CGC comics came about in the 1980`s as a result from uneducated and unethical business of a multitude of comic book sellers on eBay, who did not know the first hand thing about comic books, their sentimentalism to comic collectors (from childhood) worldwide, and pricing structures with respect to the comic book price guide (CBPG for short.) An unsuspecting buyer, not understanding he would be paying an absurd price for a book, would usually discover later he had been ripped off.

After CGC (Certified Guaranty Company) comics slabbed and "apparently" professionally graded books, these books began popping up on eBay and other comic shops online and offline, at different prices, they soon moved to Amazon, and sold their tricks there...at least for a while.

Then other companies followed suit and set up their own "certified grading" operations. CBCS, PGX and a few unknowns became predominant or cheaper to slab.

Initially, things started out OK, but then took a dark turn into greed, aside from eBay/PayPal fees tacked onto sales by comic book slab vendors online and offline -- prices began souring or they at least were jacked up in the minds of sellers due to the PRO grade and the encased book not so labeled and protected from external damage, which of course in one sense does make sense because if you wanted to protect the book it could be stored away for years to come and be pulled out years later from anyone`s home, dusted off and voila! Instant sale!

As a collector myself, I disagree with CGC and other slabbing companies, because it`s a come-on much in the same way that backing up an odds bet to one`s initial bet on the pass-line at craps is a come-on venture, one which doesn`t need to exist.

Many serious collectors were outraged, because it merely ruined what collecting comics was all about in the first place, reading comics and preserving them over the years for either their children`s children or perhaps sold somewhere down the line.

My second point is that some books should be sent to CGC and other "reputable" companies, but not all books should. Golden age books and keys perhaps, but all types, no. If you know how to grade a comic book an apparent book grade, is just that -- apparent. And without going into the semantics of how to go about detecting a book`s grade, any collector who knows his or her stuff may say the grade of one copy is 6.0. while another who buys and sells books will tell you that this same copy is 5.5, so no one single grade is 100% accurate.

But when the grade approaches worse condition it comes closer to being agreed upon what the condition of the book actually is; with wear and tear and damage, almost any person without the know-how of how to grade comics can tell you right off the bat that a book without it`s cover is worthless to a serious collector, or that tears, missing chucks, multiple folds/creases and improper handling of a book makes it fair to bad to a good copy --whatever that means is unclear even for myself since no one has a definite system whereby to do so other than grading from what we know about how to grade comics.

I have seen one page from action comics No #1 slabbed and sold for thousands, it`s really wacky! In reality, I wouldn`t bother with such a purchase if I had the capitol to do so.

Now let`s get into the heart of this and do an analysis. If conditions between persons differ upon actual grades of single copies, then how is it that CGC and other slabbers of comics are professional graders? Remember now, that CGC is an umbrella company which was formed under NGC, a coin grading company, who have been in the business for years. But to get into comics and start asserting yourself as some pro-grader, doesn`t make much sense because conditions are graded slightly different between those graders who know what they are doing, but when a copy has obvious damage the apparent goes down. And yet these buffoons claim to be professional graders, then encase a book intended for occasional reading with proper handling, so you can`t even get through the encasement to read and/or handle the book short of cracking the encased book and carefully removing the book from inside.

Once that`s done, the book "supposedly" had no more professional grade, and must be re-submitted (usually with the label it was encased with), so that you or someone else who now owns the book, have to shell out another "whatever amount" to get it re-slabbed.

So they profit regardless?

WTF?

Wait.

What?

Aren`t comic books for reading in the first place, that is if properly handled and not falling apart.

But here we have a clear case of taking something meant for entertainment value and cut it off form being touched...ever. While this protects the book in the long run, it also is fairly bad for the book on the long run. This is because more breathing room is neglected from the book and if and when it is "cracked-open" some years down the line (say 34), exposure to air will cause it to crumble, as is the case when paper is put in an air tight box for a few days.

CGC and other companies also do a restoration check, which awards the slabbed book a purple label. Some graders do not know what to look for here and sometimes is undetectable without a close examination and comparison and is the case in most antique dealings. Also sellers and vendors misuse the word vintage for books as opposed to rare. vintage is a term that applies to antiques, usually golden age related as in the 1940`s. You see it all the time on eBay, and irritating words inexperienced or laymen sellers use to attempt to move the book and get it sold from among the thousands of other sellers out there who are also trying to sell similar copies. These words I merely pass up because a savvy buyer checks the seller`s rating first. L@@K! Tough luck buddy.

CGC and other comic slabbing companies have yet to acknowledge that that they are responsible for the shockingly high prices re-sellers select to price their books at, and while it is their choice, somehow they believe that just by the mere fact that the book is or has been slabbed and supposedly graded professionally, that the copy, depending on the grade, is of course more valuable than a book not slabbed, encased and graded.

Sure the book is now protected and perhaps it being an old book or a key issue makes sense, especially for major key issues and first appearances of characters, but something in that thinking is wrong right there.

Have you seen why yet?

It`s because of a yearly or when inflation goes up, etc, etc the comic book price guide comes out with it`s price guide for all books presently known. A current version of CBPG indicates grade and price by grade or condition of said copy and if it is rare or not. In NO list on any page of a current version of a CBPG, will you see CGC pricing of graded copy. And as of yet the company itself who publishes the yearly CBPG has not CGC CBPG.

Understand?

What this means is that even though collectors and vendors submit books to slabbing companies, the mere fact it has been slabbed and supposedly graded professionally, does not change or alter the price of the book according to a current version of a CBPG. So to break this down further, if you have a copy of Incredible Hulk #181 (1974), and the price guide indicates that a high grade copy goes for $3,400.00 (and no CGC price is listed in the guide), then the price for a slabbed book of a copy with the exact same grade is $3,400.00 and therefore is exactly $3,400.00 as it is for an un-slabbed book.

If they are 2 identical copies and both have the same grade and one gets slabbed by say CGC and the other not, then why does the slabbed book suddenly get jacked up in price based merely on the fact it is now encased inside a piece of plastic which cannot be accessed to remove the book nor return it? Or is it because the person now selling the slabbed book paid a specific sum to the slabbing company for services rendered and tacks on the price paid for the slabbing and now wants to recoup that and make back and additional profit?

No, it`s not that way at all! Owners of CGC and other slabbed books are decisively jacking up the prices based merely on the fact that the book is professionally graded and slabbed. In reality, the book (let`s say Superboy #68 [1958] (1st app. Bizarro)), goes in a high-grade for $2,800.00 regardless of being slabbed or not. In other words these sellers began a now out-of-control pricing structure for slabbed books they tacked on themselves, but the reality is weather slabbed or not the book still goes for $2,800.00! All your really paying for is the estra protection and inaccessibility of to the book of it`s encasement -- and that`s all, nothing more or less. It`s still the same price according to a current version of a comic book price guide!!

Absolutely no CGC comic book price guide has yet been published and slabbers have no regulation over such prices, all they do is do a service for the money being paid for the service - it really is an absurd situation with no end in sight and the worse part - there`s no difference in pricing between one grade un-slabbed or not slabbed for the same book graded and sell-able - it`s till $2,800.00, yet the owners have created a market wherein the value of slabbed books becomes more lucrative in spite of the fact that a current CBPG say the price for that book at that grade has not changed. Period.

This is how ridiculous eBay ( and other vendors) slabbed comics have become, but in all actuality...it`s just greed and anyone buy slabbed books at a prices which does not match the CBPG price that does not include CGC prices, is in fact being ripped off -and was more the majority of sellers know it! An exclusion principle to this would be an old book, highly valuable, and a buyer aware of what he is getting for the price being offered. Hey, if you want it, great...some people, no many people do. Fact is I have a few slabbed books myself, but I already knew about the absurdities of slabbed books and the sellers out there trying to make a "bigger profit" off copies of the same books, vying for a sucker who`ll pay the differential, unaware that the person on the other end is smirking every time he lands a sale on slabbed books. Now let`s head on over to eBay and use a few snipets as exemplifications as to the craziness of these UN-regulated sellers of slabbed books and we will look at 3 books at varying prices. We will look at the Highest Priced one first and the lowest ones found online at the time of this writing.

Our first book will be Strange Tales #110 (1963), [The 1st Appearance of Doctor Strange] Going for high grade for $17,000.00 according to CBPG prices.

Here, I did actually locate a closely priced slabbed book close to thje CBPG suggested price:

Here is the Highest Priced book I found with the "buy it now" option at the time of this search:

Here is one which was moderately priced considering the grade, but still overpriced with such a grade in comparison to CBPG pricing suggestions for the grade:

And of course the lowest one which first came up when I scrolled down:

The above, is so shot it might be worth leaving it in the slab since it looks so beat up.

Next we have a famous book made popular by Wolverine and Hulk fans (myself included) is the highly sought after and now classic cover of Incredible Hulk #181 (1974) [1st full appearance of wolverine]. Going for slabbed and UN-slabbed sell-age according to CBPG price suggestions in high grade at... $3,400.00!

Now remember, a current CBPG suggests UN-Slabbed and slabbed prices are identical for that particular grade, and we have below a "buy it now" item highest first, selling at::::

Does this look like it is $3,400.00? No way, it`s completetly off the rector scale to the CBPG...way off! In fact it`s so far off,like the highest example on the prior book, it goes into 39,999.99 almost 11 times! In more direct terms it`s owner as an asking price 11 times the amount to the CBPG ! WOW! Either 1). He or She`s got a sentimental attachment to the book, or 2). He`s just plain grredy, hoping for a fish to take the bait.

An here is the lowest buy it now the came up when I scroll down having chosen that option:::

Holy Cottage Cheese Batman! It looks like we get a worthless copy for over half of $500, perhaps the "value" will go up someday; but to someone out there it might make a fine addition to their collection until they can afford an upgrade - of course it`s probably worth less irrespective of slabbing...go figure. But then again I myself have purchased a copy of amazing spider-man #10 with a few chunks absent from the interior and a section cutout from the top by a mean kid...I assume, but I bought it at a comic book shop for $30.00, not what this clod is asking for minus eBay and PayPal fees -Good Lord! Even at this image size you can esily see tears and UN-restorable and perhaps UN-salvageable damage. Go ahead..you buy it, no thanks!

Next we have Superboy #68 1st App. of Bizarro from 1958.Going for... $2,800.00 in high grade.

...And our first winner for high priced items goes to the lucky...um well I can`t tell you, but here it is----

Hey not bad, looks like we actually found a deal! Purchase or no? In all truth, yes. his would make a great purchase because it is lower than the suggested CBPG price! Quick! Get it before it`s sold!

Next we have the lowest in non-CGC and is it worth it?

Yes and no on this one, take a closer look by clicking on the link and if it looks suspicious ask some questions to the dealer and be sure to look at his or her selling rating -if all is well try it, it may be well worth the investment.

So there you have it! Slabbed books are no more worth Un-slabbed books according to a current version of the comic book price guide. Hey! happy Hunting!

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You must know that this of course is my own opinion and this narrative may go into total obscurity or may be disagreeable at any point, but they are my own personal observations based on my own research and findings give or take whatever critiques may be introduced at future intervals.

If you enjoy this articles by all means let me know, otherwise I don`t care.

WHY I DESPISE THE NEW "LOOK AND FEEL" COMICS

On a side-note comic book paper has changed drastically; starting somewhere between 1998 and 2003, I believe. The preference is finalized the end result of the particular publisher-(s).

Additionally, they are more delicate than the old look and feel comics apart from the glossy interior shine; however it is the cover wrap (back and front) which gets squashed somewhere during or after production of the particular book-(s) being published and in my opinion makes for worse conditions even before hitting the newsstand or comic shops.

This results in a bad crease down the entire length of the spine; degrading the book from what would otherwise be at least a 9.0.

For today`s consumer buying many of these new “look and feel” comics are discouraging to the comic collector. I am a collector myself and am working on full runs of various Marvel titles, in the main silver and bronze age books as most of my early childhood collection went south due to unforeseen financial problems, which is my own personal business.

As it went my entire collection of over 400 + comics, books and memorabilia became lost, today I have 80% of those books recovered and now own over 616 books with titles I am working to build and put in my library.

Many of these new look and feel books have a thinner semi-glossy newsprint interior and a thicker glossy to semi-glossy exterior; cover to back.

I am overjoyed to have the privilege to collect books and fill-in the blocks of my growing runs and collection. My latest addition was completing the story of the second appearance of Howard the Duck with an 8.0 copy of Man-Thing #1 (1974) to complete the story of the first appearance of Howard the Duck in adventures into Fear #19 (Dec 1973).

Marvel, back then at least to encourage buying their books, split the stories up almost always in 2 parts or 2 books, some were crossovers into other titles and some were not. However when you look at any particular book imagine it blank, it is the same comic as any other comic just the title and prints are diverse.

When I began adding newer books to my collection NOT from my original collection and not from the Bronze Age (books I wanted because they appealed to me or had some cool features, origin, story arc) or having read or seen them online, I acquired.

What I did not realize was that the “look and feel” with respect to the paper texture has changed. My first acquirement was the story arc of HULK 2008 (aka Red-Hulk). The first issue in which the Red-Hulk was introduced (suggested earlier by Kenneth Johnson) from the Incredible Hulk TV series starring Bill Bixby Lou Ferrigno and now deceased Jack Colvin.

When I got it in the mail I was disappointed not at the fact of acquiring the first appearance of the Red-Hulk, but by the look and feel of the book itself –and I did not like it. First my complaint is that the spine was not rounded; it was creased, as though someone had taken special care to use their thumbnail and crease it too tightly. This made me think that if I opened the book cover too often the cover would tear away from the rest of the book, and to date I have not re-read the book out of fear that this might actually occur.

The new look and feel was also very dissimilar to the books which used newspaper print with a glossy cover and back, (silver-age, bronze-age, etc) although enticing for whatever extended life the thicker and glossier look was distasteful to me (in my opinion) and I wondered why the majority of publishers went this route, especially when the books could fall apart when the spine is creased like someone folded it so it would tear apart with the gentlest tug at the wrong time.

I searched Google out to seek as to what material the books were made of; turns out they were merely thicker newspaper prints with higher gloss, but the fact remained that spines were creased too much; which devalued the book and disgruntled many a collector, including me. This I suspect was due in the main to the chosen printer, who instead of considering the collector in their selling practices, print large volumes and smash them together in such a way that the spine becomes creased as though rubbed several times with the fingernail and thumb.

If you take an average piece of blank paper and fold it in half, you will find that in order to tear each half apart equally, you will have to re-fold it reversely. That is fold it back over to increase the crease. Then by using one`s thumbnail you can go over the crease down the length of the fold, then fold it back over until you are able to tear each half apart without “ripping” the two half unequally, an easy way to get two halves.

To break this down a little more, what this means is that by folding and refolding the center crease, the paper weakens at the crease the more you do it and thus the paper will spate more easily without rips or tears outside of the intended crease to bring about two halves.

This is exactly what the crease on the new look and feel comics look like, which indicates that printers are careless with comic printing process and distribution, which in turn means they don`t care about collectors and are only interested in making a profit.

While this accusation has merit; it goes without saying that better service means better customer loyalty and when print come out the way I have seen them (not all BTW), it shows a general disregard for customer satisfaction, detail and transparency. Tell you what if they were my comics and I was printing them and I saw that, I would definitely sue, complain or do a re-print to make sure that such errors were rubbed away.

This can be exemplified by the 1950`s surge in personal service and attention to detail. Unless you’re a youth you may or may not comprehend this; during the 40`s and 50`s Television was barely getting started, entertainment was at the theater, dance, big bands and rising celebrities etc, etc. Comic books were a definite source of entertainment because back then there was only the radio, and hence everyone was into them. But along these same lines personal service was the call of the day, guys in white outfits came out of gas stations to serve your every need, check tires, and shine your car, give you a beverage and you`d be filled up and on your way with a smile. Many companies followed suit, providing attentive service such as milk bottles at your back doorstep; the newspaper was delivered properly, department stores would detail your every need and there was a generally friendly atmosphere whenever you went to shop. Soda fountains, malt shops, drive-in theaters and food were customary, America was at its highest happiness and things began to peak.

Greed gain its headway, with the rise of corporations and the decline in the quality of life as the French used to say, complexities arose and lines were crossed. Gone are the days when service and politeness was a major factor in retaining a customer base, now there are warehouses, assembly lines, multi-nationals, buzzbacks and lack of customer service outside of monetary compensation, value transformed into corporations and mom and pop shops partly died.

There is a long list to this change, but it`s just products and customer manipulation via advertisements that they seek and through various outlets, psychological deceptions and suggestive advertising. It generally means a lack of concern for customers and a focus on profit. Ah…the good old days!

But in a sense it might be better or worse –who knows.

Back to the look and feel of the new comics, I took the liberty to do a comparison using my digital camera showing a few books which have these creases, in comparison to a silver-age book of Tales to Astonish #43, the other two are the new look and feel higher gloss thicker page books from captain universe #1 (First App. of Blue Hulk), and the last is a copy of Mister X #3 from vortex comics, which you can clearly see on both these new look and feel comics have this same creasing on the spine.

This goes without saying that a percentage of these books were ordered online from mycomicshop dot com. MCS has a history of jipping people, fact is, they even did it to me on one particular order and never bothered to re-fund the differential between the actual order and what I received. I no longer order from them, and find their service disreputable, even though they do an impeccable job at protecting the orders through the mail. Which I suspect is their little secret to the may complaints they have received, just take a look at the fluctuating complaints on their eBay site as opposed to their website.

Therefore the real culprits behind the lack of concern for collectors may indeed not be the printers, it may have come from MCS and or other comic book sellers. The reasoning for this is due to the fact that if you visit a comic shop you will discover that the books are tightly packed together in boxes making it difficult to retrieve and return them back into the boxes. MCS has thousands of titles and thus come from a major warehouse distribution center where orders are taken explicitly online. The sloppiness of the employees indicates that there in it for the money and really could give a shit less, as you can see from the added dis-benefit of the mailing prices in addition to the price of the order. Not to mention the multitude of consignors on MCS who, BTW, overprice their books with respect to the comic book price guide -- ESPECIALLY on graded CGC/PCX and CBCS certified comic books some 5 to 9 times the going price. Even mailing comics can be risky, since packing them tightly against other books in the rsh to fulfill order can lead to the creased spines as described.

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Now while I DO enjoy the benefits of these new look and feel books, they do have an allure and good story in which makes them superior over the old look and feel of comics, but I myself prefer those as opposed to the new one, even though I do purchase them. Hey maybe I`m a critic or an imbecile judge for yourself.

HOLLYWEIRD AND COMICS

In 1985 DC Comics came out with various issues called pre-crisis and Crisis on Infinite Earths (12 issues), which changed the DC continuity forever. This was due to inaccuracies in the DC character universe which were inconsistent with later issues. For example, superman could only leap and bound when he began and could not fly.

Robin was murdered by the Joker, the original Flash wore a tin cap, and Green Lantern originally had a cape, and so on down the list. As the characters developed stories and characters diverged from their original powers with development or things which happened later that indicated they were inconsistent with the DC timeline and the DC universe continuity. Initially this took some time for DC to reconfigure to end that continuity with a rebirth in Crisis on Infinite Earths. This story arc basically tells the story of the multiverses convergence and the death of of one with the reemergence of the new one.

Look it up on Wikipedia, it’s really a cools story arc and excellent artwork, that`s one reason I got it.

Some years later various stories were published by DC Comics, which led up to the Flashpoint story arc involving The Flash emerging into an alternate timeline, without his powers. Flash meets a different version of Batman, and Cyborg and together they attempt to set things right. Hero’s as well as villains are altered due to the new timeline and it is up to Barry Allen to get his powers back and set things back to the original timeline.

After this story arc and its subsequent delving into the flashpoint universe DC comics then rebooted its entire line of super-stars and the new continuity actually began.

So what about Marvel Comics? What about their continuity? Marvel, as the case may be, sold many properties to Disney (who BTW tries to sue Marvel over Howard the Duck infringement over similarities to Donald the Duck). Stan (the man) Lee went on to do cameos on just about all his character movies and still reigns as the creator of almost all comic book characters which are known worldwide.

Marvel, as you know has been there in the comic industry right along with DC comics and other notables since the early 1940`s. Sub-Mariner, The Human Torch and Toro and Captain America just to name a few.

If you know anything about comics and comic book stories, you`ll know that Marvel didn`t side with DC Comics on this particular alteration of their continuity thang, but they did do a re-boot and many new characters popped out of the woodwork as a result.

The word incarnation should strike up some fanciful feet-rubbing in your free-for-all fabulous world, it means that given a character and it`s attributes that character can have many different incarnations in addition to its original. And because it is fiction, it can reach new levels and more multiverses plots, arc and stories. Like a tree with branching arms.

Unlike DC Comics, Marvel just went on to do their own thing with incarnations. I am an Incredible Hulk fan and by example I can name these incarnations with some level of accuracy.

For instance, there are the incarnations of The Savage Banner, Savage Hulk, Smart Hulk, Banner-Hulk, Gray Hulk, Red-Hulk, She-Hulk, Red She-Hulk, and of late when the Hulk Hulk`s out he becomes Kluh. These “incarnations” are safe to assume because they do not infringe or interfere with the original character, they are like extensions of the character. So they don`t hurt the character in any specific way, for instance, in the original sin story arc (the death of the watcher) 3.1 to 3.4, (known only by the watcher before his death)we learn that a young tony stark tampered with the original gamma-bomb which created the incredible hulk, unfortunately this secret is pretty much kept away from banner`s knowledge in their relationship years later after stark becomes Iron man and Banner the Hulk.

In this same story arc, 5.1 to 5.5, The Mighty Thor learns he has a sister (also known by the watcher) but it was hidden from him by Odin and his mother.

This same incarnation premises are seen in Marvel studio movies, where a re-telling of the origin of characters undergoes minor alterations (except for spider-man and captain America). Bill Bixby who was the major star for the incredible hulk TV series had a different name and the origin was different from the comic book origin (banner originally became the hulk when he was caught in the heart of a gamma-bomb explosion saving a young Rick Jones. Banner`s first name is also changed from Bruce to David.

In the 2003 re-make of the hulk, David Banner is Bruce Banner`s father, who becomes the absorbing man. And finally we neither see General T. Ross, Major Glenn Talbot, Betty Ross or Rick Jones in the original incredible hulk TV series. The show was loosely based on another TV series called the Fugitive, starring David Janssen. Rick Jones never appeared in either of the two re-makes of the incredible hulk in 2003 nor 2008, but the 2008 movie did feature Jack McGee coming across the lawn to film the military fight with the hulk.

Incarnations are such a throw around though and disappoint comic book fans who think that Hollywood and Marvel studios are not sticking to the comics and comic book origins when they do do their movies, and to some degree they are right, because it is a letdown in a big sense to comic book fans even if the story is good, which many have been thus far except for Man-thing in 2005, which I thought was awful and even though I am a Marvelite. If Hollywood doesn`t do a second feature on this movie then the semi-good Man-thing will go down as a murderous creature and the Nexus of all Realities into…?

Hey, but who knows? Perhaps Man-thing returns and this will lead to the next Howard the Duck Movie. Frankly I like the comic book stories better, but I enjoy a good movie too.

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