*DC: We commence a series of updates this week starring our favourite characters, the Legion of Super-Heroes, kicking off with two lovely condition tabloids from the 1970s. All-New Collectors’ Edition C55 features the wedding of Lightning Lad and Saturn Girl, essential for any Legion collector since this is not a reprint. Limited Collectors’ Edition C49 reprints the classic first Mordru story. Both issues feature the fantastic large size art of the tabloid format and a host of special features about the Legion, and both are in a spectacular VF+ grade. 
PICTURED:
ALL NEW COLLECTORS’ EDITION C55 VF+ £60 SOLD
LIMITED COLLECTORS’ EDITION C49 VF+ £25 SOLD

*Marvel: By the time of Spider-Man’s 50th issue, ‘new’ artist John Romita had made the series his own, and this milestone number was marked with the debut of a new villain, the Kingpin – so long associated with Daredevil, in the post-Miller years, that younger readers are unaware that he originated in Spider-Man’s Rogues’ Gallery! The cover of #50, with Peter temporarily abandoning his Spider-Man identity, has become etched in the minds of a generation, endlessly imitated and ‘homaged’, in comics and other media. This is a reasonable lower-graded pence printed copy; it notably has a long diagonal crease across the top right corner that breaks colour (see scan) and a number of smaller white creases or marks, along with edge wear and corner blunting. Staples are firm at cover and centrefold and page quality is okay. A relatively affordable major key issue.
PICTURED: AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #50 GD/VG p £400 SOLD

*Marvel: By his 101st issue, Spider-Man had become temporarily encumbered with six arms, leaving him a true eight-limbed arachnoid hero; but more importantly, he met a foe who was destined to become one of the Marvel Universe’s prime anti-heroes. Following the 1971 relaxation of the Comics Code Authority (which had hitherto banned mention of vampires and werewolves in the wake of the 1950s horror comics scare), the floodgates were opened for all manner of supernatural beings; one of the first was Michael Morbius, tragic scientist who, while not a traditional vampire, gained many vampiric attributes after an experiment gone awry. Among said attributes: enhanced strength, speed, senses… and an uncontrollable craving for human blood. A big hit with the Spider-Man audience, Morbius the Living Vampire first appeared in Amazing Spider-Man #101 and #102 revealed his tragic origin; he then made a rapid reappearance in Marvel Team-Up #3, graduating to his own series in Fear thereafter. There have been several Morbius series in the intervening decades, and the upcoming Morbius flick is leading to a heightened demand for his premier appearances. The Good Doctor#101 is not a great copy, pence printed and plagued by multiple long and deep colour-breaking cover creases, as well as edge and general wear and corner blunting; staples are firm and page quality quite decent though. The epic-length #102 is also pence printed with unspoilt cover image, minor creasing which barely breaks colour and a 2 cm split at the base of the squarebound spine. Staples and pages are good.
PICTURED: AMAZING SPIDER-MAN
#101 FA+ p £125 SOLD
#102 VG p £50

*Marvel: The Silver Surfer met Spider-Man for the first time in issue #14 of the Sky-Rider’s short-lived 1960s series. As is so often the way with such things, they didn’t get along. This is a decent mid-grade pence stamped copy, with excellent colour and gloss, minor creasing in the logo area which does not break colour, very minor edge wear including a few spine ticks, tight staples and just a hint of colour fade at the very left edge of the masthead box. All in all a very respectable copy.
PICTURED: SILVER SURFER #14 VG+ p £75

*Alan Class Reprints: For many years now, we’ve been scouring the personal archives of legendary publisher Alan Class (who is still very much with us) and with his full co-operation, releasing for sale sets of the original printing plates that were used to print the covers of his comics from 1959-1989. We have now reached the final phase of these plate set releases, which will last us into 2022. These sets are time-consuming to prepare, so our release schedule will be staggered. But the good news is that all the sets we have left are among the best, either featuring a classic Marvel comic reprint, or else a very early fantasy/mystery issue. So, this final phase represents your last opportunity to add one or more of these unique pieces to your collection. Each set comprises the lead printing plates used in the original comic’s colour printing, a copy of the comic printed with these plates and a signed certificate of authenticity signed by Alan Class himself. These are packaged in a special protective presentation case. Several sets (as noted) have additional historical artefacts such as colour proofs, interior page plates, printers’ photostats etc. (Please be aware that these weigh a lot and postage will be expensive. Also note that due to the onerous paperwork required for customs declarations following Brexit, we can no longer post these Plate Sets outside the UK.) Three new sets this week, details as follows:
SINISTER TALES #104 £70 Comic: GD/VG;  Reprints Amazing Spider-Man #70 inc cover,  ACG, Atlas.
Extra: Cover colour proof SOLD
SUSPENSE #60 £65 Comic: GD;  Reprints Daredevil #8 by Wood inc cover,  Atlas, 1 Chameleon, 1 Young King Cole, 1 Target SOLD
SUSPENSE #99 £75 Comic: VF;  Reprints Avengers #60 (Hank & Jan wedding) inc. cover plus Daredevil #47, Charlton, Atlas. Extra: Colour cover proof SOLD

*Girls’ Picture Libraries: IPC/Fleetway’s Love Story Library (later Love Story Picture Library, to distinguish it from the numerous all-text series), featured picture strip romances for young women (and nostalgic housewives), frequently beautifully illustrated. It ran a respectable 1600+ issues between 1952 and 1976, and our latest additions are 20 newly listed between #275 & #322. From a newsagent’s unsold stock, these would grade FN if not for the pernicious staple rust of long term storage, which, although not harming the stories themselves, is a little heavy in places, bringing most of these down to a GD/VG grade, although a few very nice ones grade higher with little rust.
PICTURED: LOVE STORY LIBRARY #318 VG SOLD

*DC: In the mid-1970s, DC reprinted some of their most famous and iconic comics of yesterday in Tabloid size form under the heading ‘Famous First Edition’. F5 of that series featured a facsimile reprint of Batman #1 from Spring 1940, the famous landmark issue that also included the first appearances of the Joker and Catwoman. This copy is a little grubby with some edge wear, particularly at upper right corner, but it’s a snip of a price for such an historic item.
PICTURED: FAMOUS FIRST EDITION #F5 GD/VG £20 SOLD

*Marvel: It’s not often in these modern times that a single digit numbered issue of Amazing Spider-Man turns up less than £300, but here’s one come along from the Good Doctor Collection right now. Amazing Spider-Man #7 features the return of the Vulture, one of Spidey’s earliest foes. This cents copy has plenty of flaws: spine roll, a loose centrefold, a small biro figure ‘6’ on the cover by the Vulture’s head, long vertical colour breaking cover crease and lots of similar smaller ones, edge wear and worn spine, ragged right edge pages, back cover tears and a small front cover tear bottom right; the most significant defect is a jagged finger-size section missing from the bottom of the spine (see scan). For all that, it is otherwise complete, the colours are good and the page quality acceptable. Certainly a great gap-filler for the budget conscious.
PICTURED: AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #7 GD- £260 

*Marvel: We don’t see CGC 9.8 grades too often in vintage comics, so it’s really a nice coup to have Amazing Spider-Man #192 & #193 new into stock this week, both in this NM/M grade. Both are unrestored blue labels, with undamaged cases. #192 has Off-White to White Pages, #193 White Pages. It’s a two-part story featuring Professor Smythe and The Fly.
PICTURED: AMAZING SPIDER-MAN BOTH SOLD
#192 CGC 9.8 NM/M £105
#193 CGC 9.8 NM/M £140

*Vintage UK/Australian Reprints of US Material: Around about three decades before Haysi Fantayzee’s ‘homage’, John Wayne was knocking ’em dead in the US with his own title from Toby Press, reprinted here in the UK by World Distributors. Always a popular series for Western buffs, we have three early black and white reprints new in this week, all in nice shape: #2, #3 & #5. See our catalogue for details. 
PICTURED: JOHN WAYNE #2 VG £12

*Boys’ Adventure & War Comics: This week, all 13 issues of Lion, the ‘King Of Picture Story Papers’ from the third quarter of 1953. From an original owner collection, these average a nice uniform VG at £5 each, with one or two higher or lower. The inevitable rusty staples are not too much in evidence with only minimal bleed. As Lion succinctly put it in one of their straplines: ‘School, War, Detective & Adventure Picture Stories.’ See our catalogue for full details.

We thought it Timely (if not Marvelous) to advise you of how we’re operating over the upcoming festive period.

To order in time for Christmas, UK orders must be placed by 4 pm on Saturday 11th December. As long as they’re paid for by 4 pm on Tuesday 14th December, they’ll be posted on Wednesday 15th December. Royal Mail advise that these should be delivered in time for Christmas. (Delivery times vary outside the UK, so we’re not giving dates for these.) After this, we won’t be posting again until Wednesday 29th December.

Our weekly Newsletters will continue up to and including 11th December, after which they’ll be taking a two week break, returning on Saturday 1st January. You can of course place an email order at any time, and we will fill your order and bill you to fit in with the above postage dates.

We shall be using the time to catch up with the assessment of several collections that are awaiting valuation, so that when the Newsletter returns on 1st January, it should feature bumper updates going forward.

*DC: The House Of Mystery entry into DC’s tabloid range is a wonderful package; not only do you get seven superb stories by the very best of 1940s horror artists: Neal Adams, Bernie Wrightson, Gil Kane, Alex Toth, Jack Sparling and Segio Aragones (!), with their art on wonderful display in this tabloid size, but it’s also chock-full of games, cartoons, a 3D mystery cut-out, features and pin-ups. This GD/VG copy has some spine wear and stress marks (black background), colour-breaking creases in the corners of both front and back covers, and some tanning on the inside covers, but we’ve seen worse…  An uncommon item.
PICTURED: LIMITED COLLECTORS’ EDITION C23 GD/VG £20 SOLD

*Marvel: The Claremont & Cockrum New X-Men was already a critical hit when #101 turned up, and in a dramatic turn of events, Jean Grey, former weak sister of the team, was elevated into a powerhouse when a cosmic ray storm seemed to transform her into the entity known as Phoenix – and a major, ultimately tragic, story arc for the X-Men began. The legend was somewhat tarnished in later years by Marvel’s back & forth position on whether Jean actually was the Phoenix, or whether the Phoenix force just manifested itself in her form (with a swingin’ new costume), but nevertheless, this remains a key and highly sought after issue. An outstanding copy of this key issue new in this week in very high grade. Pence printed, flat, tight, glossy, vibrant, supple, and all those other adjectives applicable to the best quality. Square corners, white pages, firm staples. There are just the very slightest stress marks at the spine (just a couple) and a tiny crease mark at the bottom right corner which just stopped us awarding an even higher grade. High resolution images are available on request.
X-MEN #101 VF+ p £600

*Marvel: As befits its status as the premier series of the Marvel Universe, the Fantastic Four has launched many secondary careers of the FF’s foes and friends who first appeared as guest-stars, then graduated to their own series. The Silver Surfer, the Inhumans, the Black Panther and many others have debuted this way, and in Fantastic Four #66 & #67, we were introduced to a mysterious cocooned figure who emerged the following issue as ‘Him’, a being of almost godlike power. Later, he would be named Warlock and would enjoy a chequered career of critical acclaim, but haphazard commercial success, coming into his own with Jim Starlin’s controversial series of the 1970s. Adam Warlock is scheduled to appear in the Guardians Of The Galaxy 3 movie in 2023. These two issues see the first appearance of the character, though he was not fully revealed until the second half of the two-part story.
PICTURED: FANTASTIC FOUR
#66 GD/VG £40 An okay copy with a fair bit of spine and edge wear, including colour-breaking creases. There is a biro squiggle over the ‘F’ in Fantastic and a 2 cm tear to the right edge without loss. Staples are attached, but are not tight; some tanning to page edges. SOLD
#67 VG- £130 A sturdy and supple copy with some colour-breaking creases across cover corners; other wear is minimal. Nice cover colour and gloss; good pages with tight, firm staples. SOLD

*Marvel: A 30th Century first this week. We’ve had the complete Wolverine 1982 mini for sale as a set before, but we’ve never yet sold a complete slabbed set of anything. Here it is! Perhaps surprisingly, Wolverine had been around quite few years before he starred in his own title. (Even after this 1982 mini-series, it would be a further 6 years before Logan got his own ongoing solo title). You can’t say that Marvel were milking the character’s popularity – a phrase I thought I’d never write. But they did pull out all the stops with this mini, combining X-Men scribe Chris Claremont with super-star artist Frank Miller in this tale of the Yakuza and Wolverine’s doomed love Mariko Yashida. All fours issues are presented here as a set, all CGC graded, unrestored blue label, white pages, perfect cases. #1 and #4 are 8.0 (VF); #2 and #3 are 7.5 (VF-). A great opportunity to add a prestigious series to your collection.
PICTURED: WOLVERINE (1982) COMPLETE SET 1-4 £255 (NB sold as set only) SOLD
#1 8.0 VF
#2 7.5 VF-
#3 7.5 VF-
#4 8.0 VF

*Marvel:  A small update to Tales Of Suspense this week between #51 (1st Scarecrow) and #95 in a mixture of grades. Most of these issues are shared between Iron Man and Captain America. Included is #94, the first appearance of the ever-popular Modok, and a couple of Cap’s WW2-set adventures before he moved into a contemporary setting.
PICTURED: TALES OF SUSPENSE #94 GD+ £40 1st Modok; a decent enough copy marred by a small scuff near the Comics Code Box and a couple of small and mostly unobtrusive stains on the cover. SOLD

*Miscellaneous 1960 Onwards: A chunky top-up to our stock of Atlas Seaboard comics published in 1975. In the 1980s and 1990s, new universes were quite commonplace (Valiant, Ultraverse, Defiant etc), but back in 1975 a whole new comic group launch competing with DC & Marvel was quite a bold and innovative move. Sadly, this project helmed by Marvel’s founder Martin Goodman was doomed to failure, and none of the 28 comic and magazine titles lasted more than 4 issues, despite having stellar names involved such as Wood, Ditko, Chaykin, Adams, Heath, Severin, Toth and more. A nice selection of Atlas Seaboard titles new in this week, including the Destructor, the Grim Ghost, Morlock 2001, Phoenix, Planet Of Vampires and Weird Suspense (featuring the Tarantula), many #1 issues among them. See our catalogue for our full listings of all our Atlas Seaboard stock. 
PICTURED:
GRIM GHOST #1 FN+ p £6
PLANET OF VAMPIRES #1 VF p £11.75

*Collected Editions: Strange bedfellows from Titan publishing this week. Top Traitor, the third volume in Titan’s most recent complete publication of Modesty Blaise’s adventures from the London Evening Standard is long out of print and difficult to get; here in a lovely copy with very little sign of wear. Stalwart of 2000 AD, Rogue Trooper is here in Book One of his adventures, the first Titan edition collection from 1986 with a couple of creases to front and back covers, but still very nice.
PICTURED:
MODESTY BLIASE: TOP TRAITOR VF £25 SOLD
ROGUE TROOPER BOOK ONE: FN £10 SOLD

*Girls’ Comics: Two Free Gift issues of Mandy this week with a difference. Both #396 (1974) and #439 (1975) promised a lucky dip of Free Gift, each with one possibility of several enclosed. I’m sure there’s a lot of you out there anxious to collect all the various gifts, so just for you, I’ll specify that #396 appears to have a ring (it’s still in its sealed envelope, but that’s what if feels like), whereas #439 has a Zodiac Medallion (also in its sealed envelope, but we’re fairly sure of that since it can be seen through the envelope a bit). Both comics are FN, both gifts at least VF.
PICTURED: MANDY
#396 FN WITH FREE GIFT VF £35 SOLD
#439 FN WITH FREE GIFT VF £35 SOLD

We thought it Timely (if not Marvelous) to advise you of how we’re operating over the upcoming festive period.

To order in time for Christmas, UK orders must be placed by 4 pm on Saturday 11th December. As long as they’re paid for by 4 pm on Tuesday 14th December, they’ll be posted on Wednesday 15th December. Royal Mail advise that these should be delivered in time for Christmas. (Delivery times vary outside the UK, so we’re not giving dates for these.) After this, we won’t be posting again until Wednesday 29th December.

Our weekly Newsletters will continue up to and including 11th December, after which they’ll be taking a two week break, returning on Saturday 1st January. You can of course place an email order at any time, and we will fill your order and bill you to fit in with the above postage dates.

We shall be using the time to catch up with the assessment of several collections that are awaiting valuation, so that when the Newsletter returns on 1st January, it should feature bumper updates going forward.

*DC: I have a soft spot for this series, inasmuch as it’s one of many that featured the classic quartet line-up of scientist/leader, his strong best friend, his girl and her kid brother. Here, Dane, Biff, Judy & Nicky were engaged in undersea adventures at the hands of Robert Kanigher (writer) and Russ Heath (artist). The Sea Devils had undersea adventures for three issues of Showcase and 35 of their own series. I think they may have stumbled across more lost civilizations than Tarzan did in Africa (and that’s going some!), and a monster lurked within every coral reef. Their early adventures were often mind-warpingly wild as was the case with a lot of ‘Barking’ Bob Kanigher’s output, and the art by Russ Heath was superlative (you could really believe these adventures were happening underwater). Later, after the departures of the creators, subsequent hands provided more ordinary fare, though competently done for the most part. A selection of issues by Russ Heath and later artists between #2 and #21 added to our catalogue this week.
PICTURED: SEA DEVILS #2 GD/VG p £30 SOLD

*Marvel: One of the most sought-after Marvel Comics of the 1960s is Fantastic Four #48, which introduced the Silver Surfer, a cosmic-powered being the equal of the combined FF… and the Surfer’s master, Galactus, an entity of even more monstrous might! Both became major figures in the Marvel Universe, with the Surfer repenting his role as Galactus’ herald and choosing the side of justice, while Galactus’ insatiable hunger drives him ever onwards to more heinous acts. This Good Doctor Collection copy is pence printed and in beautiful condition, with vibrant colour cover and a totally unmarked cover scene. Corners are fairly sharp, and staples firmly attached at spine and centrefold. Wear is minimal, mostly restricted to the top edge, but very narrow. There are small handling marks at top corners resulting in tiny creases. Pages are a lovely white to off-white, nearer the white end of that scale. Covers and pages are both beautifully supple and fresh. Just to the right of the Fantastic Four logo there is a soft, barely discernable crease of about 4 cm, with just a hint of a colour break. An iconic Silver Age comic in fabulous condition, which would be a high point of many a collection. High resolution images are available on request.
PICTURED: FANTASTIC FOUR #48 FN/VF p £3,750

*Marvel: We conclude this week’s visit to the Good Doctor Collection with a long run of Avengers, complete from #101 to #125. Many famous storylines included in this period, involving the Grim Reaper, the Sentinels, Magneto and the X-Men, the debut of Mantis in #112, the Avengers/Defenders War, the Collector, Zodiac and an appearance by Thanos in #125. Full details as always in our catalogue. More from the Good Doctor next week!
PICTURED: AVENGERS #112 FN- p £40 1st Mantis