|
Post by tonebone on Jul 27, 2022 8:49:54 GMT -5
It's not close to the horror stories already posted, but I had some trouble sorting out back issues of Legion Of Super-Heroes after they added the second title. Something to do with one title reprinting the other after a gap of maybe six months? Eh... I gave up and blocked out the memory. Same thing happened with New Teen Titans.
Short version is this. DC decided to relaunch both books as direct market only books, with better quality paper and covers, and the reprint the stories a year later as newstand books. The new books were launched with new numbering starting at #1, while the xisting books were renamed as Tales of the Teen Titans and Tales of the Legion of Super-Heroes and continued their original numbering. However, because they wanted to a year of stories in reserve before they started doing the reprints, the Tales books continued to print new stories for 12 months (give or take) before switching to reprinting the Baxter books.
I've always felt that was a terrible idea, and it completely killed my desire to continue reading the book. I didn't live near a comics shop, so I was left with the newsstand version. I understood the hardcover/softcover idea, but it really struck me as a money grab, and I ditched the book. Forever. I've always wondered how it affected the sales and momentum.
|
|
|
Post by Deleted on Jul 29, 2022 12:29:04 GMT -5
This discussion of Fast Willie Jackson just reiterizes what mrp always says about this hobby being a niche pastime. If you were to publish that series in a tpb today, it would do poorly. No one knows or cares about it except us comic geeks.
Just needs a tv series....when I showed a ratty-condition copy around, people were amazed there was a 'black Archie' series....
|
|
|
Post by Icctrombone on Jul 29, 2022 12:31:53 GMT -5
Maybe they were amazed but how many would buy it?
|
|
|
Post by Ish Kabbible on Aug 8, 2022 20:31:49 GMT -5
This title would be a pain in the butt to collect if you didn't know the history Strange Suspense Stories started in 1952 and was published by Fawcett for 5 issues, ending in 1953 Charlton Comics acquired the title name and resumed publishing in 1954. But their first released issue was #16 The title only last till the end of 1954. It stopped with # 22 Then almost a year later, it came back from the grave. However the title resumed with # 27 Strange Suspense Stories continued on it's merry way reaching # 77 at the end of 1965 And so ended.. But Wait.. It's back... Two years later, in 1967 it's on the racks again This time as a #1 and calling itself Volume 3 There never was a Volume 2 And when the 2nd issue came out, it was back to Volume 1 Finally with the 9th issue in 1969 a stake was hammered into it's heart If not for dozens and dozens of Steve Ditko stories including some of his Captain Atom reprints, many collectors wouldn't bother with the sorry mess of it's publication history
|
|
|
Post by Deleted on Aug 8, 2022 20:46:46 GMT -5
The Phantom book was started by Western/Gold Key and ran for 17 issues before being taken over by King Features for issues 18-28, then taken over by Charlton for the rest of its run. However, Charlton started its run with #30, there was never an issue #29.
-M
|
|
|
Post by jason on Aug 8, 2022 23:18:49 GMT -5
One day, some company will do this.
|
|
|
Post by tonebone on Aug 11, 2022 8:30:20 GMT -5
One day, some company will do this. Marvel is close, already. Every series that fails is retroactively called a "limited series" and starts over with a FIRST ISSUE COLLECTORS ITEM LIMITED EDITION the next month. Also, remember this? Definitely a classic!
|
|
|
Post by Deleted on Aug 11, 2022 8:45:22 GMT -5
One day, some company will do this. I remember Byrne proposing, eons ago, that publishers regularly restart every series each year with a new number 1, and call each new series a volume or something like that. I think his reasoning was that this way nobody gets jaded because it's a known and predictable occurrence (I think he cited some non-American comics market as a model for this). I won't argue for or against the overall wisdom of this, but it would have at least made back issue and trade collecting less confusing than it is now, if you only needed to look at sequential volume numbers (plus issue number, of course, for single issues) to identify a comic or a trade, and where it fits in the series publication history. I like that the Epic line kind of retro-actively does this, where even if they print an Epic volume somewhere in the middle of a series, they've done the math, and given the trade a volume number it would have as if all of the prior issues were already collected in Epic volumes.
|
|
|
Post by Deleted on Aug 11, 2022 10:09:33 GMT -5
One day, some company will do this. I remember Byrne proposing, eons ago, that publishers regularly restart every series each year with a new number 1, and call each new series a volume or something like that. I think his reasoning was that this way nobody gets jaded because it's a known and predictable occurrence (I think he cited some non-American comics market as a model for this). I won't argue for or against the overall wisdom of this, but it would have at least made back issue and trade collecting less confusing than it is now, if you only needed to look at sequential volume numbers (plus issue number, of course, for single issues) to identify a comic or a trade, and where it fits in the series publication history. I like that the Epic line kind of retro-actively does this, where even if they print an Epic volume somewhere in the middle of a series, they've done the math, and given the trade a volume number it would have as if all of the prior issues were already collected in Epic volumes. It's the way traditional periodicals were numbered (and the way some Golden Age comics were numbered). Since comics in their traditional format are periodicals it wouldn't have been a stretch to number them that way, and if they had been, we might not have the fetishization of issue numbers and other trade dress features we have in the hobby now and instead focus on what's between the covers. -M
|
|
|
Post by Ish Kabbible on Aug 15, 2022 23:16:38 GMT -5
Not the most confusing publishing history, like I've posted with other titles earlier, but still. Sweethearts from Fawcett- took over the numbering from Captain Midnight when he turned into a pumpkin. # 68 was the first issue in 1948. Sweethearts ran until Fawcett folded (or rather the tap was turned off). Last issue was #121 in 1953 Fawcett auctioned off all their titles. Charlton was the winner with Sweethearts Took a year but #122 came out in 1954 But then, as Charlton inexplicaby was known to do, they renumbered the series The next up was #23. Makes no sense I know Sweethearts ran until # 137 in 1973 So there are two Charlton issues with a #122 And many duplicate issue numbers where you have to pay attention to the publisher name
|
|
|
Post by Deleted on Aug 16, 2022 0:45:55 GMT -5
This one took me almost 15 years to find. I first came across it in early 90s when I was in single digits, but I had no idea it was called 'DC Special Series #5' and just vaguely remembered it as an 80 page Superman Dollar Comic.
|
|
|
Post by Deleted on Aug 16, 2022 1:06:48 GMT -5
As @mrp helped me with collecting in another thread a while back, collecting "Berni Wrightson, Master Of The Macabre" miniseries could have been easier. To start with, I didn't realize he didn't have an "e" at the end of "Berni" at the time these were published, which probably cost me some missing search results in on-line stores. The fist four issues were from Pacific, and then the fifth issue was published by Eclipse. There is an unrelated (but similar) series from DC/Seagate called "The Masterworks Series Of Great Comic Book Artists", issue three of which was devoted to Berni Wrightson. This issue has Wrightson's name and "The Macabre" on the cover, and being from the same era as the other series, it looks like it could be an issue of the Pacific series. If you're careless, you could think you've got issue three of the Pacific series on your hands. Yes, you'd have to be really careless, but that's me. If I see anything other than the DC Bullet or the Marvel logo on the cover, then I mentally lump most independent publishers together, and the DC issue does have this Seagate logo on it, which I mentally file under "independent", with no more distinction than I mentally file "Pacific" under "independent"
|
|
|
Post by Ish Kabbible on Aug 16, 2022 1:14:56 GMT -5
As @mrp helped me with collecting in another thread a while back, collecting "Berni Wrightson, Master Of The Macabre" miniseries could have been easier. To start with, I didn't realize he didn't have an "e" at the end of "Berni" at the time these were published, which probably cost me some missing search results in on-line stores. The fist four issues were from Pacific, and then the fifth issue was published by Eclipse. There is an unrelated (but similar) series from DC called "The Masterworks Series Of Great Comic Book Artists", issue three of which was devoted to Berni Wrightson. This issue has Wrightson's name and "The Macabre" on the cover, and being from the same era as the other series, it looks like it could be an issue of the Pacific series. If you're careless, you could think you've got issue three of the Pacific series on your hands. The DC series was unrelated to the Pacific/Eclipse. DC's masterworks # 1 & 2 featured Frank Frazetta and finished with Wrightson. It only used material that DC published earlier Pacific had several series that were focused on reprinting a particular artists' work. Besides Wrightson they did John Bolton, Ralph Reese, Wally Wood and Arthur Suydam. When Pacific closed shop, Eclipse published many issues that remained unpublished from Pacific
|
|
|
Post by Ish Kabbible on Aug 18, 2022 9:00:00 GMT -5
The Overstreet Guide lists Team Helix, a 4-issue mini-series from Marvel in 1993 with a cover price of $1.75 and Wolverine appearances in the first 2 issues. Just says it's a teen group But it's not listed on Comic Vine or the GCD database An example of Overstreet purposely inserting fake info to catch plagerists? Me thinks yes
|
|
|
Post by Deleted on Aug 18, 2022 14:18:43 GMT -5
The Overstreet Guide lists Team Helix, a 4-issue mini-series from Marvel in 1993 with a cover price of $1.75 and Wolverine appearances in the first 2 issues. Just says it's a teen group But it's not listed on Comic Vine or the GCD database An example of Overstreet purposely inserting fake info to catch plagerists? Me thinks yes It' not listed on Lonestar either, and they list just about anything published either as available or out of stock. -M
|
|