Mike Sterling's Progressive RuinWhere legends live since 1969

Sometimes, you just need a good Rob Liefeld panel to cleanse the palate.

§ May 30th, 2007 § Filed under Uncategorized § 3 Comments

from X-Force #6 (Jan 1992)

God bless you, Rob Liefeld.

• If you’re keeping up with DOORWATCH ’07…we finally got replacement glass in our door. One week later. “Fast service,” my fanny.
• Say, maybe you’ve heard that Marvel’s publishing hentai now. Okay, that’s exaggerating the point a bit, but not by much. Regardless, this is going to be one of those covers I’ll be embarrassed about having on the new funnybook rack. One thing I’ve noticed over the years…the more embarrassing the comic, the more likely Junior’s gonna race right to it, grab it off the shelf, and wave it at his mom shouting “I WANT THIS ONE!”

  Here’s another cover I was completely thrilled about racking. “Ladies and gentlemen…Wonder Woman’s taint. Please, enjoy.”

• If I can wave my double-standard in your face for just a moment…I had Eric Powell’s delicious Goon spin-off Satan’s Sodomy Baby on the rack (sealed in the bags they came in, natch, with the only visible title being “Satan’s $#!!@ Baby”). The employees, a couple friends…they asked me, “Mike, are you sure you want this on the rack?” And I sez to them, I sez: “Yeah, sure, what the heck…it’s in a bag, isn’t it?”

  Okay, if I had any complaints or problems with young’uns trying to sneak off with the book, I would have done something else with it. But 1) no problems were to be had…most people who saw the cover were amused by the extensive warning, and 2) the point soon became moot anyway, since we ended up selling out of them pretty quickly. Which proves, once and for all, comic fans love Satan. Or sodomy. Or…well, I’ve probably tripped the net nanny filters by now, I’m sure.

  As it turned out, there was some reported panic pricing on this book that we were hearing from some of our customers. One store allegedly had the book marked at fifty bucks, but with a “half-off” sale price of only twenty-five. This would be on the day the comic came out…a week later for west coast Diamond customers than for the rest of the country, so said store probably noticed the pricing trends over that week and exploited their customer base accordingly, once they had their mitts on the funnybook in question.

  That had me wondering if our customers were buying the book for “investment” purposes, but I didn’t notice any multiple-copy purchases or any other behavior that would indicate folks were looking to make a few easy bucks. Not that I, Mr. “Google Sidebar Ad,” have any room to judge.

  I did check the eBay once I heard about the crazy-pricing…well, this wag has an opening bid on his copy of $6.66, har har, and the highest realized price for a single copy, so far, is $23.86. There were a few $10 and $20 concluded auctions last Wednesday, but a look at current auctions shows the craze has died down, somewhat…lots of low opening bids, few takers.

  Okay, and that’s enough about that.

• Funnybook publisher pal Nat gets some newspaper coverage. Something about “election scandals” and “WMDs” and a “barfight with Lindsey Lohan” and…oh, okay, not really. They talk about Charles Schulz, Licensable Bear™, and 24 Hour Comics…but sadly, no mention of one of Nat’s favorites, and mine, his Quantum Creep parody comic. Next time, Nat, next time.
• Supergirl gets new artist, some reasonable clothing, and human anatomy.
• Received a toy and statue catalog at the shop on Tuesday…along with a few pages of Japanese girly figurines that make that Mary Jane statue look like Ms. Petticoat DeMure, there was this…this…
  

  CHER BARBIE

  
  It’s…I’m…I don’t know how to react to this. It is both terrifying and wonderful.