Post Your Top 3 Personal Comic Book/Original Art Acquisitions of 2018! 5 5

[lizards2]

6 minutes ago, deadleg said:

Two can play that game, mister chain yanker.

[deadleg]

11 minutes ago, lizards2 said:

Two can play that game, mister chain yanker.

 

[wolverine180]

On 12/11/2018 at 8:02 PM, batman_fan said:

I have only posted these about a hundred times but what the heck, scored my 1st, 2nd, and 3rd Peanuts original strips. These things are amazing in person 

Those are just epic. Congrats. One day I may own an original. Thanks for sharing these beauties

[wolverine180]

On 12/13/2018 at 4:27 PM, revat said:

Glad to see Darkhawk get some love .   I just got into comics around the time he was introduced.  He was an instant favorite for me. 

[MisterX]

Great stuff so far, everybody. It's always interesting to see what other collectors are into. 

Here are my top 3, and their reasons why...

1) Tomb of Darkness 20, British Pence Variant

For the past couple of years I've been picking up the occassional pence variant. Then I decided to focus on just the BA Marvel horror reprints. I like them because the stories are cool (usually Kirby and Ditko), the books are scarce with low print runs and survivability rates, very few collectors seem to care about them, and they're easily snagged from the Brits because they don't like them either! (Or course, with one notable Boardie exception!) 

Anyway, I really enjoy the cover to ToD #20, which also has a thirty-cent variant cover that I do not own. I'd be curious to know the print runs on both of the price variants compated to the regular twenty-five cent edition.

2) Creepy 5

I'd been looking for a high grade copy for a few years, and was pleased to find one at Harley Yee's booth at the NYCC. My absolute favorite Frazetta cover of all time.

3) Hostess Fruit Pie OA The Penguin in "The Cuckoo Cuckoos"

My top aquisition, by far! What can I say? I started reading comics in the Bronze age, and these Hostess ads were everywhere. The OA is tough to find, I'd been trying to land one for several years. (Although now it looks like the Tex Blaisdell family is letting go of quite a few at auction.) This particular ad checks all my boxes. It's surreal, the artwork is fun, everytime I look at it I hear Burgess Meredith squawking, "waak, waak, waak," and Hostess fruit pies save the day with their tender, flaky crusts and real fruit filling.

 

[Pirate]

My top 3, no pictures as usual

WWBN 32 7.5  Was a raw 5.0

Amazing Spiderman #194 CGC 9.6, was a voldy 9.0

Marvel Premiere #15 CGC 9.2 was a voldy 8.5

 

Edited December 19, 2018 by Pirate

[PopKulture]

1 hour ago, MisterX said:

 

Interesting array of faves! I especially like the OA for the Hostess ad: I remember those ads well.  

[lhcomics]

If this thread was showing the 3 comics you sacrificed to get a grail I could do that. Anyway that grail will come early next year so I can't post it yet.

I did pick this 1938 Al Taliaferro Donald Duck art and framed it for my office. 

I believe this is the 3rd earliest known Donald strip art. Shown is the art and a screenshot of April 25 1938 newspaper comics page.

[Mephisto]

I went a little off the rails this year.  I actually just picked up my most wanted piece (that was actually for sale, it’s the first picture).

I will probably never spend as much as I did on this Hildebrandt piece but it was a real treat picking the piece up. My girlfriend and I got to spend two hours with Greg and his wife Jean this weekend and was given a full tour of their place. It was amazing getting to talk to him about hanging out with Michael Jackson at Neverland Ranch in the late 80’s and hearing about various pieces he did over the years.

I’ve wanted this Star Wars piece for many many years.

I love Bob Larkin’s art and I love Loki so to get this piece was a a real treat.

 

Edited December 19, 2018 by Mephisto

[kav]

This thread is very depressing to old Kav.  Setting my entire collection out by the dumpster.  What was I thinking?

[Bronty]

I've bought very few comics this past year as most of my collecting budget has gone elsewhere, but these are two I enjoyed

 

 

 

As for OA  I don't think I bought any purely comic OA this past year so this would be the closest thing since Boris is known in comic circles.   (Golden Axe 2).

 

Edited December 19, 2018 by Bronty

[Mephisto]

Very Canadian Dan...except for the Boris!

[GoldCap]

Lots of excellent pickups posted so far to say the least!

As with last year, I didn't pick up a whole lot this year and I lost out on way more auctions than I won but here are my top 3 pickups...

Diary Secrets #28 - Tied for my most liked Baker cover with Cinderella Love #25

Captain America Comics #4 - I really like this cover!  It's one of my favorites from the entire series.  My first Simon & Kirby issue! My earliest issue previously was #27.  Luckily this was low enough grade/restored so I could afford it 

Bob Lubbers Wings faux-cover art - I'm a big fan of Bob Lubbers and GGA so this was pretty much a must have for me.  "This piece was created in ink and watercolor with a printed paste-up logo on bright white 8.5" x 11" paper."  I actually don't have this in hand yet, but I wait with bated breath every day  

Edited December 19, 2018 by GoldCap
spelling

[bc]

In 2018 I completed my PHM collection with these two (both from ComicLink auctions):

The third would be this one to add to my small GA collection of Pre-WW2 Schomburg covers (from a local convention). Really wanted one of these since I have a copy of the book they are previewing on the cover. Been trying to pick up books with promo ads for other books I have.

-bc

[valiantman]

23 hours ago, Pirate said:

Amazing Spiderman CGC 9.6, was a voldy 9.0

Impressive!  Or maybe not. 

It depends on which issue. 

[Pirate]

3 hours ago, valiantman said:

Impressive!  Or maybe not. 

It depends on which issue. 

194

[Crimebuster]

Most of my buying this year was Bronze Age romance, which is where it's at! I got a lot of great romance comics, though I still have a ways to go to finish my BA Romance checklist. And then, of course, a lifetime of upgrading begins. 

Sprinkled in, though, were a few bigger, grail-ish purchases, which I am stoked about. It was a really good year for collecting for me!

Here are my top three acquisitions of the year.

 

1. Boy Comics #3

Obviously, the big grail for me. This was a birthday present from my awesome girlfriend!

 

 

2. Jughead #89-91 original cover art

This three-part series introduces Jughead's arch-frenemy Trula Twyst, and the original art for the cover of #89 was one of my major all-time grails I never thought I would see up for sale. When I saw this set on ebay, I snatched them up immediately!

For non-Jughead fans, this would kind of be like getting the cover art for Iron Fist #14 or something. 

 

 

3. Just Married #104

Hard to find comic, harder to find in nice shape. Still a bit of a sleeper, but for my money, one of the true romance keys, thanks to its provocative and fantastic interracial kiss cover, which I believe is unique among classic romance comics. 

[letsgrumble]

22 hours ago, Mephisto said:

I went a little off the rails this year.  I actually just picked up my most wanted piece (that was actually for sale, it’s the first picture).

I will probably never spend as much as I did on this Hildebrandt piece but it was a real treat picking the piece up. My girlfriend and I got to spend two hours with Greg and his wife Jean this weekend and was given a full tour of their place. It was amazing getting to talk to him about hanging out with Michael Jackson at Neverland Ranch in the late 80’s and hearing about various pieces he did over the years.

I’ve wanted this Star Wars piece for many many years.

I love Bob Larkin’s art and I love Loki so to get this piece was a a real treat.

 

This is great! 

[Buzzetta]

Okay... 

1st... whoa to the Calvin and Hobbes piece, Tec27 and AF15 9.0, makes me kind of want to upgrade mine... 

Especially the Calvin and Hobbes piece though... you just never see Watterson art.

Anyway.. It was another slower year as I focused more on some house changes and quickly buying back my GI Joe figures.  So, three comics, three toys, and perhaps one toy... 

GI Joe: Issue 20 Page 29: Half splash page of Clutch, the first GI Joe figure I ever received, plus an earlier issue from the run.  Special credit goes to @jaybuck43 who had to deal with my whining chatter on how annoying it is how GI Joe pages went up in value as I tossed and turned on pulling the trigger on this.  I think Bechara made a deal just to finally no longer have to deal with me staring at it.  "Yo, Adrian, we did it!" - Purchased at NYCBM

Marvel Fanfare #42 Page 2 - Featuring Spider-man - Blow it up... this sums up 80's black costume Spider-man name checking everything in the book that makes Peter Parker who he is.  The page was loaded with Spider-man and dynamic in every panel as you get the feeling of Spidey navigating the canyons of New York City.  I found it on eBay. 

GI Joe Issue 30 Page 2 - Honestly stumbled upon this at NYCC.  I was going to go with an Eternal Warrior cover I picked up, (shameless plug and cheat for a fourth item) but I REALLY liked this page featuring Zartan and the Drednoks doing their thing. For anyone familiar but trying to place the page this comes from the red cover issue where Buzzer is chainsawing off the tailfins of a skystriker.  Anyway... Zartan doing his thing. 

BONUS: GI Joe Clutch 1982/1983 - This was a preproduction / production figure.  Again, Clutch was my first GI Joe figure. This was a Vendor Sample Pilot / Engineering Pilot or Final Engineering Pilot.  This means it was one of the figures passed around the Hasbro offices to determine how they were going to proceed with the figure.  The provenance comes from Dan Klingensmith who has been repping Hasbro creators and seems to be a guy that is to GI Joe what Steve Sansweet is to Star Wars collecting (on a smaller scale).  He facilitated the sale from the Hasbro employee who in this case was the marketing director. Thanks to @comicwiz for leading me to this group. 

What is a VSP/EP/FEP ?

Spoiler

VSP (Vendor Sample Pilot): This would have been the first molded complete(ish) sample sent from the factory to check on whether the colors were correct, spray operations were correct, if all the weapons or accessories that were intended to be packaged with the figure were included, etc. Fit, function and details other usually needed to be dialed in. 
EP (Engineering Pilot): If a VSP has imperfections that needed to be corrected, comments would be sent to the factory to make the necessary corrections. (ex. Weapon missing, spray op incorrect, etc). The EP would be sent following the correction(s) back to be reviewed. 
FEP (Final Engineering Pilot): The FEP would be sent from the factory once all the changes occurred. These samples would resemble the final product that would go into production. Once approved, some would be sent off to Quality Assurance to do the appropriate testing. (There have been occurrences of minor changes that the factory made after production started and these would be considered a running change.)

 

 

Edited December 20, 2018 by Buzzetta

[ExNihilo]

I can't keep up with all the great stuff posted here.  Honestly, those C&H and Peanuts strips.  Wow.  And of course the AF15, Tec27, and OA ASM 300 cover.  Yeesh.

So my modest haul for the year:

Captain America #700 CGC SS 9.8 signed and sketched by Ash Gonzales; signed and quote by Chris Evans

 

Star Wars #1 CGC SS 9.8 Mark Hamill

 

And then a tie between Incredible Hulk #180 CGC 8.5 and Fantastic Four #49 CGC 7.0 (not pictured)