An American goes hunting in Germany 0

[Hey Kids, Comics!]

My wife had to attend a conference in Germany and I tagged along mainly in the hopes of finding cool foreign Duck books. I hit two shops in Frankfurt when we arrived but nothing exciting to report from there. We drove to Paderborn, where the conference is, and it’s a comic wasteland. I checked Google maps and found that a little over an hour away was Dortmund where there are about half a dozen shops in a 30 minute radius so that’s where I headed. The first was Comic Haus, who had Scrooge and Donald on their sign. This obviously made me feel good about my chances. I found some cool German Ducks and a wonderful coffee table book on Don Rosa. I picked up a few older issues of Green Lantern, FF, Spidey, etc for friends as older books were cheaper than new ones!

 

[Hey Kids, Comics!]

The second stop was ComicLand in Dortmund. They LOVE hardcovers in Europe and this place was full of them. All the comic boxes on the top of the U shape section are trades. The bottom two sections all around it are long boxes alpha-numeric by company American issues (over 150 boxes of them). 99% of them were not priced and thus cover price. All of the obvious big books were gone, but there was still a lot of good finds to be had. I’m sure I missed some stuff as I don’t know EVERY good book, but below is some of what I picked up. Luckily, I planned pretty well and brought an empty rolling suitcase just in case I found a bunch of treasures. 

 

[Hey Kids, Comics!]

[ADAMANTIUM]

@Hey Kids, Comics! 

 

That's just Awesome! Loving the Punisher #102  to think that there are treasure troves around the world!

[Hey Kids, Comics!]

5 minutes ago, ADAMANTIUM said:

@Hey Kids, Comics! 

 

That's just Awesome! Loving the Punisher #102  to think that there are treasure troves around the world!

It wasn’t one of the books that I had never found in the wild until leaving the country! Add Venom 1 3rd print and Elephantmen 18 to that list too.

[ADAMANTIUM]

3 minutes ago, Hey Kids, Comics! said:

It wasn’t one of the books that I had never found in the wild until leaving the country! Add Venom 1 3rd print and Elephantmen 18 to that list too.

ah ya the elephantmen Campbell  Sweet! Were they all necessarily German editions? Still pretty cool  

[STORMSHADOW_80]

Great haul!

[ygogolak]

Awesome!

[manetteska]

3 hours ago, Hey Kids, Comics! said:

The second stop was ComicLand in Dortmund. They LOVE hardcovers in Europe and this place was full of them. All the comic boxes on the top of the U shape section are trades. The bottom two sections all around it are long boxes alpha-numeric by company American issues (over 150 boxes of them). 99% of them were not priced and thus cover price. All of the obvious big books were gone, but there was still a lot of good finds to be had. I’m sure I missed some stuff as I don’t know EVERY good book, but below is some of what I picked up. Luckily, I planned pretty well and brought an empty rolling suitcase just in case I found a bunch of treasures. 

 

Fantastic! I think these need to be fanned out a bit more.

I see: Elephantmen 18 sketch, Power Girl 27, Punisher 102, Superman Adventures 5, Flash 197, some Gotham City Sirens, some Hughes Wonder woman, Mon Knight 60...

[Hey Kids, Comics!]

44 minutes ago, manetteska said:

Fantastic! I think these need to be fanned out a bit more.

I see: Elephantmen 18 sketch, Power Girl 27, Punisher 102, Superman Adventures 5, Flash 197, some Gotham City Sirens, some Hughes Wonder woman, Mon Knight 60...

I purposely didn’t fan them out for the pic on Facebook as I have a lot of fellow collectors in my area who are “friends” of mine. I don’t think they necessarily deserve to know all the good books. The ones who know are aware of what books they are by the spine. The others don’t need to know.

[Hey Kids, Comics!]

1 hour ago, ADAMANTIUM said:

ah ya the elephantmen Campbell  Sweet! Were they all necessarily German editions? Still pretty cool  

No, all the books in that picture are American editions! The only German ones are the ducks and the Campbell Spiderman 

[manetteska]

10 minutes ago, Hey Kids, Comics! said:

I purposely didn’t fan them out for the pic on Facebook as I have a lot of fellow collectors in my area who are “friends” of mine. I don’t think they necessarily deserve to know all the good books. The ones who know are aware of what books they are by the spine. The others don’t need to know.

So showing off your books without showing off your books?

I can tell from spine as well, just some are mashed together and bad lighting/flash.

A couple Boys #1...

[1950's war comics]

i like the name  " Mickey Maus "  !!

[Hey Kids, Comics!]

23 minutes ago, manetteska said:

So showing off your books without showing off your books?

I can tell from spine as well, just some are mashed together and bad lighting/flash.

A couple Boys #1...

The best are on the top row and should all be recognizable. The ones you can’t see all of aw common Hughes WW, Deadpool’s, etc. nothing great there.

[Mercury Man]

So is there any particular reason why Donald Duck/Scrooge McDuck etc.  are big in Germany?   Explanation?  Donald was quite the Nazi fighter in the 1940's from some of the cartoons etc. 

Or is it one of those mysteries like Jerry Lewis in France, or Michael Jackson still popular in the Far East?

[the blob]

19 hours ago, Mercury Man said:

So is there any particular reason why Donald Duck/Scrooge McDuck etc.  are big in Germany?   Explanation?  Donald was quite the Nazi fighter in the 1940's from some of the cartoons etc. 

Or is it one of those mysteries like Jerry Lewis in France, or Michael Jackson still popular in the Far East?

The Germanic and Scandinavian countries love him. Some of the stuff is much more "literary" with them over there, donald is really a tortured soul, etc... I think they might be fond of him in France and Italy too.

Anyway, those look like great shops.  We went to the comic museum in Frankfurt, but we were not there long enough to do any comic hunting per se (and were there on a sunday as well). Hit a shop in Paris that was a little disappointing.

[fastballspecial]

Fantastic find there. Well worth the trip Great Job.

 

[Hey Kids, Comics!]

On 2/8/2018 at 11:27 PM, Mercury Man said:

So is there any particular reason why Donald Duck/Scrooge McDuck etc.  are big in Germany?   Explanation?  Donald was quite the Nazi fighter in the 1940's from some of the cartoons etc. 

Or is it one of those mysteries like Jerry Lewis in France, or Michael Jackson still popular in the Far East?

Finland is the big one for Donald. He's the number one pop culture figure in the nation. There are full page ads in the national newspaper for the upcoming issues of his comic. Most comics aren't for children in Europe as they're read mostly by teens and adults (even the Ducks). In Europe, Don Rosa is as popular as any American artist is here. When he does come in the States, he even wears a shirt that says something like I'm huge in Europe (especially Finland). 

Edited February 10, 2018 by Hey Kids, Comics!