20 cents here

20 cents here. My weekly allowance/chores money was $1, so I'd find a few cents for tax and ride my bike to 7-11 every week for 5 brand new comics, mainly DC titles at that time.

I think most of my early comic buying was at either the $0.25 cover price, or the $0.30 price point, but I think I got $2 for weekly allowance, so I could buy a few more comics.

It was different here in California in regards to taxes on comic books because I distinctly remember they didn't tax comic books until '91. I remember having a discussion about it with the owner of my local comic store at the time. It must have been different in your state.

Oh, it could have been the same here. My memory isn't good enough to remember exact details of things from the 70s, I was just guessing the tax/change thing. But I miss the days of waiting for the next Plop! or Superman Family giant.

Yeah, I loved the 100 pagers. I think DC thought they were getting away ripping off readers with just 17 pages of new story and the rest reprints but looking back now it was the best thing they did. For me it opened up a lot GA and SA stories that otherwise I wouldn't have never read if not for the reprints.

Great point. Those reprints helped get me more into comics as well. Unless I'm forgetting something, they backed way off on including reprints in current titles. I would think it would be a good strategy to use, even today.

I think the only way to get GA, SA or even BA stuff are in TPBs or HC editions and those cost and arm an a leg sometimes.

I kinda wish DC and Marvel had a similar deal with grocery stores that Archie still has... I know they used to, at least. I loved those cheapish, thick digests, which I think would be perfect for reprinting a mix of old and new stories.

Yeah, the Blue Ribbon Digest series. I still have a few of those in my collection. Two Green Lantern books and The New Teen Titans. The TT one actually has an original story in it.

I used to love the Blue Ribbon Digests! The 100-pagers too. I admit I once bought an issue of Savage Dragon just because they were riffing on the 100-Page Super Spectacular cover designs.

I didn't know the reprinted that as a Blue Ribbon; I never saw it before. I still have the originals. That was an awesome story.

Yeah, I still have the digest and it was how I first read the story. I love Aparo.

Aparo was awesome with his early work at DC; especially the Spectre run in Adventure. His work on B&B was good, also. He was my second favorite artist after Adams; they were both striving for that realistic look. I actually thought his backgrounds were better than Adams. However, I didn't really like his later work on Batman and Detective. It changed in the 80's and 90's; maybe it was De Carlo's inks. It just wasn't as good as his early work.

BTW, even though that cover was done by Aparo; I believe the interior art (at least in the second part) was done by Ernie (Chua) Chan.

I'm sure you're right. I haven't read the story in a while.

Loved those DC Digests. For awhile I was buying them all, then later went back and tried to fill in the gaps, may own most of them.

It was his work on Bats in that era that I first saw his work, actually. And now that you bring it up, I'm reminded that most of the issues I had with his work I bought a few years after their original publication in those overstock 3-packs that DC put out in the early 90s, where they'd put three issues of a given title together and there would be a sheet of cardboard inserted between two of the issues. The top of the sheet stood above the comics and had the pricing information, etc., and the rest of it had eight different trading cards printed onto it you could cut out.

As a funny aside... Adams is bat-shit-(hehe)-crazy. You can find his theories on science online where he basically believes that the Earth is hollow and growing and everything we know about physics, gravity and paleontology is wrong.

Well, maybe I got a reprieve from quitting when DC decided to keep their line of comics to the $2.99 price point, but reducing the page count from 22 pages to 20 pages. The comics that had the back-up stories will go back to 20 pages and $2.99 price point. The other licensed comics with the $3.99 price will also go down to $2.99 with a 20 page count.

There will be a few $3.99 titles with 30 page count, but the majority of the line will fall in with the $2.99 price and 20 page count.

http://www.comicbookresources.com/?p...ticle&id=28738

He's been probably reading too much Warlord. He does sound nuts on his Youtube videos.

Marvel is following a similar suit with a $2.99 price tag on new titles starting January 2011.


http://www.comicbookresources.com/?p...ticle&id=28740


I was in the process of whittling down my monthly haul not because of price (well, that did factor in a little) but because of time. I have 4 short boxes filled with comics I haven't read yet thanks to a job that's having me jump from country to country for the past three years. I now have the money to spend on tons of comics but not the time to read them.



I was debating either digital download (legal) or trade paperbacks.

Marvel's response is tepid.

Sorry for the wall of text in advance. But here's my little rant.

I quit after I bought my 4,000th comic book in 2008. I still love the characters and enjoy the movies / animated series. But have no regrets in quitting. Now companies like Marvel release every Spider-Man on PC disc (PDF) for a decent price. You get them all and save a lot of money. No more missing gaps. It's not the same as the real thing. But it sure saves on space. I've had to lug those heavy long boxes all over. I tried to sell them on eBay. Sold about 500 comics. But now days no matter what I put on eBay no one even looks any more. I see other comics on eBay and no one is buying them. So I'll wait for a movie release like Thor or Captain America and then sell sets of those characters comics. It's about the only way these days. Comic shops only complain how they don't make any money and are going under. They don't want our comics. Yard sale / flea market shoppers only want to pay like a quarter per comic no matter what it is ... or steal it from you. Most everyone I know all quit comics so they don't want them. I am shocked at current prices of comics. I don't see how anyone buys them anymore. One comic book = one DVD (or even 2 DVDs at Big Lots.) So it's just over for me. Just like action figures. I bought 200 of the new Star Wars figures (tons of vehicles) and finally realized what am I going to do with all of this stuff? No place to display it. I was wasting money. So I sold it all off. (My entire Star Wars action figure collection. Not just those 200.) No regrets.

I liked watching TV Super Heroes in the 70's when I was a kid. I didn't start collecting comic books until 1990. First book I bought was Captain America 367. It was the Acts of Vengeance story line. Magneto is standing on top of a defeated Red Skull. I read this book and liked it so much, I had to go buy back issues of all books covering this story line. I then set up subscriptions for Avenger, Captain America, Thor, Iron Man, Fanstastic Four, Daredevil, Hulk, Spider-Man and X-Men. I started buying lots of back issues. Bought and Completed series of Power Man, Iron Fist, Captain Marvel, Spider Woman (Jessica Drew). Bought all the back issues of Punisher and set up subscription. Same with Wolverine, Nova and Quasar. Then added all the other X titles. Also added any new hero books that came out: Darkhawk, Sleepwalker, New Warriors, Moon Knight and alot of others. When they started cancelling good titles, I started slipping back. I was buying about every title Marvel came out with. But the prices went up again around 2000, 2001. I bought a house and wasn't reading as much anymore, but I was still buying them. Then about 6 monthes before 9-11, I came to my senses and I stopped buying all together. Cancelled all subscription. Got too expensive. I still have 18 long boxes of comics. I want to go back and read the earlier issues, but haven't found time to. I'm going to be going through all of them and selling off the limited issues: Black Wolfe, Crimson Dynimo, NFL Superpro, Sleepwalker and some 4 issue limited series X titles. I was caught up on reading everything Avengers (Captain America, Iron Man, ect..) and Fantastic 4. I stopped reading them when I got the Onslaught Saga. I stopped reading X-Titles when I finished The Age of Apocalyspe saga.