Golden Age curiosities Batman Detective Comics 0

[Batgyro]

Ok. So, I figured out many, many years ago that some dealers that bragged about being Overstreet Comics Guide advisers had artificially inflated prices to benefit books they had in stock. We all kind of know that. But, in doing so, certain books have been overvalued by inaccurately describing them as a first appearance of, first cover appearance of, change of costume, etc, etc. That leads to my question about a particular book. There seems to be a consensus that Detective Comics 40 is the first cover appearance of The Joker despite him not appearing in the issue at all. I know it is. You know it is. They had simply changed his skin color and his purple suit to brown. He even has the hatchet that appeared in his second story from Batman #1 (which I assume was to be his 1st appearance story in Tec 40). So, no argument with that. I agree. That being said, the 1st appearance of another Batman biggie, Two-Face, is not afforded the same common sense approach. Detective Comics #66 is the first appearance of Two-Face. No argument there. However, here's where it gets murky. On the cover of Detective Comics #66, we have a man standing on a ledge wearing a brown checkered suit with brown fedora firing a pistol at Robin as Batman approaches. This is the same suit and hat that Two-Face Harvey Kent (Dent) is wearing in the Tec #66 story. On the cover of Tec #66, only the right side of the man's face is visible to maintain the "surprise" of the Harvey's transformation until you reach that point in the story. This of course references Two-Face's damaged left side of his face and normal right side of his face as he's normally portrayed. The Two-Face concept is also referenced by Robin covering half of the clock face. This is readily apparent as the first Two-Face cover. Here's my issue.

That brings me to Detective Comics #68. Tec #68 is called and listed by our grading companies, as the 1st cover appearance of Two-Face. The cover of Tec #68 does show the "bad" left side of Two-Face's face and also features him in the same brown checkered suit with brown fedora I mentioned earlier on the cover, and in the story, of Tec #66. The Tec #68 1st page/splash page shows the same checkered suit and fedora clearly. Tec #68 appears to be incorrectly labeled as the first cover appearance of Two-Face. Therefore, this artificially inflates the price of Tec #68 and appears to document the comic incorrectly. Why is this not given a second thought and why don't the grading companies research the comics before putting this on their description? I've noticed that some collectors in recent years rely more on the grading labels than what's actually in the books (an unfortunate side effect of "slabbing"). Is there no way to have these probable oversights and mistakes fixed? Who would you even talk to at CGC to present the facts to them to review? Please give me your thoughts and comments on this topic.

[ft88]

Good points.  But the 68 cover is hella-better so there's that.  Let me point out that, in both Tecs, Robin looks like Luke Skywalker in the Bacta Tank: White, pudgey and with a loaded diaper.

[rjpb]

The cover to 'Tec #40 was clearly originally meant to reference "The Joker Returns" which ended up published in Batman #1, but I don't recall there being a scene in the first Two-face story with Robin tied to a clock. The cover from #66 is from an era when Detective comics often had nothing to do with the story inside, frequently featuring Robin in bondage. 

[rjpb]

I'll also note that Two-face's suit was colored as two-tone in his early appearances, and only half had a checked pattern.

[Gotham Kid]

1 hour ago, rjpb said:

The cover from #66 is from an era when Detective comics often had nothing to do with the story inside, frequently featuring Robin in bondage. 

indeed, examples of cover nothing to do with story.

 

Edited May 9, 2019 by Gotham Kid