Saga. I also bought many back issues of Conan the Barbarian from my local comic book shop, because Roy Thomas kept dropping these tantalizing hints of past stories that piqued my curiosity. But I eventually lost interest, as I inevitably do with all stories I follow.
In the 2000s, I read a lot of old Conan prose stories, and reflected that no one could give me a sense of CONTINUITY in Conan's life better than Roy Thomas could. Yet I couldn't bear to read my old issues at that point. I felt the need to read the stories that had come before, so I could REALLY experience the continuity. After all, when Thomas wrote Conan the Barbarian from 1970 to 1980, he presented the story in mostly chronological order, relating 10 actual years of Conan's life. I'm not aware that any other writer gave us any period of Conan's history in that kind of detail.
So in the 2010s, I finally did it. Thanks to used copies of Dark Horse's The Chronicles of Conan, my own old issues of Conan Saga, and about 10 back issues of the color comic, I managed to get and read that whole 10-year epic, over the course of many years. I then went on to get a lot of the lesser material from the 1980s. Among other things, I got the first 20 issues of Jim Owsley's run, largely because they included the introduction of the demon Imhotep, who played a major role in The Savage Sword of Conan issues 202 through 206, which I had enjoyed so much back in 1992.
But I found the works of those lesser writers disappointing. I then went on to get every issue Roy Thomas wrote from when he resumed the post - with issue 240, in 1990 - up until the point where my old collection had started. Then I could re-read my old Conan the Barbarian material and look back to the stories that Thomas had referred to. That was great, at first. But as I proceeded, I felt that Thomas' writing was declining, and I stopped re-reading somewhere in the middle of issue 263.
But what about The Savage Sword of Conan? I felt no need to read Thomas' every issue of Savage Sword, which was not chronological... at least, most of it wasn't. I ordered only about half a dozen old issues of Savage Sword and over a dozen issues of Conan Saga that told stories I felt were significant enough to be worth getting. In some cases, I got an issue as a by-the-way. For instance, when I ordered Conan Saga issues 20 and 22 through 27, I happened to throw issue 21 into my order as a kind of a whim, just to fill in that gap, not realizing that I would come to want that 21st issue many years later. I didn't see the significance of the story in that issue at the time, even as I read it. And I was fortunate enough to find - in my local public library - the fifth Dark Horse Savage Sword volume, reprinting Savage Sword issues 49-60, including several stories whose significance WAS obvious to me at the time. And I read a few individual issues of Conan Saga here and a few individual issues of Savage Sword there, but not all of them, because like I said, those series' didn't present a chronological narrative, as the color comic did.
But when Thomas resumed writing Savage Sword in 1990, he actually DID write chronologically, detailing Conan's adventures with the Barachan pirates, after The Gem in the Tower. Back in 1992, when I read about Conan working to rescue his old crew in a five-part story in Savage Sword 202-206, I felt - just like with the color comic - that I was missing out on some fascinating continuity. Who were some of these characters, and what were these past plotlines Thomas referred to? When ordering back issues with my friend, I got Savage Sword #190. Most of the individual issues after that were too rare for me to find, but I planned to get Dark Horse's 19th volume, which would begin with #191.
Yet year after year went by without my ordering that volume, because whenever I looked for a copy, I never found one at a decent price. Finally, a few months ago, I shouted "Oh, to heck with it!" I'd been wanting that book for so long, and it seemed I would never get it at a reasonable price. So I shelled out over $60 for the thing. The only times I can recall ever paying that kind of money for a single book, it was a college textbook.
And as I began reading, I was disappointed to discover that Thomas had droned on for too long in some of those issues. After slogging to the end of issue 195, I decided I couldn't get through the book, and I put it down.
But recently, feeling in the mood for that kind of fantasy, I picked it up again with issue 196. That issue surprised me by referring heavily to Treasure of Tranicos. In this thread, I mentioned that I had Conan Saga issues 26 and 27, with Roy Thomas' adaptation of The Treasure of Tranicos, in
this post in 2022 and in this post in 2023. It's a happy coincidence that I had that story, as I had bought it for completely different reasons. I suddenly realized that I had forgotten a lot of that story - which was written much earlier although it took place later chronologically - so I dug it up and read it a second time, before picking up 196 from where I had left off.
Issue 196 showed Conan's first meeting with Strombanni, with Black Zarano, and - surprise! - even with Valeria. I had always wondered what Conan's first meeting with Valeria was like.
And so I got re-hooked, and stuck with that volume until I - FINALLY! - caught up to where I had started back in 1992! At last, I could - and did - re-read the letters pages in the Savage Sword issues numbering in the 200s, which talked about the issues in the 190s, this time understanding what those letters were talking about! And I could re-read the second Imhotep saga, the "City of Magicians" story from issues 202-206. I was astonished at how much of that story I had forgotten in the thirty years since I had last read it. And as I re-read that story, I kept taking detours to re-read other stories that "City of Magicians" referred to, and whose details I had forgotten, including "The Snout in the Dark" (Conan the Barbarian issues 106-107), "The Horror from the Red Tower" (from the copy I just happened to get of Conan Saga #21), and the particularly relevant excerpts of the first "Imhotep" story (which I mentioned earlier, in Conan the Barbarian issues 179-185). With all this cross-referencing, I can no longer be the young, wide-eyed reader I was in 1992. Now I'm bogged down with chasing down references and taking long asides, so my progress was slow. Reading this way has been a very different experience.
And although I had my doubts sometimes, I now feel it was totally worth the effort!
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Bought a big stack of back issues today. Most of them were in the $3-4 range. One was a bit more, but only because it had a Liefeld cover. The stack covered several series: 80s/90s Justice League, Mister Miracle Volume 2, Namor the Sub-Mariner, Sandman, Wolverine. Not as many as I’d like, but more than I hoped for.
I'm curious. Which Justice League series - or series' - are you talking about? The long-running Justice League of America that ended in 1987? The Justice League series that ran from 1987 to 1996 (sometimes calling itself Justice League International and sometimes Justice League America)? Justice League Europe? The JLA that started in 1997? Or maybe even that series' prequel, A Midsummer's Nightmare?
I remember going to my friend's house and reading the first few dozen issues of that series. A few years later - still going to my friend's house - I re-read the first dozen or so issues. That book had its charms...
...but on the other hand, it wasn't the LEAGUE. Years after that, in a bookstore, I saw trade paperbacks reprinting the series that had started in 1997. I goggled at the sight. The league was the LEAGUE again! I bought several of those trade paperbacks and read them many times each. And when my kids came of age, I read them some of those paperbacks, to teach them what the Justice League is.
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Yes. That run had it's charms, but was far too often played more for humor. It had it's moments, but there are other runs I prefer far more.
I still think that Grant Morrison's run was one of the best things he ever did. His Darkseid story from Rock of Ages (JLA #14), narrated by the Black Racer, is one of my all-time favorite single issues of a comic.
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And I just put in an order at mycomicshop.com for some books to fill in those gaps:
Lucifer #62 (from the Sandman universe)
X-Force #74 (first series)
Starman #41 (Will Payton)
Question #6 (from the 2004 Veitch series)
Metamorpho #'s 2-4 (from the 1993 mini-series)
Shadow of the Bat #1-4 (I'm missing a good bit more, but wanted those first four)
Oddly enough, the most expensive one was the Starman, at $5.60. All except the Shadow of the Bats will finish off some series for me.