c/comic-book-fans

Free Comic Book Day chaos made me question if we even care about comics

Last Saturday at my local shop in Portland, Free Comic Book Day turned into a total madhouse. People were grabbing stacks of free issues they'd never read, just to flip them on eBay later, while kids who actually wanted a Spider-Man #1 got nothing because the box was wiped in 20 minutes. On the flip side, the old timers who showed up early were trading stories about the 90s speculator boom and how this felt exactly like that all over again. The shop owner even yelled 'you all act like this is a stock market, not a hobby' and honestly he had a point. Do we still care about the stories or are we just chasing the next hot back issue?

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nancy3•3d ago

My long box collapsed under its own weight last Tuesday

I stacked my old short boxes on top of a long box for 8 years in San Diego humidity and the cardboard just gave out, bending like paper. I switched to snap-together plastic bins and labeled the sides with painter's tape, but now they take up half my closet, has anyone else dealt with a shelf sag from these things?

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lucaslane•5d ago

The 'pure fan' label gets thrown around way too loosely

I saw three separate posts this week calling people fake fans for not owning every variant cover from 1991. I've been reading since 1987 and I skip most anniversary issues, that doesn't make me less of a reader. Is anyone else tired of gatekeeping based on how much money you drop versus how much you actually follow the stories?

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faithrodriguez•10d ago

My issue with silent auctions at cons got way worse in Pittsburgh

Two years ago at Pittsburgh Comic Expo a guy grabbed the wrong bin from a silent auction table and started pulling out sealed variants, deck broke out over who was bidding on what. I now take photos of every lot number and the bid sheet before I walk away, has anyone else had a silent auction mixup ruin a con day for them?

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willow_anderson85•11d ago

That 12 year old at my shop got me into indie comics

A kid came in with his mom while I was grooming their poodle, and he was reading some random indie comic from a local shop in Austin. I asked him about it, and he spent 15 minutes explaining the whole plot, even showed me his favorite panel. It made me grab my first non-big-two book in years, and now I'm hooked on 3 different series. Anyone else have a stranger unexpectedly turn them onto something new?

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josephf10•13d ago

Found a first issue of X-Men at a garage sale for 4 bucks, the old guy told me it was his ex-wife's

I flipped it open and the cover was peeling but the inside pages were mint, turns out it's the 1963 one, he just laughed and said take it, and now I'm paranoid every bargain bin find has a hidden gem so I bring a loupe and a UV light to every sale, has anyone else gotten burned by feeling too cool to check condition carefully?

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max68•14d ago

Went to MegaCon Orlando and the artist alley felt different this year

I popped into MegaCon Orlando last Saturday and noticed way more creators selling their own indie comics instead of just prints. Has anyone else seen that shift at bigger cons, or was it just this show?

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val_taylor•14d ago

My LCS guy in Akron told me to stop bagging my books, he was right for once

Been going to the same shop for 5 years, and the owner finally convinced me to drop mylar for standard bags on older issues. He said the tight seal was causing spine roll on the shelf, and after checking a 1997 run I've had bagged since 2012, sure enough a few covers had that wave. Switched to slightly oversized bags with a board, and the difference in how they lay flat is obvious. Anyone else had a dealer give advice that actually saved them money in the long run?

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jade618•15d ago

A 10 year old kid at my LCS corrected my pull list mistake

Last Wednesday at Third Eye Comics in Annapolis, I was adding a new series to my pull list and the kid behind the counter, maybe 10 years old, pointed out I had the wrong variant listed for issue #2. He was completely right, I had grabbed the foil cover instead of the regular one I actually wanted. It made me realize I never double check my own orders before confirming, I just trust the shop staff. Has anyone else had a younger fan save them from a dumb comic buying error?

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cooper.spencer•18d ago

A random convo at the soda aisle got me rethinking my pull list

Was grabbing drinks at the 7-Eleven off Exit 12 in Dover last Tuesday and this older guy sees my Deadpool hoodie. Says he hasn't picked up a comic since 1994 because 'everything got too dark and complicated.' Honest truth, I laughed at first. Then he mentioned he missed just grabbing a random issue off the rack and having fun, no reading order, no continuity homework. That hit different for me because my pull list right now has 14 titles and I need a spreadsheet to track crossover events. I'm honestly questioning if I actually enjoy half of them or if I'm just stuck in a completionist loop. Anyone else ever trimmed their list after a talk with a random stranger?

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uma_patel19•18d ago

Warning: my longbox shelf collapsed during a reread marathon

Last Saturday I was pulling out my old X-Men run and the whole shelf just gave way, 40 longboxes dumped across my living room floor in 3 seconds. Took me 4 hours to sort everything back by issue number, and now I'm paranoid about weight limits. Anyone else had a storage setup fail at the worst possible moment?

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betty_shah•19d ago

My comic box exploded at a con in Chicago, total chaos

I was at C2E2 last March flipping through a long box and a guy bumped the shelf, sent like 40 issues everywhere. My toddler was with me and started grabbing What If? issues off the floor, I nearly lost a #12 variant. We spent 15 minutes sorting by title and condition right there in the aisle. Anyone else had a convention disaster like this, how did you keep your cool and salvage the pulls?

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the_taylor•20d ago

I finally stopped gatekeeping my pull list and it feels weird

For like 3 years I only traded with this one dude at my LCS because we had the same taste. Last month the shop owner paired me with a random guy who only reads indie horror and honestly he's opened my eyes to 5 new books I never would've touched. We now swap stacks every Wednesday and I've actually dropped a couple of my usual superhero titles because his picks are that good. Anyone else ever swap with a complete stranger and have it totally change their reading routine?

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max68•21d ago

That 50 cent back issue bin saved my wallet, no joke

I used to walk past those dollar bins at cons thinking it was all junk, but last month at the Philly show I grabbed a stack for 50 cents each. One of them was a 1987 Spectre issue that I later found out goes for like 30 bucks online. The cover was creased and the binding was loose, but the story inside was solid and it filled a gap in my run. Has anyone else had a surprise score from the bargain boxes or am I just lucky?

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reeseanderson•22d ago

Found a stash of 80s comic ads in a flea market in Ohio, blew my mind

I was digging through a $2 bin at a flea market near Dayton last Sunday and found a stack of old issues from 1986. What got me was the back pages, all those mail order ads for X-ray glasses and sea monkeys. Nobody talks about how those ads shaped our imagination more than the stories themselves. I spent 45 minutes just reading the tiny print and laughing at the prices, like 5 bucks for a full hologram poster. Does anyone else collect old ads or is it just me who thinks they are the real hidden gem?

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betty_shah•24d ago

Serious question, how do you all handle a longbox that's packed too tight?

Last week I finally tried to pull out issue #12 of a run I've been collecting for 3 years, and it took me 20 minutes just to get it out without bending the cover. I've got about 450 comics in a single longbox, and I think I overstuffed it back in March. Is there a trick to organizing them so you can actually flip through without wrecking the bags? Do you sort by series or by number, or do you just leave gaps at the end? I'm about to redo the whole thing this weekend and I don't want to make the same mistake twice. Has anyone else dealt with this or am I just being too picky about my books?

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green.mason•24d ago

Serious question, how did we survive before back issue bins were organized by character?

I used to dig through this massive unmarked longbox at a shop in Austin for 2 hours every Saturday, now I just walk to the 'Spider-Man' section and pull what I need in 10 minutes, but I swear I miss the hunt even though my back doesn't, has anyone else felt this weird trade-off?

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wendy_clark•24d ago

Bought a $40 longbox from a yard sale, ended up with mold everywhere

Last Saturday I stopped at a yard sale in Arlington and saw a longbox stuffed with old issues for only $40. I flipped through the top few, they looked fine, so I grabbed it without checking deeper. Got home and found the bottom three rows were all warped and covered in black mold spots. The smell hit me as soon as I opened it in my living room, and now I'm worried it got into my other boxes that were nearby. I tossed the ruined comics but the box itself was beyond saving too. Has anyone else dealt with mold creeping from a cheap haul, or is there a way to treat the survivors without ruining the ink? That $40 lesson stings, especially since the good stuff on top was mostly 90s filler anyway.

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tessawebb•25d ago

That guy on reddit was dead right about variant covers, wish I listened sooner

A few months back some user with like 12 upvotes said variant covers are a trap for collectors, that they kill the resale value of regular issues because everyone hoards the variants. I thought he was just salty about missing a drop. Then I took a stack of 30 regular issues from 2021 to my LCS in Portland to trade and got offered $40 for the whole lot. The guy at the counter said the market is flooded with base covers while the variants sit in slabs. He was completely right, the advice was spot on. I should have bought one variant of the books I actually cared about instead of trying to grab every alt cover that came out. Anyone else dump a bunch of regulars at a shop lately and get that rude wake up call?

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simon_black•25d ago

Am I the only one who thinks the 90s X-Men cartoon is overrated?

Last week I rewatched the whole series on Disney Plus and I just don't get the hype. I was 12 in 1992 when it first aired and even then I remember thinking the animation was clunky. The voice acting is iconic, sure, but the plots get recycled every 3 episodes with the same Phoenix or Sentinel drama. Three years ago I tried showing it to my nephew and he fell asleep during the pilot, which says a lot. I think most fans look back with nostalgia glasses instead of judging it as a show. Does anyone else prefer the 90s Spider-Man cartoon for its story arcs and pacing? I'm curious if I'm just missing something.

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anthony165•28d ago

Spent $60 on a 'rare' first appearance comic that turned out to be a reprint from the 90s

Picked up what I thought was a legit copy of New Mutants #98 at a flea market in Nashville. The seller was all hyping it up saying it was the first appearance of Deadpool and I totally fell for it. Got home and looked closer at the paper quality and the colors seemed too bright. Looked it up online and found out it was a 1994 reprint from some random collection. Lost 60 bucks on that mistake and now I triple check everything before buying. Has anyone else gotten burned by fake reprints at flea markets or yard sales?

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terry_mitchell•1mo ago

I used to judge comic book fans who only read trades, now I'm one of them

Back in the 90s I was that guy at the shop every Wednesday buying single issues, flipping through them on the bus home. I'd look down on people who waited for the collected editions, thought they weren't real fans or something. Then around 2015 I got a job that had me traveling every other week and I kept missing issues. By the time I got back to my pull list I'd lost track of storylines and it drove me crazy. Now I buy maybe 3 or 4 trades a year from my local shop in Portland and that's it. The waiting is actually kind of nice because I get the whole arc at once without any cliffhanger frustration. Has anyone else switched from floppies to trades as they got older?

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janahenderson•1mo ago

Waited 3 weeks to fix a comic book store's broken database because I didn't check the backup tapes first

The backup tapes from June were corrupted and I lost 200 customer orders from the last sale, so if you run a shop, test your backups every month or you'll waste a whole Saturday rebuilding everything from scratch like I just did.

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josephf10•1mo ago

Which comic book reader is worse: the one who bends the spine or the one who skips to the end first?

I had to choose between lending my ASM 300 to a guy who dog-ears pages or a girl who reads the last 3 pages as soon as she opens it... I picked the spoiler reader and she ruined the Goblin twist for me before I even started. Who do you think is the bigger menace to a collection?

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iris_park•1mo ago

That time a 10-year-old corrected my pull list and I actually saved money

I was at a tiny shop in Portland called Cosmic Komix last month and this kid saw me grabbing my usual stack of Batman variants. He pointed at one cover and said 'that artist reuses poses from issue 42, you're wasting $8.' I got defensive at first but looked it up on my phone and he was totally right. So I started checking cover credits before buying and I've cut my weekly spend from $50 to like $30. Anybody else had a random kid or stranger give them a tip that actually worked?

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