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Marvel Australian Price Variants
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There has been a lot of misinformation about these US Marvel comics printed specifically for the Australian newsstand market in the early nineties. They have been described as 1A variants (which applies to some other editions printed for other countries), but this is not accurate. The 1A status was simply arrived at with the limited information available at the time. The information presented here was obtained by us, first hand, from the Australian Marvel Sales rep, whose job was to increase Marvel comic newsstand sales.

Click link to see the full article: http://www.alternateworlds.com.au/news-events/australian-premiere-editions-ape

It is a bit long for a standard post here.

 

APECollge3.jpg

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7 hours ago, Joseph21 said:

There has been a lot of misinformation about these US Marvel comics printed specifically for the Australian newsstand market in the early nineties. They have been described as 1A variants (which applies to some other editions printed for other countries), but this is not accurate. The 1A status was simply arrived at with the limited information available at the time. The information presented here was obtained by us, first hand, from the Australian Marvel Sales rep, whose job was to increase Marvel comic newsstand sales.

Click link to see the full article: http://www.alternateworlds.com.au/news-events/australian-premiere-editions-ape

It is a bit long for a standard post here.

 

APECollge3.jpg

That's a VERY interesting read.  Thanks for sharing!

@Get Marwood & I, looks like you have some covers to pull from their APE list variant page.

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2 hours ago, masterlogan2000 said:

That's a VERY interesting read.  Thanks for sharing!

@Get Marwood & I, looks like you have some covers to pull from their APE list variant page.

Cheers Master Logan - I pulled 15 new cover scans from the site so we're up to 1,051 now :headbang:

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9 hours ago, Joseph21 said:

There has been a lot of misinformation about these US Marvel comics printed specifically for the Australian newsstand market in the early nineties. They have been described as 1A variants (which applies to some other editions printed for other countries), but this is not accurate. The 1A status was simply arrived at with the limited information available at the time. The information presented here was obtained by us, first hand, from the Australian Marvel Sales rep, whose job was to increase Marvel comic newsstand sales.

Click link to see the full article: http://www.alternateworlds.com.au/news-events/australian-premiere-editions-ape

It is a bit long for a standard post here.

Hello Joseph!

Nice of you to drop in and welcome to these here boards. You'll see I've responded to your duplicate post on Ben's wordpress site and Ben himself has fired a few questions at you.

My interest has been in cataloguing what AUS copies exist - if you get time, perhaps you could cast you eye over my summary page here:

https://www.cgccomics.com/boards/blogs/entry/4916-marvel-australian-price-variants/

 

Since I wrote it the numbers have increased to 1,051 confirmed copies across 93 titles

Cheers, Steve :)

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On 7/8/2019 at 4:06 PM, nesqrick2 said:

Been a while,Here are more AUS copy to add the list. (thumbsu

Cheers Nes :)

I'll post an update at the weekend. The spreadsheet is showing a number of titles all stopping at the same time, coinciding with a cover price change, so it's getting easier to speculate how many there may end up being. No new titles on the website from Joseph above so far. 

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4 hours ago, Joseph21 said:

We are still going through the warehouse trying to separate our AUS and regular US versions, so even we don’t know what we still have! We are only about 15% through, with a basic scan. I will update you as we find more.

Great, thanks Joseph. A fun task to have! I'll be interested to see if you find any titles that I have missed, or books that are dated outside of the current known ranges. 

I'll post the key body of your website article here for those that might like to read it. Your explanation of the 'first wave' being produced first, and without Marvel's knowledge, is quite groundbreaking information. I don't plan to debate it here, despite having a number of questions myself, and will instead keep an eye on your ongoing discussions with Ben over at Wordpress Towers. Good luck!

 

Australian Premiere Editions (APE) By Joseph Italiano

There has been a lot of misinformation about these US Marvel comics printed specifically for the Australian newsstand market in the early nineties. They have been described as 1A variants (which applies to some other editions printed for other countries), but this is not accurate. The 1A status was simply arrived at with the limited information available at the time. The information presented here was obtained by us, first hand, from the Australian Marvel Sales rep, whose job was to increase Marvel comic newsstand sales.

At the time, circa 1990, we (Alternate Worlds) were supplementing our direct market purchases with local newsstand editions, (since newsstand editions here were released two months after we had already received the direct market copies). This meant if a book was to unexpectedly become popular and sell out, we still had a source to restock the book. Alternate Worlds was (at that time) purchasing through the newsstand distributor Gordon & Gotch (G&G). Circa 1990, G&G "lost" the rights to distribute Marvel comics in Australia. We obviously began buying from the new distributor Network (NDD). The Australian Marvel Sales rep. approached us before hand to tell us about the new Australian editions that were going to be produced. He was so buzzed about the new more collectable editions that would increase Marvel’s newsstand sales in this country. (We had direct contact with the Australian Marvel Sale rep, as we were a distributor too). To alleviate some of the problems they were having with delayed release times and the "damage" caused by the local newsstand "defacing" comics with Australian price modifications and return dates, resulted in the Australian Premiere Editions (APE). Up until now these editions have been termed Type 1A cover price variant.

Type 1A variants are standard US editions that were printed with the local country's currency price. There are a number of differences between Type 1A books and APE, as follows:

1.         APE books have a different cover month to that printed inside the book. It is not just the price that has been changed. The reason for this, is that the new distributor wanted to avoid newsstand writing anything on the cover (to preserve collectability). The month on the cover was the month the comic would be available until, on the newsstand in Australia. Like the US theory, they were hoping to extend the lifespan of the comic on the shelf for more than one month.

2.         The APE books were collated first, before any other editions. This was so the lag time between US editions release and Australian edition release would be reduced. As soon as these books were printed, they were shipped, while the regular US editions were yet to be completed. We are unsure how much time difference there was between the editions, but in any case, they can be identified as the first of the print run. After about a year of this practice, Alternate Worlds broke the news about APE's.

APE's are the “first” print runs of the US books. As soon as this fact came out and Marvel head office realized that some pencil pusher down the line had effectively made all their comics “second” editions, they took immediate action. I presume that after they became aware of the APE concept, although the Australian variants were still produced, only the first years of books are actually APE and after that they are just Australian variants.

Facts about APE's

1.         Print runs for APE for the Australian newsstand market was 2000-4000 per book.

2.         Many local collectors, shunned Australian cover price editions as they thought they were inferior to the US cover editions (many thought they were local reprints), so most newsstand sales were to casual readers. The remaining non-sold copies were pulped. Estimates (depending on title) suggest that most books had a survival rate of 5%-10% and those that did survive are usually in low grade condition. These “variants” are vert rare.           

3.         Not all Marvel titles were distributed on the newsstand in Australia, but all books that were, were from 1991 cover date.

4.         During this short time, many key books were released. These include:

                        a.         New Mutants #98 (1st deadpool)

                        b.         Silver Surfer #47 (1st Infinity Gauntlet)

5.         This whole exercise was not a “Marvel experiment”. Marvel head office let their reps do there thing and were unaware of this experiment until we broke the news in 1992 with our ads in the CBG (Comic Buyers Guide), selling these books and a prominent back issue dealer contacted Marvel about the books after buying some from us. Marvel denied everything. This then prompted Marvel head office to contact us about the issue. The local agents created this entire concept without specific knowledge from their superiors. Since we did not want to put Marvel offside, we backed down even though we knew that the APE editions are identifiable as being the first of the print run (at least for the first year or so) and the regular US editions are technically second editions. Now that so much time has passed, it is no longer an issue for Marvel any more.

 

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Afternoon :)

Some great stuff coming from Joseph Italiano who appears to be as near as we'll ever get to a 'subject matter expert' on the history and production of AUS price variants. You can read about it all here, where the discussion is ongoing:

https://rarecomics.wordpress.com/2017/05/17/aus-price-variants-australian-newsstand-editions/

If only a similar person could emerge to tell us about the early days of pence copies and font variants!

Joseph has even provided an explanation for the handwritten 'N' numbers that often appear on AUS copies. Great stuff.

As for my work here, we're up to 1,054 confirmed copies now. I'm sure more will come from Joseph as he updates his website and it will be interesting to see what surfaces. I'll be keeping an eye and continuing to monitor ebay until the spreadsheet is full. 

Here's a snapshot of my spreadsheet by the way which shows three titles all 'stopping' in June 93:

190038487_Jun93stoppers.thumb.PNG.d7118e082185099fb2c34d36178b19d9.PNG

 

The date coincides with the cover price rise, so you can see that it's likely that the titles do legitimately stop. Quite high profile characters too.

So my projection of 1,677 maximum possible AUS copies - assuming the dates are right and all titles are captured - will drop accordingly over time if it becomes clear that gaps like these were by design and the missing copies will not therefore ever appear.

I don't plan on any further posts here - the discussion is elsewhere, and no one here seems that interested. I hope my work has gone some way to identifying what exists. 

Cheers, Steve

 

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May be missing the latest update but here are ones I personally own that are not part of the list I can see (had 949 I think, and I know it's up over 1051).   Apologize if these are dups.

Clive Barker - Ectokid 2
Daredevil 295
Fantastic Four 363
Ghost Rider 19, 21
Inc Hulk 397
Morbius 11
Punisher: Origin of Microchip 2
Secret Defenders 5
Spectacular SpiderMan 190
Thor 428
Web of SpiderMan 69
Wolverine 61

 

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5 hours ago, Get Marwood & I said:

Afternoon :)

Some great stuff coming from Joseph Italiano who appears to be as near as we'll ever get to a 'subject matter expert' on the history and production of AUS price variants. You can read about it all here, where the discussion is ongoing:

https://rarecomics.wordpress.com/2017/05/17/aus-price-variants-australian-newsstand-editions/

If only a similar person could emerge to tell us about the early days of pence copies and font variants!

Joseph has even provided an explanation for the handwritten 'N' numbers that often appear on AUS copies. Great stuff.

As for my work here, we're up to 1,054 confirmed copies now. I'm sure more will come from Joseph as he updates his website and it will be interesting to see what surfaces. I'll be keeping an eye and continuing to monitor ebay until the spreadsheet is full. 

Here's a snapshot of my spreadsheet by the way which shows three titles all 'stopping' in June 93:

190038487_Jun93stoppers.thumb.PNG.d7118e082185099fb2c34d36178b19d9.PNG

 

The date coincides with the cover price rise, so you can see that it's likely that the titles do legitimately stop. Quite high profile characters too.

So my projection of 1,677 maximum possible AUS copies - assuming the dates are right and all titles are captured - will drop accordingly over time if it becomes clear that gaps like these were by design and the missing copies will not therefore ever appear.

I don't plan on any further posts here - the discussion is elsewhere, and no one here seems that interested. I hope my work has gone some way to identifying what exists. 

Cheers, Steve

 

 I am still a fan of AUS copy,  Great work you have done in finding them.  :headbang:

Edited by nesqrick2
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15 hours ago, redsox1946 said:

May be missing the latest update but here are ones I personally own that are not part of the list I can see (had 949 I think, and I know it's up over 1051).   Apologize if these are dups.

Clive Barker - Ectokid 2
Daredevil 295
Fantastic Four 363
Ghost Rider 19, 21
Inc Hulk 397
Morbius 11
Punisher: Origin of Microchip 2
Secret Defenders 5
Spectacular SpiderMan 190
Thor 428
Web of SpiderMan 69
Wolverine 61

 

Hey, @Get Marwood & I... another person showing interest in the thread! :baiting:

@redsox1946, thanks for sharing!  Do you have cover scans of those issues you can post?  Not only would a number of us like to see those scans, but that is the current criteria for getting them added to the full list.

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43 minutes ago, masterlogan2000 said:

Hey, @Get Marwood & I... another person showing interest in the thread! :baiting:

@redsox1946, thanks for sharing!  Do you have cover scans of those issues you can post?  Not only would a number of us like to see those scans, but that is the current criteria for getting them added to the full list.

Yes, of course. Sorry, I was being an idiot yesterday Master Logan. Too much acid :foryou:

@redsox1946 - welcome! Pictures would indeed be lovely... You have five that I don't currently have:

  • Daredevil 295
  • Ghost Rider 121
  • Inc Hulk 397
  • Morbius 11
  • Punisher: Origin of Microchip 2

Here is the current full list:

 

Confirmed Titles with AUS Printed Price Issues Produced / Found  
     
Title / Expected AUS Issue Range Confirmed AUS Priced Issues         Total
     
2099 Unlimited (1-10) 1-2 2
Adventures of The X-Men / Adventures of Spider-Man (Flip-Book) 3 1
Alf (34-50) 37, 39-40, 42-43, 46 6
Amazing Spider-Man (340-417) 341-384, 408, 410-417 53
Amazing Spider-Man Annual (1993 Only) 27 1
Avengers (325-402) 325-342, 344-351, 354-363 36
Avengers (1996) (#1 Only) 1 1
Avengers West Coast (63-102) 63, 64, 66-85, 87-92 28
Barbie (1-35) 1, 3, 11-19, 21-25 16
Barbie Fashion (1-35) 1-3, 12-13, 35 6
Bruce Wayne: Agent of Shield (1) 1 1
Cable (1-37) 2, 5-6 3
Cable - Blood and Metal (1-2) 1 1
Cage (1-20) 3, 5-12 9
Captain America (378-454) 378-409, 411-423 45
Clive Barker - Ectokid 1-2 2
Clive Barker - Hokum & Hex (1-9) 1-3 3
Clive Barker - Hyperkind (1-9) 1-2 2
Clive Barker - Saint Sinner (1-7) 1-2 2
Conan The Barbarian (237-275) 237-241, 243, 244, 246, 248, 254, 256-258, 261-265, 269-275 25
Daredevil (285-358) 285-292, 294, 296-314 28
Darkhold - Pages From the Book of Sins 1 1
Disney Comic Hits (1-14) 13 1
Doom 2099 (1-44) 1-10, 12 11
Elektra (#1 Only) 1 1
Fantastic Four, The (345-416) 345-348, 350-359, 361-364, 366-367, 371-374 24
Fantastic Four, The 1996 Series (#1 Only) 1 1
Gambit (1-4) 1 1
Generation X (1-21) 12-21 10
G.I. Joe (105-155) 105-110, 112-114-119, 122, 124, 127, 130-139, 140-142 30
Ghost Rider, The (6-75) 19-20, 23-29, 31-44 23
Ghost Rider Annual (1993 Only) 1 1
Ghost Rider / Blaze: Spirits of Vengeance (1-23) 1-5, 7, 9, 11-12, 14 10
Incredible Hulk, The (374-447) 375-393, 395-396, 399-412, 447 36
Independence Day (0-2) 1 1
Infinity Crusade (1-6) 1-3, 6 4
Infinity War (1-6) 2-6 5
Iron Man (261-332) 261-264, 266-270, 272-275, 277-299 36
Lethal Foes of Spider-Man (1-4) 1-4 4
Marvel Tales (242-291) 242-257, 261-271, 273-277, 279-280 34
Marvel Versus DC (2-3) 2-3 2
Midnight Sons Unlimited (1-9) 1 1
Morbius The Living Vampire (1-32) 1-2, 4-9, 12 9
New Mutants, The (94-100) 94-100 7
Night Thrasher (1-21) 3-5 3
Night Thrasher: Four Control (1-4) 4 1
Punisher, The (41-104) 44-47, 48-56, 60, 63-66, 75, 78, 81 21
Punisher 2099, The (1-34) 1-4, 7-8, 10 7
Punisher Annual, The (1993 Only) 6 1
Punisher Holiday Special (1-3) 1 1
Punisher: The Origin of Microchip (1-2) 1 1
Punisher Summer Special (1-3) 3 1
Ravage 2099 (1-33) 1-8, 10-11 10
Ren & Stimpy Show, The (1-44) 12-13 2
Sabretooth (1-4) 1, 3 2
Secret Defenders, The () 1-10 10
Sensational Spider-Man, The (1-10) 4-5, 8 3
Silver Surfer (42-122) 43-53, 55, 60-64, 67, 69-75, 77-82, 84, 86-87 34
Silver Surfer / Warlock: Resurrection (1-4) 1 1
Spectacular Spider-Man (169-240)  169-172, 174-175, 178-183, 186-187, 189-207, 234, 238, 240 36
Speed Demon (1) 1 1
Spider-Boy (1) 1 1
Spider-Man 1990 (3-74) 32, 34-35, 41, 68, 72, 74 7
Spider-Man 2099 (1-46) 1-9, 11-15, 42-43, 45-46 18
Spider-Man Classics (1-16) 2-3, 9 3
Spider-Man Unlimited (1-14) 1-3 3
Star Trek Voyager (#1 Only) 1 1
Tekworld (1-24) 4 1
Thor, The Mighty (424-502) 425, 427-428, 429-469 44
Thor, The Mighty Annual (1993 Only) 18 1
Thunderstrike (1-24) 1-3 3
Transformers (71-80) 71-75, 77-80 9
Uncanny X-Men (269-338) 269-276, 278-304, 306-307, 329-338 47
Uncanny X-Men Annual (1993 Only) 17 1
Venom, Funeral Pyre (1-3) 1-3 3
Venom, Lethal Protector (1-6) 1-6 6
Venom, The Madness (1-3) 1-2 2
Warlock Chronicles (1-8) 2-6 5
Web of Spider-Man (69-129) 69-78, 80-84 87, 90-108 35
Web of Spider-Man Annual (1993 Only) 9 1
What If… (18-91) 18, 23-26, 28-31, 34-37, 44-46, 49, 54-55, 84-85, 89, 91 23
Wolverine (32-107) 48-56, 58-59, 61-62, 67-76, 98-99, 101-107 32
Wolverine and The Punisher: Damaging Evidence (1-3) 1-3 3
X-Factor (59-128) 59-97, 119-123, 125-126 46
X-Factor Annual (1993 Only) 8 1
X-Force (1-60) 1, 4-5, 7-9, 11-23, 25-29, 51-60 34
X-Man (1-21) 12-21 10
X-Men (1-58) 1a, 1b, 1c, 1d, 2, 4-8, 10-16, 18-26, 49, 51-58 35
X-Men Annual (1993 Only) 2 1
X-Men 2099 (1-35) 1-3 3
X-Men Adventures (1-15) 1-14 14
X-Men Unlimited (1-12) 2 1
X-Patrol (1) 1 1
     
                                                                                                                                                        Total        1,054
     
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1 minute ago, redsox1946 said:

Covers you requested.

If I can be of any help with other things associated with AUS price variants, let me know.  I have 200+ give or take.

Thanks.

punmicro2.jpg

Cheers redsox! :headbang:

I'll add them to the files / list. That Punisher cover's a cracker isn't it :bigsmile:

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Morning Fans of Aussie PeeVee's :)

I've added a new title to the list - "Stryfe's Strike File" - yay!

stryke.PNG.bdae3e93a977a56a25866b6f571022f7.PNG

 

It's a one shot, which brings us up to 1,063 confirmed AUS copies across 94 titles.

It's a bit of an odd one as it has no cover date - the GCD has this as a January 1993 book so, being an AUS first wave book, it's cover date would - if it had one - be April. No barcode image available - other US copies show that it is on the back cover. 

And there's the pencilled 'N5' which we now know the background on.

All good fun :)

1b.thumb.jpg.8a9bac33fa2c2030c8f0f5c7868d5a9f.jpg

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3 hours ago, redsox1946 said:

That's a cool find! Last week I did a "sweep" of my own looking for some possible lesser known titles like this, but to no avail.  Yet.

Keep looking Redsox - bound to be a few more out there hiding... (thumbsu

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