A friend of mine asked me the other day if his collection of near-mint comic books had any real value to them, and on the surface they should have been worth a few smackers. Not retirement ash mind you, but enough to buy some cool toys if my pal could have found a buyer for them. After all, with Spawn #1, a pristine white cover version of X-Men: Age of Apocalypse Alpha and a decent run of Spider-Man from Todd McFarlane’s days as lead artist, the bundle looked good!
Only problem? They’re all local printings. Back in the mid-1990s, a local comic book publisher got the rights to reprint dozens of series here, and they operated under the name of Battle Axe Press. When it comes to comic book collecting, collectors want the goods that are as original as possible. That means a first print from North America most of the time, that is in as clean a condition as can be.
Battle Axe Press may have had the right idea on spreading comic books locally but at the same time those issues were printed on paper that wasn’t even fit to be used in a petrol station restroom, had sub-par colours and were plastered with the most annoying local ads that you could think of. There was some value to those comics though, because these were meant to be rolled up and shoved into your back pocket, read roughly and dog-eared when you wanted to return to certain pages to gaze at the art of industry heavyweights such as Joe Maduereira and Andy Kubert.
They were good reprints, but poor investments. So if you’re sitting on a stack of them right now hoping for a payday that’ll make Bitcoin advocates green with envy, you might as well sit back and dry your tears with the absorbent paper once this reality sets in.
Batman #76 by Gabriele Dell’Otto
The Immortal Hulk #22 by Alex Ross
House of X #2 by Pepe Larraz
The Green Lantern #10 by Kaare Andrews
DCeased #4 by Tasia M.S
Daredevil #9 by Julian Totino Todesco
Outcast #42 by Paul Azaceta
Harley Quinn #64 by Frank Cho
Deathstroke #46 by Skan Srisuwan
Absolute Carnage #1 by Ryan Stegman
The Punisher #14 by Greg Smallwood
Lois Lane #2 by Mike Perkins
DIE #6 by Peach Momoko
Buffy the Vampire Slayer #7 by March Aspinall
Sea of Stars #2 by Stephen Green
Ronin Island #5 by Giannis Milonogiannis
Descendent #4 by Juan Doe
The Death-Defying ‘Devil #1 by Tyler Kirkham
Eternal Thirst of Dracula: Book 2 #1 by Mike Kalvoda
Last Updated: August 5, 2019
LegionZA
August 6, 2019 at 05:23
That Green Lantern cover, just wow
Admiral Chief Umbra
August 6, 2019 at 08:44
Second favourite for me, the Batman one is uber intense