Movies vs. Comic Books: Who Controls Time?

Tags

authority, Avengers, Civil War, comic books, film, Mark Millar, movies, narrative structure, planet hulk, superhero, thor ragnarok, time, Warren Ellis, widescreen comics

Now that films based on comic books and superheroes have firmly entered the mainstream of popular culture, characters and storylines we comics readers have enjoyed for years regularly come to life on the big screen for a wider audience than comics ever reached. Long-time readers are often thrilled to see their favorite heroes in live-action movies, but some feel a bit of regret. After all, it can be disheartening to hear people discussing characters as if the movies tell the entire story, when many readers have followed the characters in-depth for years or even decades.

Compressing years of story into a two-hour theater experience means a lot gets left out, as anyone who read the Planet Hulk stories can tell you about the movie Thor: Ragnarok, or anyone who read Marvel’s Civil War comics can tell you about the Captain America movie of the same name. Plus, the big screen and the printed page are two distinctly different mediums, each with its own storytelling conventions, so they deliver distinctly different stories.

Movies usually follow a formulaic narrative structure. From the inciting incident to the hero’s crisis, predicting the next story beat in a movie is pretty easy. Comic books often employ more flexible and unusual structures—a point in their favor in my opinion. This is true despite a trend toward making modern mainstream comic books more cinematic in their approach to storytelling.

Near the turn of the century, Warren Ellis used the term widescreen comics to describe the blockbuster-movie style he was creating in The Authority with artists Bryan Hitch and Paul Neary. After 12 issues, writer Mark Millar and artist Frank Quitely came on board and kept up the cinematic approach. Millar, Hitch, and Neary soon combined forces to reinvent the Avengers as The Ultimates—the forerunner of the current film versions of the Avengers. For a more in-depth look at widescreen comics, and how they influenced movies as much as movies influenced them, see Peter Suderman’s article for Vox.

As far as I’m concerned, there hasn’t been a movie yet that equals those first 29 issues of The Authority. But it’s more than just the awesome stories, vicious dialogue, and stunning artwork. What makes the printed page most enjoyable for me can be summed up in two words: time control.

In a film, time passes at a fixed speed determined by the flow of film through a projector, or its digital equivalent these days. Yes, a movie can use slow motion or speed up time, but all of that is determined by the movie itself. Moviegoers have no control of it in a theater. Time passes at a pace determined exclusively by the filmmakers.

With printed pages, the reader controls time. The reader determines how long to spend on a panel or page. Readers can turn back the pages to see something again if they did not absorb it on the first read. The reader can set the book down and walk away, then come back to it and pick up again from any point in the narrative. Movies only provide this convenience if you own or stream a copy at home and can rewind it or freeze the frames.

While I enjoy movies, I tend to enjoy their comic-book source material far more due to time control. An awesome action scene might be over in seconds or minutes on the big screen, but I can linger on it for as long as I like with a printed page. A stunning visual appears on the screen for fleeting moments, then moves on to the next one. It leaves me feeling unsatisfied when I want to spend more time taking in all its detail and beauty. With a comic book, I can pore over the artists’ rendering and take time to appreciate every line and shape, every bit of hard work that went into inking and coloring the picture. Instead of having it all fade away as I leave a theater, I can come back to it again and again with a book.

While many recent comic-book movies do look great, the awesomeness always go by too quickly for me. I never have a chance to fully appreciate it before its gone. And when the theater lights come on, fun time is over unless I want to buy another ticket. The experience is transient and ephemeral compared to a physical book I can keep for years.

None of this should be taken as an argument over which medium is “better”. Enjoy what you enjoy. This is only an attempt to articulate a feeling I’ve had for years but never explained very well to people who expect me to be super excited about recent superhero movies. It isn’t that the movies are bad; they simply lack one of the biggest things that gives me enjoyment with comic books: time control.

 

On a less serious note: a video.

throw another comic book on the bonfire

Tags

auction, comic books, eBay

Now, now. Don’t really go burning comic books… unless you post a video of it on youtube, and then we’d like a hyperlink. Here is a quick rundown of goodies currently up for sale in my glorious eBay empire.

New Gods #9 has seen better days. If it does not sell in the next 24 hours it might go back in the box of “cool old comics with historical interest but not much street value.” It’s the issue that got me into this series, and the Bug’s pathos-drenched speech is a favorite comic book monologue of mine.

Issues of this Elektra limited series used to be priced higher, but they’ve come way way down since it got reprinted in TPB editions. I have the TPB and thought a 99 cent auction of a set of 6 of the 8 issues might get a bite, but no luck so far. Miller and Sienkiewicz offer up a mix of action-movie firepower and hallucinogenic sequences of mental illness, medication, and demons from hell. It’s a wild story.

The Essential Iron Fist Vol. 1 “phone book” style reprint includes all the legendary Claremont/Byrne issues. They don’t rock my world as much as they did when I was a teenager, but I got this to just be able to sit down and read them all in order in one go for once in my life! Mission accomplished.

Turtle Soup is a cool one-shot that belongs in any true Ninja Turtles fan’s collection. It has a cool dream sequence by Steve Bissette, which we’ve posted scans of before.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles #9 and #10 should get a bite at 99 cents. The spines have a few creases, but the three-page splash fold-out in #10 is a thing of wonder. I’ve posted scans from it before, and hope it finds a good home now.

This first issue of Punisher War Journal features some of the earliest work Jim Lee produced for Marvel Comics, along with Carl “Alien Legion” Potts. It’s pretty good, but I think a true Punisher afficionado will appreciate it more than me. I put it up at 99 cents, but it looks like current eBay sales are between $10 and $20 for this one. We’ll see how it does.

Gobbledygook is another Ninja Turtles-related treasure from Mirage Studios in the late 1980s. It’s a sprawling affair with “pin-up” Turtle art, stories from various artists, and lots of non-turtle weirdness. I thought it would sell pretty fast at 99 cents, but it hasn’t seen any action after 3 weeks. Peeps don’t know what they’re missing here.

Last but not least, I listed a 7-issue Avengers run that includes the complete Red Zone storyline. The art is super cool, and the story of a red cloud of infectious agents released from a lab under Mount Rushmore is pretty compelling. Plus, She Hulk totally rages out of control, and Black Panther gets fed up with Red Skull’s racist nonsense and punches his bloody jaw right off his face. I doubt the eBay market is looking for this item right now, but the story is too good to consign to the trade-in pile just yet.

virtual viking funeral of comic books

Tags

auctions, comic books, eBay

Okay, if you really want to make this a viking funeral, take your monitor or mobile device and set it on fire. Otherwise, let’s just take a nostalgically informal tour through my recent eBay sales.

Clutch is one of my favorite rock bands, and this album has some great jams on it. (My favorite album of theirs is Blast Tyrant.) The buyer turned out to be a huge Static-X fan, and was very excited about the Wayne Static postcard included in this shipment.

I got lucky and found these two issues of Freak Brothers years ago for 50 cents each, so I made a few bucks on these in the auction. This stuff cracks me up.

I got this historic appearance of Wolverine for free from MyComicShop thanks to the affiliate program on this blog and my angelic readers who click through links to buy comics. I thought I’d make $10 or so in auction, but someone walked away with a sweet deal on this at 99 cents final bid. Plus, I packed a few extra 90s-era X-men goodies with shiny silvery covers. The buyer called it the best eBay transaction ever and effusively praised me and my ability to totally rock. LOL. It was nice, and even if I made zero dollars it was fun to spread the joy of comics across the globe.

I’ve posted scans of Michael Zulli’s work on these three issues of Ninja Turtles, and they get a stupid amount of page views sometimes. Why? Because they’re friggin’ awesome, that’s why. These would have a higher resale value if the covers didn’t have visible wear, and the buyer again walked away with a steal of a deal getting them for less than $2.

These babies retail for $10-15 a piece in this condition, but they don’t sell very fast. So I opened the auction at 99 cents, and someone got a murderous deal at less than $5 for the set. Rick Veitch did the story in these three issues, and it has some of my favorite pages from the original Mirage Studios series.

This 2009 edition of The Arabian Nights is a gorgeous hardcover production complete with gilded page edges, a cloth bookmark, and full-color illustrations. I read a few, and felt the repeated abuse and sexual enslavement of women did not make for entertaining reading. Even the consensual sex in here is described using the language of violence. It’s neat to look at this as a reference on an ancient culture, but it just made me think the culture in question was full of ***holes. Sold for 99 cents!

I was excited about IDW bringing the Turtles back, until these first issues turned out to be a kind of rehashed origin story with changes that seemed utterly pointless. I love these covers, but honestly I’d rather have them as posters than be reading the series. Fortunately, they’ve retained their resale value, and someone overseas will be enjoying them for what I paid for them brand new a few years ago.

Like Arabian Nights, Jules Verne’s story Tigers and Traitors (which you might also see referred to as The Steam House) kind of convinced me that people of history were total ***holes. On the other hand, by being everything I did NOT want in a story, it helped me define my own kind of ultimate story. A story where the women kick ass, the cats totally destroy and reign supreme, and imperialists are crushed beneath the bloody heels of the rebellion. You know, a happy story!

I expected that everyone who wants a copy of Old Man Logan already has it, considering how popular it was and how many printings the issues went through. But, even though my collection of the complete story included some well-worn early issues, it turns out most of the Old Man Logan issues are worth more than their original sales price in VF+ or better. I got nearly $40 for the set on a 99-cent auction, and stuffed the envelope full of all the Wolverine-related items it could hold.

Last but not least, I sold four individual issues from the original New Gods series by Jack Kirby. I had assembled a nice but affordable set of these in VG+ to FN condition over the years, but the glossy five-issue reprint is good enough for me. My favorite issues are #6, #7 and #9, so I put the rest of them up at 99 cents each. #1 still has a decent street value even in a somewhat battered VG condition, with a final bid of about $14.

 

 

Four Years of Life on Mars

Tags

comic books, navel gazing introspective type thing lol

Four years have come and gone since we tossed out our first blog and staked a claim on the Martian frontiers of the WordPress.com platform. Since 2011, our informal quarterly reports gathered our thoughts on this off-beat hobby of comic book and art blogging. This year, we’re going to close the book on the quarterly reports with this fourth anniversary post. We’ve got a pretty massive Archive page on the top menu of pages now, so lose yourself in our virtual bookshelves any time you want.

Our four years here on Mars have helped us get back in touch with all the things we loved about comic books. By connecting with others, we’ve gained context about the books and art we love, and discovered new things. By focusing on the work of other artists, sharing it, discussing it, we’ve gained a clearer sense of just what it is that moves us when we experience art. And that has opened up some doors to creative expression that had long been closed to us due to our exclusive focus on guitar.

Mars Will Send No More has been an outstanding vehicle for learning. As a vehicle for expressing our unbridled enthusiasm for comic books and related art, it has been a fun and stress-free way to keep current on social media and web trends that matter in our professional life. You have no idea how many times we have tried to explain what makes our post about Wolverine getting his adamantium ripped out so popular, but it makes a prime example for explaining SEO and content basics to people with questions.

We still don’t make a dime off this website. We probably spend 120 bucks every year to keep it ad-free, have extra storage for all our images, register the domain and email address, and tweak the basic “Grunge” theme with a few customizations. We might consider granting ad space to a sponsor who wanted to cover that annual cost this year. But who in their right mind would want their site advertised next to our maniacal, Kirby-Krackle-drenched, utterly unhinged ravings about the glory of sequential art?

Our affiliate relationship with Amazon doesn’t generate many free books for us, maybe $20 in store credit in four years. The affiliate relationship with MyComicShop is a better bonus for us. Since June 2010, when we were on Blogspot in embryonic form, we have referred $5,840.53 in sales to MyComicShop. This earned us store credit of $876.08 over four and a half years. Much of what we pick up there gets blogged about here. Now, due to desperate personal circumstances since Fall 2013, we’ve sold many of those books on eBay. That might be the one exception to “not making a dime off this website,” but it wasn’t an exception we were thrilled to make.

Regardless, life marches on, and comic books remain stunningly awesome! We have some favorites to share with you this year, including scans we made of some cherished books before selling them. We have bi-weekly posts scheduled for the next couple of months and enough in the drafts folder to indulge in weekly comic books obsessions for most of the year. Thank you for dropping by and indulging with us.

Tomorrow the world.

Ten More Top Ten Favorite Single Issues

Tags

comic books, top ten

Since we posted Our Top Ten Favorite Single Issues in October, 2011, our fan-blogging obsessions brought many more printed treasures to our attention. One by one, we added them to Mars Will Send No More until today’s post can link you to every one of them for in-depth exploration.

Well, nine out of ten at least. Close enough for this summer! Qualifications for inclusion on this list are simple: The issue cannot be from a series already covered in our original Top Ten, and it must be brain-stunningly awesome. Six of them are black and white books, and we had only read three of them before we started this site in 2011. Allow us to present, in no particular order, Ten More of Our All-Time Favorite Single Issues. Click their titles to learn more about each one!

Armadillo Comics #2 by Jim Franklin; 1971, Rip Off Press

Man from Utopia #0 by Rick Griffin; 1972

Lone Wolf & Cub #28; First Publishing

Devil Dinosaur #1 by Jack Kirby; Marvel, 1978

Cartoon History of the Universe #1 by Larry Gonick; 1978, Rip Off Press

Anarchy Comics #1; 1978, Last Gasp

Silver Surfer #1; Marvel, 1968

Super Villain Classics #1; Marvel, 1983

World Around Us #15: Prehistoric Animals; Gilberton, 1959

Psychotic Adventures #2. Last Gasp, 1974.

Runner up:
Spectacular Spider-man #21; Marvel, 2003.

But what about…?
Several noteworthy series have not made it into our Top 20 single issues. This includes works like DMZ, Clan Apis, Frank, 100 Bullets, and Sin City, where the entire series as a work of art outweighs any single issue. We will rectify this with future lists!

Your Guide to Getting Started Selling Comic Books on eBay

Tags

comic books, eBay, guide, how do i sell my comics, selling comics on eBay, what are my comics worth

Since we started this blog, many people have asked for advice on selling their comic books. Often, someone ends up with a big box of comics and no idea what they are worth. Or, they have an idea about what they hope the comics are worth, but no experience selling comic books on eBay. This post will serve as your introduction to the basics of selling comic books on eBay. We will discuss estimating value, packaging comics as collections vs. single issues, some simple shipping options, tips for making a great listing, and some alternatives to the traditional auction-style listing.

ESTIMATING VALUE – What are my comics worth?

Most 80s and 90s comics have a very low resale value right now. Many books considered collectible at that time have slipped into near worthlessness now. That’s the bad news.

Of course, not all comic books have become worthless from a resale perspective. But how do you know what you have? You may or may not know the difference between a nearly worthless stack of comics and the handful of them that have serious resale value.

If you know what you have, and you have a realistic sense of its current market value, then your job is pretty easy. If you don’t, you could waste your time trying to sell worthless stuff. Or, worse, you could let some valuable things go for nothing.

Let’s use Wolverine as an example. The Miller/Claremont limited series from 1982, in first printings especially, can still fetch a worthy sum on the market. Anything more recent than the first 25 issues of the Larry Hama series, however, probably languishes in bargain bins across the USA now. The number of people dumping their comic books in a hurry since the recession began several years ago makes estimating value even more confusing. Retailers often price Wolverine #100, with its awesome hologram cover, in the neighborhood of $10, but we found a copy for 50 cents in a used bookstore a few years ago.

If you don’t have that kind of detailed knowledge of your big box of comics, you can easily look up reasonably current retail prices at MyComicShop.com. Their search function is pretty friendly. It helps to search for both the title and the issue number. If you searched for “Wolverine,” for example, you would get a ton of titles to sort through. If you searched for “Wolverine #100” instead, you get a short list of results and can easily identify yours by the cover.

Now, that gives you an idea of how major retailers price books currently. But remember, the attractiveness of eBay relies on people looking for deals. You should set your expectations for a price on eBay as lower than what a giant online retailer or local comic store would ask.

You can use eBay to see details on listings that have recently sold. Yes, looking at current sales tells you what people think (or wish) their comics are worth. Sold listings, however, give you a more realistic idea of current resale value. For example, you can see search results for “Wolverine #100” are quite confusing, even when limited to the category ‘collectibles’ and subcategory ‘comics.’ But, in the left sidebar, near the bottom, there is a check box to see only SOLD listings. Check that box and you can see how the book is really performing on eBay.

SELLING SETS vs. SINGLE ISSUES

If you have a “run” of a title – a big batch of sequential issues – then packaging it as a set is probably your best bet. You can try selling individual issues if they are especially valuable, but for the most part, we sell complete or nearly complete runs. Or, we sell a set of thematically-related stuff: a grab bag of 20-cent horror and sci-fi Marvel titles, for example.

In fact, eBay’s comic books category has a sub-category designed specifically for selling runs and sets to other collectors: the “Full Runs and Sets” category. (This is a little different from their sub-category “Collections,” which is intended to sell ALL your comics at once, as opposed to the first 50 issues of one title as a set.) You can try and sell single issues if you want, but consider how many listing fees you have to pay to do that. It adds up. Plus, if you are selling a book worth a dollar, why would a collector pay two to six dollars to get it shipped to them? It makes very little sense.

This brings us to the next point: When you put runs or sets together, think about how you will ship them.

SIMPLE SHIPPING OPTIONS

Most runs we’ve sold fit into a Medium Flat Rate Box #1 for USPS Priority Mail Flat Rate. There are TWO sizes of Medium Flat Rate boxes provided by USPS. You want #1, which has a depth of nearly 6 inches and can hold around 60 bagged/boarded issues. Cost to ship through eBay is $11.30

Smaller runs or sets we put in Padded Flat Rate Envelopes, although we always reinforce them with extra cardboard to keep the books from bending or getting their corners crushed from impacts in shipping. Cost to ship a Padded Flat Rate Envelope is $5.70.

On eBay, we also use the Global Shipping Program to pick up some international sales. This means you ship to a distribution center in the USA that ships to your buyer’s country. (We’re assuming you are in the USA – a narrow assumption given our global readership, but it’s what we know best from experience.) You only pay to ship it to the distribution center instead of paying overseas rates. Is it worth the time to do this? Definitely. We have sold both comic books and art internationally quite a few times. Have a look at eBay’s Getting Started page for Global Shipping Program.

You can often find a shipping rate that is cheaper than the Flat Rates we prefer. But, then you have to go buy packaging, weigh things, calculate costs, etc. We usually found that after we paid for boxes and envelopes, our shipping costs weren’t significantly less than if we had just used the free packaging from USPS for Priority Flat Rate. Plus, Priority Mail gets to your buyer in 2-3 days, and they love getting stuff fast. Happy buyer = positive feedback = increased confidence for future buyers = more sales.

But what about using the USPS Media Mail option to get a super cheap shipping rate? Good question. Media Mail is intended for books, CDs, and DVDs that do not contain advertising. Guess what? Comic books usually have ads in them. Technically, they do not qualify for Media Mail. Can you get away with using Media Mail? Well, people have cheated the system by doing it anyway. But, you run the risk of getting your shipment returned to you if USPS decides to inspect it. Everyone from Amazon to our local UPS store has warned us this might happen. So, we do not ever use Media Mail for shipments that do not really qualify for it. Do so at your own risk.

TIPS FOR MAKING GREAT LISTINGS

If you are not an avid comic book collector, you may not understand what matters to people who are. Collectors want to know EXACTLY what you have and what condition it is in. You may not care about a wrinkled corner, but a collector will. You may not care if you have X-men #5 or #11, but a collector will. Do these three things and your chance of a sale will increase:

1. You can upload up to 12 pictures, so upload 12 pics for every listing. Photograph the set, key single issues, anything with a defect, and a few interior pages to show their condition.

2. If there are any defects, state what they are in the listing. You don’t want anyone thinking you tried to pull a fast one on them. (Rolled or creased spines, bent corners, off-center staples, whatever.)

3. List every single issue in the set in your listing. BE SPECIFIC.

Please see our comments section for more details about the fine art of grading comics and describing their condition.

TO AUCTION OR NOT TO AUCTION

We prefer listing things as Fixed Price, not Auctions, and checking the box that allows buyers to send their ‘best offer.’ (Yes, this is a negotiation process, and no you are not committing to accepting best offers. In fact, you can make a counter-offer, or accept, or decline offers.) This way, we don’t lose our shirt or give books away if an Auction only gets a 99 cent bid before it closes. You can always drop the price of a Fixed Price listing if it isn’t selling, or accept the best offer you get. We always make these Fixed Price listings for the duration “Good Until Cancelled” – not seven days or 30 days, but forever.

You should consider what eBay charges for “insertion fees” when using this method. A typical listing fee is 30 cents. Even though your listing is “Good Until Cancelled,” eBay still cycles it through a 30-day period and then “relists” it at the end. Unless you listed under one of their periodic promotions for free listings, you can get hit with insertion fees every 30 days on a lot. 30 cents is not much on a single $50 listing, for example, but can add up fast if you have a hundred single-issue lots that won’t earn you more than a dollar or two to begin with.

ANY OTHER QUESTIONS?

As you might have guessed from looking around this blog, we love discussing comic books. If you have any questions for us, please comment or contact us. If you have some tips and tricks of your own on eBay, we’d love to hear from you!

Secret Holiday Origin of Mars Will Send No More!

Tags

christmas, comic books, garage, gramma, holiday, memoir, origin, vacation

Every geek has their own secret origin, a time when the world of comic books magically came to life for them. I’ve never changed into a costume in a phone booth, but I did transform into a mutant in a garage many times during my childhood vacations.

My family lived in rural Missouri for many years. My parents’ families mostly lived in small-town Ohio back then. In most of my pre-adolescent years, Mom, Dad, Sister, and I packed our bags every December to drive north and spend Christmas with the families.

Mom’s parents had a detached garage off their modest but cozy three-bedroom house. It held the typical backyard stuff: trees, a bench swing, a small garden, a clothesline. To get to the garage, I walked along square, concrete tiles with black pebbles in the spaces between. A waist-high chain link fence separated the small path from the driveway. A door opened into the darkness of the garage, which at that time of year was always cold. When the moon was up or the back porch light was on, I could see my breath in the darkness.

The garage possessed a unique scent. Grampa smoke his cigarettes in there and framed pictures at his work bench. Dust, sawdust, stale cigarette smoke, and mold. Dampness, but frozen. It’s not the bouquet you might associate with happiness, 25 years later – unless you were also there with me to turn on the dim light, squeeze between the cars, and approach the ramshackle shelves on the far wall. Those shelves held every comic book my grandparents had purchased for their four children from the 1950’s through the 1970’s, and some that Gramma still liked to follow in the 1980s. She always called them “funny books.”

Every year I dug out a new section of the stacks – hundreds, maybe thousands of books. Some years, I excavated completely unknown buried treasures. Some years, I found an issue I’d read before: a copy of World’s Finest #147 featuring Superman and Batman, or Tales of Suspense featuring Thor, Iron Man, or the Human Torch. With a year between visits to Ohio, it was like meeting an old friend. Early issues of the X-men and Spider-man sat under so much dust and time and disuse that I sometimes got sick. I had pretty bad allergies to dust and mold at that age but zero qualms about risking my health to read those books. I would take an armful back inside the warm house, find a comfy spot to curl up, and be absorbed for hours. If the adults wanted to stay up late and play Rook at the kitchen table, I might even make two or three trips to the garage!

To read some of those magical old books now might be a disappointment. Stories that appeal to you as a boy often seem childish after a time. But, I do regret not going there and getting, oh, just a few hundred of them before the collection was sold some time in the 1990s. They didn’t sell for much, considering how many decades they had been exposed to the elements. But the connection to those feelings and those fantastic adventures my mind took as a child… There is no dollar figure you can put on fuel for your imagination. And if the nostalgia becomes too acute, I can find most of them at My Comic Shop in better shape than when I first read them!