There are a handful of covers published over the years that have become famous for innuendo or highly suggestive text (the most famous being Betty and Me #16 where Archie said he had to "beat off" three other guys).
First of all, even though these are often reference as having a "Controversial Cover," I must wonder if that is the correct label for these. Perhaps "Innuendo Cover" would be better.?
Here's a few of the KEY COMICS:
Archie #271 (June 1978) Major Key: Controversial "Pearl Necklace" Cover Even a low-grade copy of this book goes for $50-$70, and high grades go for more. This is probably the second-most infamous cover from Archie comics (the first being the above-mentioned Betty and Me #16). Link: https://www.comics.org/issue/105852/
Archie #511 (Aug 2001) Major Key" Controversial "In the pink" cover Probably the 3rd most-famous innuendo cover. Link: https://www.comics.org/issue/238442/
Archie Comics #55 (March-April 1952) Minor Key: Controversial Cover Mr. Lodge asks an innuendo question: "Did Archie get there yet?" Link: https://www.comics.org/issue/105636/
Archie Comics #78 (Jan-Feb 1956) Minor Key: Controversial Cover Archie is talking to betty and says he wants to "feel the clutch." Not as famous as the others, but it still gets higher prices than surrounding issues. Link: https://www.comics.org/issue/105659/
Archie... Archie Andrews Where Are You? Comics Digest Magazine #111 (Sept 1997) Minor Key: Controversial Cover Betty tells Archie to "Watch out for a big hole around here." Link: https://www.comics.org/issue/293921/
Betty #8 (Sept1993) Major Key: Famous Bikini Cover Not as famous as some of the other covers, but this one brings a premium price in the hundreds of dollars. Link: https://www.comics.org/issue/213444/
Betty and Me #37 (Sept 1971) Minor Key: Controversial Cover Betty says, "Yes, Archie -- You're rubbing me the right way." Link: https://www.comics.org/issue/221897/
Betty and Me #40 (Feb 1971) Major Key: Controversial Story In this issue, Archie and Betty fall in a lake and are forced to rent a cabin together; they are soaking wet so Archie orders Betty to "Take your clothes off!" They spend the night innocently wrapped in towels, but their parents are naturally furious. FAMOUS story and has only been reprinted once. Link: https://www.comics.org/issue/221900/
Betty and Me #136 (Nov 1983) Minor Key: Controversial Cover Has some notoriety because Betty is in her underwear standing on scale. Some readers were ticked off because it was body shaming her, others thought it was risque for showing her in her underwear on the cover. Link: https://www.comics.org/issue/221996/
It's time for witches to fly and the dead to rise!
Let the wind blow, let the mad seethe,
The time has come for the dead to breathe!
It's HALLOWEEN, folks! Time to get your scare on! Especially if you're from Riverdale and wander into my front yard and drink in this scene of terror!
Yeah, that's all-American boy Archie Andrews battling his former best-pal Jughead Jones.
And yes, these are life-size figures in my front yard, illuminated by black light.
Machete-in-hand, Archie will avenge the fallen members of his gang.
Hot Dog is just looking for a bone to gnaw...
Even the rotten shall fall to Juggie's inhuman hunger! I guess there's just no accounting for taste!
Most of the scene is illuminated by some SERIOUS black light (I'm not kidding, my last year I needed 7 black lights to light up this scene, but my new 36W black light spotlight is so powerful that it handles almost all of the power. I am using it and only one small 10W bulb as a fill-light for Archie's britches.
There are also night lights inside the masks. And a small misting of orange florescent paint on Archie's mask and hands to make them illuminate in the UV lighting. Until I added that (and the three night lights in Archie's head), he wasn't showing up at night (and since tick-or-treat is after dark, that's very important.
This year, to celebrate one of my favorite holidays, I decided to create a large display in my yard based on my favorite comic book, AFTERLIFE WITH ARCHIE. To this end, I created a graveyard complete with tombstones for all the members of The Archies, and even created a life-sized figure of Jughead as the King of the Zombies!
Here it is by the light of day... It is roped off with purple lights. The backdrop is painted plywood. Since I took this photo, I have added a shelf to the back of the wall so I can rest two pumpkins on it.
And at night it comes alive with black light.
Not even poor Betty could escape.
The two pumpkins up front rest on a small "brick" wall.
Looks like our boy's been eating ribs... but whose?
There are four black lights used to illuminate the scene.
And Jughead is lit from within
I got the Jughead mask as Halloween Express for about $20. The rest of the pieces came from a Dollar Store, including the hands, lights inside the hands (just strings of orange mini lights) and the night light inside Juggie's head.
My Wife carved these "Funkins" a few years ago. Slowly but surely, we add a new on each year. I'll actually pull out a lot more tonight when the Trick-or-Treaters start making their rounds.
The tombstones are made of two flat Coke cartons that are duct taped together and then painted with black paint for daylight, and highlighted with glow-in-the-dark paint for night.
Almost everything here is custom made I did buy the Jughead mask (and, of course, all the paints, lights and plastic body parts), but the rest were created by me. All in all, I'm pretty happy with the display, although there are a few additional touches I'd like to add. But, the boils and ghouls will be here this evening, so the Riverdale sign and other touches will have to wait until next year.
I was browsing through my Archie comics the other day and came across some fun reprints of the 1960s SUPERHERO versions of the Archie Characters. These were created back when superheroes were finally coming back into the mainstream consciousness after the drought of the 1950s.
For those of you who don't know, superheroes all but vanished during that decade: only the BIG THREE maintained constant publication from their halcyon days of the Golden Era that was the 1940s: Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman. Other heroes did pop up here and there, but the magic was gone. Even Captain Marvel (who once outsold Superman and moved a million comics a month) had hung up his cape (mostly due to a lawsuit from DC, but even if not for that, his glory days were also gone).
But 1956 changed that. The new version of THE FLASH revived interest by updating an old hero for a new age. Within 10 years, superhero mania swept the nation, especially when the Batman TV show became a monster hit in 1966.
Even the Archie gang was swept up in this super fever.
In October 1965, both Archie and Betty gained super powers: Archie got them in Life With Archie #44 and the girl next door acquired hers in Betty & Veronica #118. I personally didn't read these until the 1970s when they started reprinting these stories in their digest comics. I loved them, especially the Pureheart stories because they toyed around with the idea that they could actually be happening in the major continuity; every time Archie called on the "PH Factor" to activate his powers, it scrambled the memories of everyone around him, including himself, so he wasn't sure if these were real adventures or just daydreams.
The first Pureheart issue was illustrated by one of the underrated Archie artists, Bob White. Bob didn't acquire the following of Dan DeCarlo or Samm Schwartz, but he definitely captured the zany villains and absurd fun of these stories.
Copyright 1965 Archie Comics
I'm showing Super Teen's first appearance here, drawn by the incomparable Dan DeCarlo, but I'm actually showing the second appearance of PH because it's a better cover, AND it introduces his nemesis, EVILHEART (who is none other than Reggie Mantle). Of course, Jughead would soon follow with CAPTAIN HERO. It would actually take until 1995 before Veronica would get in on the game and get her own super identity as... Miss Vanity.
"But thinking in terms of quotas as a non-binding guideline could be helpful, because without some sort of prompt to encourage creators to think about diversity the default inclination is to go with what's familiar."
That is an extremely wrong-headed idea that is anathema to why Kevin has been a success. He's a fun character and him being gay is not the only thing that defines him. That's where Dan Parent has excelled -- in writing a character who feels at home in the Archie Universe. Reading the Kevin stories doesn't make me feel like I'm watching "a very special episode" of a sitcom, or an old "After School Special" (yeah, I'm that old...), but that I'm just reading a fun Archie story that happens to feature a character who is gay. I also never got the idea that Kevin is the only gay kid at Riverdale high, but rather that he's the first to break into the Archie's Gang Clique. That's why Kevin Keller works so well.
This also makes me think more about how Riverdale functions as an idyllic fictional society. Although it has may progressive traits (openness to all races, gay students, embracing environmentalism, charity work), it does so while embracing what can only be described as traditional family values. None of the core characters in the Archie universe come from broken or single-parent homes. None. And I'm including a lot of secondary characters, including Moose, Midge, Raj, Chuck, Tre, Kimoko, Dilton, Ginger, and others.
I don't want to read too much into the Archie universe, but it's interesting to note that the Progressive Agenda seems only to work when it is built upon the strong foundation of a "traditional" family.
I found another stash of comics today. I was moving some boxes of books and found that one of them was marked "Comics & SF Digests." I cracked it open and found 51 comics digests inside... and none of them are under 15 years old -- and many were more than twice that age.
That's how long they were in storage.
This was a very pleasant surprise, as I thought I'd already found all of them. Plus, there were some cool issues, including Laugh #1, several early issues of Betty and Veronica, plus Pals 'n; Gals #4, 5 & 10.
My latest unearthed stash of comics digests.
One thing I've always liked about comics digests is the sheer quantity of pages you get in a single issue. The older digests had 256 pages. With this many issues, there's easily 10,000 pages of comics that I unearthed tonight. It would take weeks to read it all at a normal rate.
And some of this does bear re-reading. I particularly like the Jonah Hex and other Western Tales digest. This issue has some classic adventures in it, like the "Point Pyrrhus Massacre" and the "Point Pyrrhus Aftermath," which is probably my favorite Jonah Hex story of all time.
In addition the the Jonah Hex book, I also found some of the other DC Comics digests, including Legion of Super-Heroes, Superman Vs. Luthor, Ghosts and Superboy.
I enjoyed these digests from yesteryear, and have long thought that it would be a good idea for DC and other publishers to bring them back -- and more importantly, get them on the shelves in supermarkets and convenience stores.
A low-priced, mass market book might be able to get kids into the habit of reading comic books. As it is, with comics stuck almost entirely in specialty stores, I don't see much of a future for our great hobby.
See you back here on Friday for more Netflix finds!
So now that I've finally selected Comic Collector by Collectorz.com to catalog my supposed collection of 10,000 comics, I've been steadily entering titles and issues. Since I started with Archie Comics, I don't have as many as I would have if I had started with Marvel or DC Comics.
If I had to guess, I would think that I probably had more Marvels than DCs, but I honestly don't know if that's true. You see, I go through periods where I buy more of one publisher than the other, but then change as my tastes evolve, and as the quality of the comics changes. Among the titles I expect to have a lot of, there are the usual suspects: X-Men (at least 150 issues in a row with no breaks) and Daredevil (probably about the same, but there may be a few breaks after issue 300 when Frank Miller left to pursue Battier pastures with The Dark Knight Returns).
I also expect to find good runs of the following titles:
The Defenders (I've got almost the entire run of 150 issues, missing only a few early issues -- but not #1 because I've got that!)
Jonah Hex (original series, I have most of it)
The Warlord (probably just missing the early issues)
Knights of the Dinner Table (I'm probably only missing four or five issues -- they were destroyed in a flood)
Fortunately, Comic Collector has cool reporting tools to help me track what I have, and to make "Wish Lists" of things I need. Here's a breakdown of the main publishers I've cataloged so far (from Oct. 28, 2011 - April 8, 2012):
Click on image to see full-size.
802 Archie
574 DC Comics
537 Marvel Comics
95 Kenzer and Company
41 Eclipse Comics
29 Dork Storm Press
28 First Comics
25 Abstract Studio
16 Harvey Comics
Many others
As you can see, Comic Collector does an admirable job of reporting what's in your collection. I may do another column on just the reporting tools. It shows both bar charts and pie charts, plus it has the ability to create custom filters that let you look for specific types of comics (for instance, I have 575 comics digests, of which 560 are Archie Comics digests -- the others are from DC Comics, Harvey Comics, and a few others).
Filters: Let's hear it for Al Milgrom
Filters may be one of the most powerful features of the reporting tools. In addition to finding out that I have almost 600 comics digests, I can create a filter to search for individual characters (Archie is in about 805 titles) or I can filter by creators. For example, out of the comics I've cataloged, 52 feature work by the incomparable Al Milgrom. Most of his work in my collection is for Marvel (including this cool Black Panther cover right here).
It's also possible to filter for specific characters, so if you want to know how many times Spider-Man appears in your collection, you can search for it. For example, Spider-man appears in 70 different titles. Or, that is to say, the word "Spider-Man" appears in the descriptions of 70 different comics. You see, although there is a screen for listing specific characters in a comic, these are often empty. Some people choose to mention the character in the text description of the title (it's that part that appears in the right-hand detail panel). So doing a full text search for Spider-Man seems like a better way to track down our friendly neighborhood Spider-man.
Let it all hang out (online, that is)
Since I purchased this software, they have actually added a feature that makes it even cooler than it was. They have provided us PRO users with the ability to post our collections online via Sync & Share. Here's what it says about this service at their Website:
Sync & Share is a basic Connect edition, created for desktop users who just want to sync their collection online and share it with friends, but wish to keep using their desktop software (Windows or Mac) to manage (add/edit) their database.
Sync & Share includes all browsing, viewing, sorting, searching, sharing, Facebook, Twitter and statistics features of Connect. But NOT the Add feature and NOT the Edit feature.
In other words, you will be able to upload your collection online, access your own collection from anywhere, any device and share the list with friends. However, you will need to do your data additions and modifications offline, with your trusted desktop software, then re-sync to Connect.
In short, Sync & Share is Connect without the adding and editing features.
A full-featured Connect subscription is available for US $19.80 per year.
I didn't review their Connect service because, as I said before, I was only interested in a desktop solution without annual fees. But this addition actually fills in one of the minor gaps in their software: An online component that I can use to track what's in my collection so that I can avoid buying duplicates when I'm at my friendly local comic book store.
This feature was added in March 2012, and it's fantastic. In addition to being viewable on my computer, it also has a cool smart phone interface, which is perfect for that comic book store scenario I described above.
By the way, the online system has reports, too, including this cool chart with a percentage breakdown of my comics by publisher (the percentage is available when you rollover the pie slice: I added them to the graphic so you can see them here).
There's also a bar chart showing the my comics ranked by title. Here's my top 5 series (so far -- keep in mind, I have not yet entered most of the Marvel of DC comics):
89 Archie's Pals 'n' Gals Double Digest
84 Jughead's Double Digest
83 Knights of the Dinner Table
74 Archie Double Digest
68 Betty & Veronica Double Digest
Finally, there are a few other cool features that bear discussion, such as the smart phone tools that let you browse your collection and use your phone's camera as a bar card reader: Yes, there's an app for that! As we'll talk about it next week as I finally conclude my series about the totally cool Comic Collector by Collectorz.com.
And see you back here to launch the weekend off in style with another edition of Netflix Friday.
I hope you'll all forgive me for shuffling the schedule around this week, but I had a busy weekend and am just now getting back into town (plus, the frames to my glasses broke, so I will need to spend a big chunk of Monday getting them replaced). So, rather than rush out with a shortened review of Comic Base, I'm going to give you a quick first impression of a new comic that just came out: Stan Lee's Mighty 7.
Yes, you heard right. That's "The" Stan Lee, releasing one of his first new titles in years. First of all, the basics:
This is a standard-format news stand comic
It is a six-issue mini-series
It is published bi-monthly.
It has a cover price of $2.99
There are three variant covers (I've got the issue pictured below)
24 pages of story on slick paper
Although it says "Stan Lee Comics" on the cover, it is published by Archie Comics
Facing Down My Own Preconceptions
Now, although Archie comics has published a lot of superhero comics over the years (including the first patriotic hero, The Shield), they've been so focused on their humor books that they have never really done a good job with superheroes since the 1940s. This alone was enough to give me pause when I first heard about this comic... but it IS Stan Lee and I decided I would give it a chance, so I subscribed to it over at archiecomics.com.
The second thing I had to get past was the name: Mighty 7. It just sounds juvenile, as though it was the title of an early 1980s direct-to-syndication cartoon. A little bit of research quickly revealed that he wanted to call it "Super 7," but that name was already in use, so a quick reshuffle and these seven heroes are mighty, instead.
Then we hit the cover itself, and this is the hardest thing to get past. These heroes look like a retread of the Legion of Superheroes. And this makes me very worried that Stan, fearing that he might inadvertently rehash some of the material he created for Marvel, decided to raid his competitor's back catalog for ideas. Or maybe this is just something left over from the Stan Lee/DC Comics experiment a while back where he reimaged DC's classic heroes, Superman, Batman, and others? In any case, by this point I was more than a little bit worried about what I would be getting.
The Comic Itself
The first issue of my subscription arrived today and I read it while winding down for the evening. I approached it with a few trepidations (as I described above), but an otherwise open mind and more than a little bit of curiosity. The cover is decidedly (and, might I say, almost refreshingly) old-school. A group of heroes battle some big, mechanized bad guy. How 1977 is that?
But there were the heroes again, looking very much like a nice fanzine version of the Legion. At the top it looks like we've got Dawn Star and Colossal Boy, that girl in the middle looks a lot like Light Lass, and then there's the dead ringer for a suitless version of Wildfire. And how on earth could I miss the Bouncing Boy lookalike at the bottom? I mean, why on earth would anybody parody a hero who is, by his very existence, a parody of a superhero?
Still, I sat down and read it. You know what? If this had come out in 1977-1982, I think it would have had a decent chance, in spite of being an almost blatant Legion rip-off. That probably sounds harsher than I mean it to sound. This is a cool comic that really relishes its old-school vibe and classic artwork. Here's the basic plot:
Stan Lee is talking to Archie Comics about writing some new material for them. He's got some ideas for Betty & Veronica (there's a sketch for "Betty and Veronica in the Moshpit of Doom" -- oh, and we get a cool Millie the Model joke, too). Archie comics John Goldwater (looking very nice) tells Stan he was hoping he would bring him some new superhero ideas. Stan says he's written so many of them that he just doesn't know if he's got one left in him...
On a planet far away, a renegade Star Marshal named Blastok is about to kill a businessman who poisoned and killed hundreds of people just to improve sales of his water purifiers. As I said above, he reminds me a lot of Wild Fire, but he's also got a little Timber Wolf vibe about him. He's stopped by two current Star Marshals -- his former friends and cadets, naturally -- named Asoara (she's the flying woman) and Vallor, who reminds me of a cross between Colossal Boy and Mon-El. The two Marshal's capture Blastok and throw him in a cell with five other criminals and then proceed to haul them back to their home planet. The five of them band together and use their powers to escape just when the ship jumps into hyperspace (which will cause a very quick fluctuation in the forcefield, so it's their one shot at getting out of this).
Meanwhile, back on earth, we get a quick cutaway to a scientific experiment that is trying to control earthquakes. A no-good scientist tampers with the controls and it blows up, releasing the mysterious "P-Waves." At this same time, Stan Lee is musing over his future in the desert and decides that he is going to retire and stop writing superhero comics... and then something crashes into the desert near him...
This isn't my first inter-stellar rodeo, so it's obvious that the criminals destroyed the navigation system in the ship, the P-Waves drew them through hyperspace to earth, and Stan Lee will actually mentor these aliens on how to become "real" superheroes. Okay, that last bit would be a stretch for me to figure out if it weren't for the fact that Stan explained this in a previous Bullpen Bulletins column... uh, errrr, that is to say, I read it in an interview and it's mentioned on his blog: https://stanleesmighty7.wordpress.com/2012/02/05/welcome-to-stan-lee-and-the-mighty-7/
So, aside from that, Mrs. Lincoln, How was the play?
As I said above, I tried to keep an open mind and, for the most part, I kind of enjoyed this because it had such a nice old-school feeling to it. By that, I mean it reminds me a lot of the fun comics I read back in high school and my early college days.
I had to work to get past the feeling that this is a Legion copy... and for that matter, I also felt like it has similarities to Chris Claremont's Sovereign Seven (super-powered aliens arrive on earth and make do as heroes). But this was new work by Stan Lee (doesn't he look dapper in this portrait?), so I'm willing to give it a chance just to see if there is any of that old creative spark there.
Also, it should be mentioned that although Stan's name is on the cover (he is, after all, one of the greatest self-marketed writers since Mark Twain himself), he probably only came up with the idea and then passed it off to writers Tony Blake and Paul Jackson (who, I might mention, are actually better know for writing television shows, so that makes me wonder if my Saturday Morning deja vu might not be so out of place, after all). The artwork is by Alex Saviuk, inks by Bob Smith, and the very capable lettering by John Workman are nicely finished by the bright, exciting colors of Tom Smith.
BOTTOM LINE:If you're expecting to read the next great thing in comics, you should pass on this. If you're curious to read something new by one of the greats in the field, you might enjoy reading this just so you can say you were there when Stan sang his swan song. And finally, you should pick it up it you're tired of cynical, gritty modern comics and would like, for at least 22 pages, to go back in time and read something that feels like a recently discovered series from the heydey of 1970s and 1980s comic book storytelling.
See you back here Wednesday when I try to get back on schedule!
I was out reading comics news and stumbled across a bit of liberal bigotry over at ComicsBeat.com. It seems that a conservative group is protesting the gay marriage of Kevin Keller in Live With Archie magazine #16.
The comments on the page were full of the usual narrow-minded name calling that the left often engages in. Isn't it funny how everyone who disagrees with them is an ignorant bigot who is full of hate? And this from a group of people who preach tolerance! Honestly, I sometimes think that a dose of self-awareness would hit some (not all) of them like being Ben Grimm bitch-slapped.
Here's my comments on their comments
Ahhhhh, nothing like a "hot-button topic" to bring out the name calling (shame on you, ComicsBeat.com). As stated above, not everyone who disagrees with gay marriage is a bigot, and OBVIOUSLY not everyone who supports it is tolerant of other views. In fact, the anger generated by this topic on the "Pro-Gay Marriage" side is unacceptable in our society. If you cannot maintain a level of civility in your discourse, then you should just shut up until you grow up enough to recognize that opposing views are not always based on hatred or ignorance.
Oh, and as for an activist group promoting its views on this issue? That's the way our society is SUPPOSED to work. Now, while you get worked up and ready yourselves to type some nasty (and probably poorly written) missive in response... pause for a moment and ask yourself: Is he talking about the Million Moms, GLAAD... or both?
NOW, on the the comic, of which (apparently) I am the only one who read it?
For those of you who don't follow LIFE WITH ARCHIE magazine, each issue presents two stories set in parallel universes (take that, DC Comics!) where he has married Veronica and where he has married Betty. Each story appears to follow the same general time period (the seasons in each story are the same, and each seems to be set about a year after they got married... more or less). Each issue is odd, but lately the parallel universe bit has actually been worked prominently into both storylines with Dilton Doiley working with Mr. Lodge on some kind of project involving the multiverse, and a new creepy guy (Fred Mirth) working against them. Some of the characters from the two universes actually seem to be able to cross over from one side to the other (what role does Mr. Blast-From-The-Past Ambroce play? -- he says the adventures he had with Little Archie were real and not imaginary).
Wow, that sounds harder to explain than sorting out the various earths in DC's 52 Universe. But it's not bad. Keep in mind, this new magazine is more of a soap opera than a humor book (kinda like the "relevant" last issues of the series, That Wilkin Boy, which dealt with teen issues like crime, bullying, runaways, the illness of a pet, etc.).
LIFE WITH ARCHIE #16 was a bit of a change of pace for the series so far. The Kevin Keller storyline actually didn't change much between universes. Oh, and by the way, I admit I haven't read it in a month or so, but I don't recall them mentioning Iraq as where Lt. Keller got shot. It just said "Somewhere in the Middle East..." In the Veronica story we learn that Kevin took a bullet to the back while under fire in combat. In the Betty half of the book we find that Clay Walker is his physical therapist and that -- while working through Kevin's anger about his injuries -- the two fell in love and subsequently returned to Kevin's parent's home in Riverdale to get married. I guess I'm an old man now because I worry that 10 months may be a bit hasty to rush into a wedding... but then again, I did it in 18 months, so who am I to judge?
I thought the wedding was pretty, and I loved in the Veronica storyline how Archie finally stood up to Ronnie and kicked her out of the wedding. They've been separated for a while and she's been acting like a celebrity heiress like Paris Hilton for a few months now -- she showed up at Kevin's wedding to steal the spotlight and have her picture taken and Archie tossed her out on her ear. About time, red!
As far as the soap opera elements of the series go, I really enjoyed this issue. Paul Kupperberg is doing a great job taking over for Michael Uslan (he wrote the original "Married Life" series that ran in Archie #600-606 and the first issue of the magazine). I like the balance between soap opera and sci-fi and am glad I'm following this series. That being said, this issue did feel like an intrusion into the regular storyline. Kind of like a "Very Special Episode" that might run during sweeps week, or something like that.
As for political/social analysis? I have to agree with John Goldwater: A gay marriage doesn't seem out of place in Riverdale. It is a welcoming place that represents an idealized view of society. It seems to be a place that has found a balance between social concerns on both the left and the right. In this issue, any sort of protest against gay marriage would have been out of place in the comic itself.
As for protesters on both sides of the issue? Please argue more about this! I have multiple copies of the first printing of Kevin's first (and second) appearance and I would really love it if everyone drove up the prices for me!
Your Regularly-Scheduled Comics Talk blog returns on Monday. My Rant about Grocery Shopping at Night has been rescheduled for Friday, March 16. Tune in next Friday for another cool edition of Netflix Friday.
When you look at the numbers, it doesn't look good. I've got about 10,000 comic books, digests and magazines. Not a bad horde, actually, stuffed into about 22 long boxes and about a dozen short boxes. When you consider that some of these were purchased at the newsstand (okay, convenience store -- I grew up mostly in the suburbs and not down the street from Freddy Freeman's newsstand in Fawcett City) as far back as the mid 1970s, that's probably not all that many.
Or maybe it is. It's all a matter of perspective. Let's see... Persective from a Wife / Mom / NASCAR fan: "How much money did you waste on those things? Are they worth anything now?" Perspective from a Fanboy over 40: "You've only got 10,000? That's not bad... I had that many back in 1992... To bad the market crashed on 'em." Perspective from a Fanboy Under 30: "You've got 10,000? Cool! Do you have any of that old school stuff like New X-Men or before Spider-Man #300?"
I've got some cool stuff in there (yes, I've got the obligatory 1980s books like Frank Miller's Daredevil, some early New X-Men, Wolfman & Perez's tenure on Teen Titans, and so on). But I've also got some stuff that most people would puzzle the average fanboy and fangirl. No, I'm not talking about the embarrassment that was Team America, or Stan Lee's "New Universe" debacle. (And by the way, this team has NOTHING to do with the awesome film, Team America: World Police by the South Park dudes.) No, this isn't embarrassing stuff, it's just stuff I like that's a bit outside the norm for most collectors of my age.
Things like funny animals, Archie (I still subscribe to a few titles which I will discuss in future blogs), Ren & Stimpy, and ALF. Yes, the comic book devoted to the irascible Alien Life Form that starred in his own titular TV travesty. Okay, ALF wasn't that bad, it's just I can't resist a good alliteration when I get the chance.Over the years I've collected more than a long box full of odd titles like ALF, Ren & Stimpy, James Bond Jr. (no kidding, I found JBJ #1 neatly bagged in that aforementioned long box), and even Bill & Ted's Excellent Comic Book.
Yup. Got a whole box of this stuff... which leads me to my a confession of one of my darkest secrets. You see... the fact is, I've got a lot of these odd comics. So many so that it's cost-prohibitive to board and bag them all. Good bags ain't cheap. Oh, they're not overly expensive (even in today's economy). But the truth is, with thousands of comics, I just can't afford it. So, I do something dark and loathsome... I double-bag some of my comics.
I'll wait while your collective gasps travels the world via cyberspace. I know, some of you have just spewed your Super Big Gulp all over the screen. Others may have accidentally dropped a puppy or shrieked in horror. I only pray that no one was driving while reading this on their smart phone and crashed into a bus-load of nuns (I often wonder why so many nuns travel via bus... I always picture it as some sort of scene out of Where Angles Go, Trouble Follows).
Even though this particular clip has nothing to do with nuns in buses, you can watch the theme song clip from Where Angles Go... while you recover (think of this as a "Family Guy" cutaway gag).
We now return you to your regularly scheduled confession of a dark secret. Yes, I said the unthinkable: I double-bag some of my comics. That is to say, I take a perfection good bag and board and put two books in the same bag! Yes, that's right, I grab all that pulp goodness and I just stuff it in there. I said it and I don't care who knows it.
Go ahead, write to me and tell me how the back of the board isn't 100% acid free and that, over time the book will become damaged. Go ahead, and I will laugh in the face of your superior knowledge! Yes, laugh and scoff. Because, you see, I know the risks. I know that -- at some point in the distant future -- the cruel hands of time shall pass forward on the clock of eternity and these books might be less than perfect. I know, and I don't care.
You see... it's an ALF comic. I seriously doubt it will ever be popular enough to sell for the big bucks it will take to save the family farm (okay, not my family's farm, but someone else's). I enjoyed it when I read it (and even reread an issue recently for the awesomely funny X-Men parody) and I want to reasonably protect it from moisture and marauding kitties (I'll tell you about that particular danger some other time), but I'm not going to pay 15 cents or more to protect each and every single copy. I'm just not going to do it. So, I got the larger Silver Age bags and fit 14 issues into three bags. They're snug, but they actually fit quite nicely. I could probably get two more issues into the set if I had do.
Yes, you heard me right. I got 14 comics into three bags. That means I'm not just a double-bagger, but a multi-bagger. Bawah hah hah. Again, I know not the meaning of the word "contrition."
All kidding aside, I've had many of these comics in storage since the mid 1980s. In fact, the bulk of my horde has been in storage for 12+ years, and to be honest, they look fine. The bags have not significantly degraded. They are still firm and clear without any oil residue. Likewise, almost all the backing boards are crisp and clean with no image transfer on the backside. In short, multi-bagging these comics has not harmed them.
There are a few exceptions, though. I did find a few books where the bags were feeling weird and oily. These were from before 1982 and they have a soft, matte feel to them (if you know what I mean). These were very old bags, and in the past 30+years, even in storage in a dark box in a climate controlled storage facility, they obviously degraded some. The comic inside feels okay (no staining or discoloration of the cover or the interior pages where they touch the plastic on the outer edges).
Those are the bags I've replaced. I'm hoping the new-and improved plastics will last more than 30 years. After that, it may not be my problem any more. By that time, they'll probably be looking to preserve ME in a mylar bag!
Comic Talk returns on Wed. with a discussion of bags and boards Check back on Friday for a rant about why I hate buying groceries at night!
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