Vel

I've been doing searches and finding hardcover versions of Hellsing vol's 1-9 - I haven't seen them on amazon, but rather on smaller book sellers, and ebay too.

There was a brief run of official Hellsing hardcover volumes in 2004, but it seems that's all there ever was from Darkhorse: http://search.barnesandnoble.com/Hel.../9780760768679

But recently, it seems someones been making prebinds of Hellsing paperbacks, meaning the paperback cover was scanned, then digitally printed on a hardcover and the book was rebound with that hardcover

Tower Books: http://www.tower.com/hellsing-volume...wapi/112106083


Does anyone know what's the quality of the paper or if these are worth the price? I know Darkhorse used to use toilet paper for pages a few yrs ago, and I'm wondering if they've changed to something more substantial recently?

Thanks for any help

benedict

From time to time members endeavour to slip in links that may be of personal benefit and for that reason we get a little antsy about certain ebay referrals.

Although do I believe this to be a genuine request for info, I've removed the ebay link so as to discourage the less scrupulous occasional reader/contributor here from thinking there is a green light for that sort of thing.

Hopefully sufficient answers will arise through reference to the text of the above post and the B&N/Tower links. And, of course, by posting this I bump the thread

fujishig

I don't think there was an initial run of HCs for the first four volumes, only the first one. Back then, DH had some deal with Barnes and Noble to make hardcovers of some of their manga, but they only did the first volumes of the series... I think they had an Akira and a Trigun one as well, not sure about Berserk. So there was definitely a B&N exclusive HC for volume 1.

As for the paper quality... which older DH trade are you referencing when you say it's like toilet paper? The quality of the paper in their manga has been pretty good, at least IMHO (and probably as a result, their manga is a bit more expensive than Tokyopop/Viz). It's certainly better than Tokyopop's recent paper, or the few CMX volumes I have. If these are truly rebindings of the DH volumes, the best thing to do would be to go to your local bookstore and flip through one.

I suspect, however, given that the price at tower is the same as the retail of the softcover book, that this is just a mistake in the listing.

Vel

I used to buy some manga. and the paper always seemed really thin compared to a book with text in it; so I never really bought any of the paperbacks of any manga; I asked around and it seemed a common opinion that manga publishers used cheap paper. I'm really comparing the paper thickness to a typical book, which is what led me to say that (mind you this was about 5 yrs ago or so)

I don't think these hardbacks are listing errors either, since on the ebay link(thanks Benedict for not deleting my thread ), it said the publisher was 'Pawprints' or something. I googled it, and it seems Pawprints is a small-time publisher who caters to those who can't otherwise get published - so they're a cheap self-publisher it seems.

What I'm really looking for, is a complete collection of the Hellsing series in hardcover; so I'm wondering if DH or anyone else is gonna make a hardcover with some decent paper.

Again, thanks for keeping my thread open and for any help

fujishig

They may be a small time publisher, but Hellsing already has a publisher in the US: Dark Horse. I'd think it would be illegal for them to rebind and sell these at a store like tower.

Now some libraries to rebind manga to keep them from falling apart, so I can see one-off auctions on ebay being for something like that. But the tower listing says the publisher is Dark Horse, the cover price is exactly the same as the paperback version retails for, and tower does not have a great reputation as an online retailer ever since they were bought out.

This is all speculation on my part, however. Also, keep in mind that Hellsing is not finished yet. As far as paper quality, the DH editions seem fine to me... it's not high-quality glossy paper or anything, but durable and not cheap-feeling.

Also just did a quick search for pawprints and hellsing... seems like there are some smaller stores selling editions published by pawprints, but they seem to retail for around 30 bucks. Still not sure of the legality of it (maybe they're the publisher in another region or something) but that really makes me doubt the accuracy of tower's listing.

Vel

ah, thanks for that - I'd never heard of Towers reliability or whatnot, and my attempts to ask about the ebay listing were never answered by the seller.

But Hellsing is finished - the last chapt. came out in Japan so now I'm just waiting around for them to release some collection or something that I can buy. I think Hirano said he's gonna resume The Dawn next (I think he's only up to ch. 6 on that).

Anyone know if DH has a history of releasing hardbacks after the series is finished?

fujishig

DH doesn't do that to my knowledge.

They did release beautiful oversized Library editions of Hellboy and I think Sin City, but those are franchise properties for them with movie tie-ins.

You'd think, if they were going to do so, they would've done HCs for Akira or Ghost in the Shell. I highly doubt they'll redo Hellsing after they complete it.

I haven't had firsthand experience with tower.com, but there are nothing but horror stories in the store forum on this site.