The Outhouse - The Greatest Comic Book Forum

by **GHERU** » Tue Feb 07, 2012 5:07 pm

TimDrake'sDumbWings wrote:
Thanks for the advice.

However, I feel like buying the hardcover ANYWHERE sends a message to Marvel that these types of collection practices are okay. If the product stops selling, Marvel will realize that a hardcover should have AT LEAST 5 issues in it.

seems fair
its mainly what keeps me buying single issues

by **TimDrake'sDumbWings** » Tue Feb 07, 2012 5:15 pm

GHERU wrote:seems fair
its mainly what keeps me buying single issues

It just blows my mind that trades and hardcovers could cost more per-issue than buying floppies. Weren't trades originally CONSIDERABLY cheaper than individual issues? When I started reading comics in 1997, I picked up a copy of BATMAN: A LONELY PLACE OF DYING. it must have contained 6 or 7 issues. The cover price was $4.95. What happened? (I'm asking that seriously. If there's some kind of production reason behind the paradigm shift, I'd love to hear it.)

by **mrorangesoda** » Tue Feb 07, 2012 5:21 pm

GHERU wrote:DC is real bad about trades
Vertigo is pretty good, ususally.
Marvel is much better, I know that vol 1 of Venom is availibe (soon?) in TPB, SA is only ~2 arcs behind in TP and one in HC, same with most Marvel books

I'm waiting, and hoping for, a delux DEADPOOLMAXX HC of both volumes

I bet that Pigs, Mudman, and the new Image books will be availible fairly quicky in trade, and I know that the Severed HC is availible for order in the new Previews

I meant that I will take forever to getting around to the trade. I have a few series I read immediately in trade, and fitting in others from my trade list is hard to fit into the budget. Also, I tend to have a problem with Marvel announcing an complete omni/hc right after I buy the tpb of vol 1.

by **Chesscub** » Tue Feb 07, 2012 5:21 pm

TimDrake'sDumbWings wrote:
It just blows my mind that trades and hardcovers could cost more per-issue than buying floppies. Weren't trades originally CONSIDERABLY cheaper than individual issues? When I started reading comics in 1997, I picked up a copy of BATMAN: A LONELY PLACE OF DYING. it must have contained 6 or 7 issues. The cover price was $4.95. What happened? (I'm asking that seriously. If there's some kind of production reason behind the paradigm shift, I'd love to hear it.)

Well the original Lonely Place of Dying was on newsprint and had been out for a while.

by **Zero** » Tue Feb 07, 2012 5:30 pm

mrorangesoda wrote:
I meant that I will take forever to getting around to the trade. I have a few series I read immediately in trade, and fitting in others from my trade list is hard to fit into the budget. Also, I tend to have a problem with Marvel announcing an complete omni/hc right after I buy the tpb of vol 1.

Well it's because DiDio hates the trade medium, and feels that a poor collection program will increase sales on singles because people can't wait. Whether he's right or not I dunno.

by **TimDrake'sDumbWings** » Tue Feb 07, 2012 5:36 pm

Zero wrote:
Well it's because DiDio hates the trade medium, and feels that a poor collection program will increase sales on singles because people can't wait. Whether he's right or not I dunno.

That's pretty crazy, since DC's pre-2000 trade program was so strong that Quesada and Jemas looked at it as a model for the trade program they started. I wish all of this "hardcover-then-trade" business was done away with immediately. If a collection houses 5 issues, a trade is more appropriate. If it has 10 or more, it should be a hardcover.

by **GHERU** » Tue Feb 07, 2012 5:41 pm

TimDrake'sDumbWings wrote:
It just blows my mind that trades and hardcovers could cost more per-issue than buying floppies. Weren't trades originally CONSIDERABLY cheaper than individual issues? When I started reading comics in 1997, I picked up a copy of BATMAN: A LONELY PLACE OF DYING. it must have contained 6 or 7 issues. The cover price was $4.95. What happened? (I'm asking that seriously. If there's some kind of production reason behind the paradigm shift, I'd love to hear it.)

the only thing I can think of is that floppies have ads in them whereas trades do not. Add to that the cost of hard or soft (hehehe) binding, the actual cost of produicing the trade is probably more expensive than a single issue

is it a whole dollar per issue more expensive? I doubt it for TPBs, but it might be for HCs

by **GHERU** » Tue Feb 07, 2012 5:43 pm

as for why they used to be so much cheaper - they weren't a considerable part of the profit margin so actual cost might not have been that big of a deal, now they are

by **mrorangesoda** » Tue Feb 07, 2012 5:49 pm

Zero wrote:
Well it's because DiDio hates the trade medium, and feels that a poor collection program will increase sales on singles because people can't wait. Whether he's right or not I dunno.

It's not a matter of the collections not coming out on time. It's a matter of my pull list+my insta-buy trade list leave little room in the budget for much else.

TimDrake'sDumbWings wrote:
That's pretty crazy, since DC's pre-2000 trade program was so strong that Quesada and Jemas looked at it as a model for the trade program they started. I wish all of this "hardcover-then-trade" business was done away with immediately. If a collection houses 5 issues, a trade is more appropriate. If it has 10 or more, it should be a hardcover.

I don't begrudge them making money like a traditional publisher (HC then paperback) on big books (events, Batman, etc.). Marvel has a bad habit of putting things out in HC that don't have a big market to begin with (I think they did a Premiere hc for Thunderbolts a year ago...).

by **Zero** » Tue Feb 07, 2012 5:52 pm

TimDrake'sDumbWings wrote:
That's pretty crazy, since DC's pre-2000 trade program was so strong that Quesada and Jemas looked at it as a model for the trade program they started. I wish all of this "hardcover-then-trade" business was done away with immediately. If a collection houses 5 issues, a trade is more appropriate. If it has 10 or more, it should be a hardcover.

I'm fine with how Marvel initially did it, giving high-profile stuff a HC to start with and everything else as a trade. No-one in their right mind is demanding Ms Marvel in a deluxe format but there she is.

by **covalesky** » Tue Feb 07, 2012 6:00 pm

Vertigo, Image, Icon, Avatar, Radical, Red 5.... all have better trade policies than DC and Marvel.

by **Royal Nonesuch** » Tue Feb 07, 2012 6:00 pm

There are definitely good to great comics out there. There pretty much always are. You just have to look for them. Most people just don't want to expand outside their "comfort zone (ie superheroes)."

by **DMM** » Tue Feb 07, 2012 6:13 pm

I have tons of new comics piled up that I have yet to read, I'm running out of room for storing my massive collection as it is, and when I see the amount of comics I'm brinign in monthly, it scares me trying to figure out where I'm going to store it all. I wish it was easy/easier to sell them. I don't have the time to run an ebay operation.

by **ThirtyFiveMinutesAgo** » Tue Feb 07, 2012 6:58 pm

It has been almost ten years since I trimmed my pull list down to one title per month.

Online retailers, auction websites, and library collections provide me with so much reading material that it can take months to get around to my recent single issues. Even if every new issue stunk I would still consider this a great age for me as a reader.

by **Herald** » Tue Feb 07, 2012 7:13 pm

Chesscub wrote:
Memorial is a fantasy story by Chris Roberson. Power of stories and imagination
Cold War is a spy story done by John Byrne. Retired MI-5 guy goes to work freelance helping out the governemnt.
Mouse Guard : mice with swords!
Locke and Key : fantasy/horror (not gory at all). Trust me it's really really good.
Green Wake : I'd probably avoid then.

I've seen Mouse Guard, come to think of it. Not bad.
I'll consider the others, although I don't think my LCS has ever had the first two.