wolverine – Page 2 – Mike Sterling's Progressive Ruin

I’m telling you, Marvel fans back in 1974 really wanted that Shanna the She-Devil stamp.

March 11, 2019March 11, 2019 filed under hulk, retailing, wolverine 5 Comments

So since opening up Ye Old Comics Shoppe in Camarillo, CA, available seven days a week for your funnybook purchasing needs, one of big surprises I’ve had in my acquisition of collections was just how many copies of Incredible Hulk #181 I’ve come across.

Now, maybe it’s not as surprising as the one and only time a copy of this showed up in my shop, but given the rather higher profile of this Hulk #181, being the first (full-length) appearance of Wolverine, it still amazes me every time I see it.

One thing about these #181s that I’ve been getting…more often than not, and I mean a lot more often than not, they have the Marvel Value Stamp cut out of ’em. (Read more about the Marvel Value Stamps right here!). This promotion of Marvel’s is the bane of many a dealer in old comics, as we gotta page through Marvel issues of a certain vintage and make sure that damned stamp hadn’t been cut out. And here’s the weird thing…about 98% of the time, when I’m checking most Marvels that have these stamps to make sure they’re still intact, they are. But when I’m checking Hulk #181s, the stamps are cut out, like, 90% of the time. It’s like those kids back in ’74 knew I was going to try to resell these. “Let’s stick it to that 5-year-old Sterling kid who’s gonna try to make a buck off these in about 4 decades or so!” Anyway there’s a reason why I made that #181 joke in this post.

Anyway, the thing about Hulk #181 is that they sell very quickly, stamp or no stamp. I’ve yet to have a copy in the store overnight, in fact. I either move it on eBay immediately, I call someone up on my list of Folks What Want the Fancy Books and they dash in and buy it, or a lucky walk-in grabs it. Good thing it sells so fast, because (gulp) I sure do spend a lot of money on these, and would like to recoup the cost right away (and make some much needed profit besides).

I’m bringing this all up because about a week ago I had another copy of Hulk #181 oome into the shop. And the reason I don’t have an actual picture of that copy of the comic I acquired (instead linking to the Grand Comic Database instead, just in case you needed a reminder of what this comic looked like) is because almost immediately after handing my guaranteed-good business check to the seller, completing the transaction of ownership over this back issue, I had someone in the store say “I’ll buy that!” Just as quickly as I’d acquired it, it was gone. Nice when a collection purchase turns out like that.

I did say “collection,” because there was more than just the Hulk #181. There was also Hulk #180, which I did take a picture of:

And if you don’t happen to know the significance of this comic…the reason I specified #181 being the first “full-length appearance” of Wolverine is that he appears throughout that entire issue. #180 is in fact his real first appearance, in the last panel of the final page of the book:

BONUS: reference in caption to Hulk’s green butt. You’re welcome.

Anyway, this issue doens’t have quite the demand the follow-up does in the collector market, despite literally being the character’s first in-story appearance. In one of the few times back issue demand actually makes some sense, the comic with the awesome red-background cover that actually features Wolverine, and contains Wolverine throughout the issue, is in much higher demand than the one where he pops up just in one panel on the last page, Hulk butt talk in the caption or no.

And this specific copy I acquired…hoo boy. Not only was the value stamp in this one missing as well:

…but some young person had gone scissor-mad with power after clipping the coupon, and trimmed a segment out of one of the center pages as well:

I had no real confidence in selling this book…well, okay, that’s not true. The ol’ Canucklehead’s panel was still intact, and you know, there’s always someone out there looking for this, regardless of condition, if it’s priced right. …Amd priced right it was, because I also managed to sell this very quickly. Not as fast as the #181, but still, it moved out the door faster than I expected.

It’s nice to get the big ticket items like this and turn ’em around almost immediately. It definitely helps subsidize the cost of the other items in the collection which aren’t as pricey and aren’t in nearly as much demand, and thus may sit around in the boxes a little longer. Which isn’t to say they’re turkeys, by any means…they’re just not Hulk #181. Or even #180. But it’s still, like, Kirby Tales of Suspense and that sort of thing. They’ll sell.

That’s one of the fun parts of owning a comic shop…never knowing what’s going to be in the next collection that walks in the door. I mean, sure, it’s usually a run of Team Youngblood or something, but once in a while, you get a nice surprise. Even if it does have the Marvel Value Stamp cut out of it.

The only thing I really wondered about is how much money Fox paid Warner Brothers to use the Superman music in that Deadpool trailer.

April 3, 2017April 3, 2017 filed under movie reviews, wolverine 9 Comments

So we finally made the time to go see Logan…for free, at the movie theater on the local Navy base, which is always the best way to see a movie in the theater because the other patrons are always so well behaved. No yapping during the film, no foolin’ around with phones, no acting up and causing disruptions…yup, I didn’t do any of those things this time.

As to the movie itself…hoo boy, I was told to expect a bit of the old ultraviolence, and that’s what I certainly got, but it’s not jut exploitative and…well, okay, maybe a little exploitative, but built on the story’s framework of aging, loss, and regret. It’s violent, but it’s serious and it’s funny and it’s sad, and it’s probably one of the more mature works in the superhero film genre. Tonally, it’s difficult to extrapolate Logan from Wolverine’s beginnings in the early X-Men films, which helped establish early on the formula for superhero films, but Logan wouldn’t work nearly as well without the character work performed by Hugh Jackman and Patrick Stewart in those movies, endearing Wolverine and Xavier to us.

But you all saw it already, so you know all that. One of the things I kept coming across online, in between the film’s opening and my seeing it this past weekend, were a handful of clickbait-y articles declaring that fans were confused by the end of the film. Now, I deliberately didn’t click on said articles, since I didn’t want the film spoiled for myself, and a cursory glimpse today in the various internet arenas where I spotted those particular headlines didn’t turn up anything. I didn’t see anything in the ending that looked like it needed any kind of explaining, so I turned my query to my Twitter pals to see what they had to say. Just what was so confusing about the ending of Logan?

(SPOILERS AHEAD, in case you hadn’t seen it yourself, yet.)

One possible point of confusion that was mentioned was the eulogy Laura recited at the graveside. The thought was that maybe, despite hearing the same speech during the bits of Shane shown earlier in the film, viewers may have forgotten that bit of foreshadowing and later wondered just what she was talking about. That’s a possibility, I guess, thought that scene where they’re watching the movie in the hotel room might as well have had the caption “WE’RE SETTING YOU UP FOR SOMETHING LATER IN THIS FILM” across the bottom of the screen.

The other bit that may have thrown people off is the nature of “Eden” or “sanctuary” that the kids are trying to reach, whether it’s real or not. There’s radio contact with an unseen someone who is trying to help the kids, and we never see the kids reaching their supposed safe haven after leaving their gathering place on this side of the border. And given that the coordinates for that gathering place were taken out of a comic book presenting the fictionalized adventures of the X-Men….well, there’s a lot to parse here, and I think this isn’t so much “confusing” as “deliberately vague.” This movie’s not about kids trying to reach safety. It’s about what Logan goes through to help these kids…any details as to what this safe haven is, and how the kids learned about it, who distributed those kinda terribly-printed X-Men movies, etc. etc., can all be explained in Logan II: Laura Strikes Back.

And the only other thing that struck me as possibly making viewers scratch their head is Laura turning the grave’s cross on its side to make an “X.” Let’s face it, that’s waaaaay subtle.

Also mentioned to me on Twitter, and everyone in my theater thought this too (I know this, thanks to the incredible telepathic powers I’ve developed after seeing every X-Men movie in the theater), was the idea that surely Wolverine’s clawed fist was going to thrust out of the grave in that very last second of the film. C’mon, you expected it too. I’m glad they didn’t, however…just letting the story end right there, as kinda depressing as it was, was the right move.

At least until Logan III: Return of the Mutant, coming Summer 2021.

Yet another thing Wolverine has in common with the Three Mouseketeers…

January 25, 2017 filed under three mouseketeers, wolverine 4 Comments

…is the fact that they coexist in worlds with comic books based on them. For example, here’s ol’ Canucklehead holding an X-Men comic in the most recent Logan trailer:

…and here are the Three Mouseketeers reading a letter from a fan of the Three Mouseketeers comic wondering how mice are able to read and write:

Also, how come two of you wear clothes and one of you is naked?
…which begs the question, if Little Petey is so convinced of collective illiteracy of mice, then why did he address the letter to them? Unless of course Little Petey, as a big fan of the Mouseketeers, reluctantly buys into the premise that they can read and write, and is asking, in his somewhat rude way, for an explanation of their decidedly non-mouse-ical abilities. (The answer, of course, is that the mice went to school.)

Now Marvel Comics has long established that a version of Marvel Comics exists in the Marvel Universe, publishing semi-fictionalized accounts of the superheroes in their world, so seeing Wolverine holding a somewhat sloppily-manufactured X-Men comic in that trailer has precedence. But the idea that someone at DC Comics discovered a tiny community of talking, literate mice and decided “let’s make a comic book based on this!” instead of “let’s sell them to scientists who will dissect them and find out what’s wrong with them” or, more likely, “OH MY LORD KILL THEM, KILL THE MONSTERS” — well, that’s a bit weird.

Then again, it may be that Sheldon Mayer was a kind, gentle soul who believed in simply providing wholesome entertainment for kids and used the Mouseketeers as inspiration for his art. Though that wouldn’t stop someone else from tracking them down and exploiting them in more cynical ways. I mean, they’re getting mail…clearly they’re not hard to find.

from Three Mouseketeers #3 (Sept/Oct 1970, reprinted from Three Mouseketeers #6, Jan/Feb 1957) by Sheldon Mayer

Today’s post is dumb.

February 24, 2013 filed under found art, wolverine 3 Comments

“Oh, you have such good taste in comics! You certainly picked a top notch book to read! May I say again how much I admire your discerning eye for such excellent reading material?”

Um…I don’t think that’s what the “complimentary copy” stamp on your cover is supposed to mean.

“Okay, fine. Enjoy your lousy free funnybook, cheapskate.”

From the backroom of misfit toys.

November 28, 2011November 28, 2011 filed under misfit toys, wolverine 3 Comments

Well, it’s not really a “toy” as the term is generally used, and it’s not an item that’s been sitting around in our backroom for years and years (it’s from a box of another store’s stock dumped at our shop), so I’m abusing the title a bit, I guess. But it’s certainly a misfit item:

I don’t know if anyone’s still doing the mini CD-ROM “multimedia collector cards” thing, but I seem to recall a number of releases along these lines about ten years ago. (My particular favorites were the randomly-packed “chase card” die-cut CD-ROMs that came with this Star Trek set.)

Anyway, as it says there, the CD (dated 2002) contains screen savers and desktop pics and “hotlinks to websites” that are probably defunct (aside from Marvel.com, if it’s there), and “Motion Comics,” which, sight unseen, I can safely guess are likely terrible.

And it’s in the 3-inch format, so you gotta tray-load this sucker:

…which means, even if I wanted to open the package and check it out (which I’m not, since I’m throwing this bad boy on the eBay) I can’t put this in the front-loading slot drive on my Mac. I suppose I could bust out the old 3-inch CD adapter plastic ring (originally bought back in — ’87? — to play the original They Might be Giants “Don’t Let’s Start” 3-inch C-Dingle on my first CD player) but I wouldn’t want to run the risk of the disc coming loose from the adapter and spending the rest of the day trying to fish it out and boy am I on a tangent.

This is the first of a planned six, it seems:

“Collect all VI.” Oh you guys. Anyway, a brief Googling only turns up this same disc, so maybe that’s all that came out? I’m sure if someone out there did buy all VI, they’ll let me know.