I decided to finish my What If...? Vol 1 set... and then... 1 1

[RhialtoTheMarvellous]

I thought if I'm going to fill in the gaps in my What If...? collection that I might as well get some mint copies of what I'm missing.

Then I started looking at the various books I already had and realized that as a young man I was most interested in reading said stories and not particularly picky about their condition. In other words the new books were making my old books look bad.

Granted, issue #1 was my first buy off of the wall of a comic store, but even that one was never mint.

At this point I'm done fleshing out all the missing issues, but now I have the problem of, I do have a bunch of very mint issues, but I still have a bunch of not so mint issues and a lot of dupes of the non-mint ones.

I've discovered what many of you already know, the print quality for the issues from the late 70s is wildly variable. The 80s issues are the easy ones to find in mint condition in general, though I'm starting to become really really picky about any defects after finding issues that look basically unread.

I'm going down a rabbit hole of comic book collecting. At least I picked a relatively cheap set to do it on I guess.

 

[FineCollector]

Good time to sell What If...? as the young'n's and speculators are loading up for a what if style tv show that's rumored.  I'd clear out the extras soon, prices are strong across the board at the moment.

Edited July 27, 2020 by FineCollector

[MisterX]

Dig your username.

[WernerVonDoom]

15 hours ago, RhialtoTheMarvellous said:

I thought if I'm going to fill in the gaps in my What If...? collection that I might as well get some mint copies of what I'm missing.

Then I started looking at the various books I already had and realized that as a young man I was most interested in reading said stories and not particularly picky about their condition. In other words the new books were making my old books look bad.

Granted, issue #1 was my first buy off of the wall of a comic store, but even that one was never mint.

At this point I'm done fleshing out all the missing issues, but now I have the problem of, I do have a bunch of very mint issues, but I still have a bunch of not so mint issues and a lot of dupes of the non-mint ones.

I've discovered what many of you already know, the print quality for the issues from the late 70s is wildly variable. The 80s issues are the easy ones to find in mint condition in general, though I'm starting to become really really picky about any defects after finding issues that look basically unread.

I'm going down a rabbit hole of comic book collecting. At least I picked a relatively cheap set to do it on I guess.

What If? was one of the first 10 comics I bought back in the day (and I guess the first run I completed).  It was actually a great intro to the Marvel Universe because it had everyone's origin stories (sort of).  I love that series.  

[mec3437]

I have about 1/3 of vol. 1 and a little over 1/2 of vol. 2 completed.  I think I got the pricey (or at least pricey ones now) out of the way early, but finding NM copies can be a pain in the butt.  I've cleaned out my local shops so now it's all online/mail order for me.  I know the pain though of wanting everything to be in a fairly uniform condition.  When I completed my X-Men/Uncanny run, I went back through the issues from 100 up and started swapping out my raggedy copies for NM ones.  Good luck to you on your quest.  

[ThothAmon]

One of my favorite books to read as a kid growing up. When Conan fought Wolverine ...  Only real key seems to be 10 for Jane Foster as Thor. 

[RhialtoTheMarvellous]

15 hours ago, FineCollector said:

Good time to sell What If...? as the young'n's and speculators are loading up for a what if style tv show that's rumored.  I'd clear out the extras soon, prices are strong across the board at the moment.

Yeah, I guess it's the wrong time to buy for me. I had no idea that they were making the What If tv show when I started buying a few months ago. That said, it's still not that expensive to get the books overall. Certainly not nearly as bad as some other copper age stuff.
 

12 hours ago, MisterX said:

Dig your username.

Not many people catch the reference.
 

4 hours ago, Werner_Von_Doom said:

What If? was one of the first 10 comics I bought back in the day (and I guess the first run I completed).  It was actually a great intro to the Marvel Universe because it had everyone's origin stories (sort of).  I love that series.  

Yeah, I was a real junkie for that sort of thing as well. I have every Marvel Universe issue for that reason. I got to read about all the stories that I couldn't afford to buy.
 

1 hour ago, mec3437 said:

I have about 1/3 of vol. 1 and a little over 1/2 of vol. 2 completed.  I think I got the pricey (or at least pricey ones now) out of the way early, but finding NM copies can be a pain in the butt.  I've cleaned out my local shops so now it's all online/mail order for me.  I know the pain though of wanting everything to be in a fairly uniform condition.  When I completed my X-Men/Uncanny run, I went back through the issues from 100 up and started swapping out my raggedy copies for NM ones.  Good luck to you on your quest.  

I'm just missing issue 25 now. I might just be being extra picky now on some of the early issues.
 

1 hour ago, ThothAmon said:

One of my favorite books to read as a kid growing up. When Conan fought Wolverine ...  Only real key seems to be 10 for Jane Foster as Thor. 

That's the most expensive one and luckily I had a decent copy of it already.

[piper]

I still have my Vol 1 set. It was also the first run I completed (long before the internet). I really should have bought higher grade copies.

It was always about the stories with respect to What If. I’d love for them to do an omnibus edition.

 

[piper]

On 7/27/2020 at 1:05 PM, RhialtoTheMarvellous said:

I thought if I'm going to fill in the gaps in my What If...? collection that I might as well get some mint copies of what I'm missing.

Then I started looking at the various books I already had and realized that as a young man I was most interested in reading said stories and not particularly picky about their condition. In other words the new books were making my old books look bad.

Granted, issue #1 was my first buy off of the wall of a comic store, but even that one was never mint.

At this point I'm done fleshing out all the missing issues, but now I have the problem of, I do have a bunch of very mint issues, but I still have a bunch of not so mint issues and a lot of dupes of the non-mint ones.

I've discovered what many of you already know, the print quality for the issues from the late 70s is wildly variable. The 80s issues are the easy ones to find in mint condition in general, though I'm starting to become really really picky about any defects after finding issues that look basically unread.

I'm going down a rabbit hole of comic book collecting. At least I picked a relatively cheap set to do it on I guess.

 

Looks like you could quickly assemble multiple sets and sell them on eBay?

[piper]

On 7/28/2020 at 7:37 AM, ThothAmon said:

One of my favorite books to read as a kid growing up. When Conan fought Wolverine ...  Only real key seems to be 10 for Jane Foster as Thor. 

Unfortunately my No. 10 is not a 9.8.

My favourite story would either Phoenix had lived or the Korvac vs. the Avengers one.

[RhialtoTheMarvellous]

The extras have definitely piled up. I'm at probably 50+ extras and that's after keeping a second copy of each issue as a backup (though in some cases it's because I'm having a hard time telling which one is better quality).

[universal soldier]

This was such a fun series to read. My early OO copies are "well read" for sure (3.0 - 6.0 range) but my 10 looks to be about an 8.0.

[RhialtoTheMarvellous]

This is where I'm at so far. Complete set. 9.0+ for the majority of them. There are a couple that are probably in the 7s and 8s where I could find a better copy, but in these cases there are issues either with cost or whether I'm grading the right way.

#1 I have two of these, one of which is one I bought back in the 80s. It's a little dingy from living in the tropics for a time. The one I'm displaying here is a very nice copy, but it has the typical Marvel chipping on the right side which is a let down. My old one doesn't have this, but has other issues.

#3 I've looked at a variety of these. I have three copies right now, one of which is the one on display here. That one is in excellent condition, but it has a printing error at the top where ink has been over sprayed onto it. I've seen a few copies like this. I'm not sure if this gets dinged on grade for that, but I would bet it does.

#10 This is the key book since people attribute this as the first appearance of Jane Foster as Thor. I've had this book since the 80s. It could possibly make an 8.0 with a pressing, but it has a tiny bit of chipping at the top and a tiny color breaking crease. People are getting $75-100+ for issues that are worse than mine.

#24 I'm just being stingy on this one. I kinda don't want to buy more lots and for individual copies people want $25+ for a mint one.

[divad]

So which one do you need? #24 or #25? I can't tell . . .  I may have one for you. 

[EC Star&Bar]

For the #3 you own, likely the ink you mentioned on the top is distributor's ink, sprayed on the edges of stacked copies for their coding purposes.

I can still recall buying my copy of #1 off of a spinner rack in 1977 (edit - actually Nov. 1976, when it went on-sale).  I was pretty much a DC-only buyer, but this was a notable exception.

Edited August 13, 2020 by EC Star&Bar
added info

[RhialtoTheMarvellous]

11 hours ago, divad said:

So which one do you need? #24 or #25? I can't tell . . .  I may have one for you. 

I've got all of them at this point, it's a matter of whether I want to upgrade the quality of some of them to get everything up to a NM+ level. #24 is not a bad copy, but it's not quite there.

2 hours ago, EC Star&Bar said:

For the #3 you own, likely the ink you mentioned on the top is distributor's ink, sprayed on the edges of stacked copies for their coding purposes.

I can still recall buying my copy of #1 off of a spinner rack in 1977 (edit - actually Nov. 1976, when it went on-sale).  I was pretty much a DC-only buyer, but this was a notable exception.

That sounds about right on the ink, it's too often seen on the book to be anything else. That's cool that you got to buy #1 off the rack. I was two years old when it came out. Younger folks right? I know how you feel though when I look in the copper section and see people enthusing over getting a copy of ASM #300 when I bought mine off the rack.

Buying comics off a spinner or at a newstand was always so random, but at the same time as a kid really magical.

[divad]

So that's a no? don't bother? 

 

[musicmeta]

Nice set of "What If" books!

[RhialtoTheMarvellous]

On 8/16/2020 at 2:14 AM, divad said:

So that's a no? don't bother? 

 

Sorry, about the lack of response. Busy week. I'll be happy to take a look at 24 or 25 if you have either or both. I haven't got particularly great copies of either.

[ThothAmon]

 Tip of the proverbial What Ifberg.