When I first started, quantity was the name of the game. If my friend Greg had 100 comics, I had to have 101 comics. Back when New England Comics (www.newenglandcomics.com) had their 10th anniversary sale, they had a number of back issues for 10 cents each. I went to the store 2 or 3 times during the week of the sale and loaded up on issues...some of them I wanted and some of them I bought just because they were 10 cents each. I also have a long box full of Valiant back issues (including numerous duplicates) bought using the "quantity logic". Fast forward to today...I still look for great deals, but my tastes are a little more refined. I mostly look for comics that have to do with Spider-Man, Batman, Superman, and the X-Men. I know that this still leaves a lot of comics to buy, but it definitely has brought a little bit of sanity to my collection. What is the point of all of this?? The point is that where you start out as a comic collector will not always be the same place you are at 17 years later.
There are many different ways make your collection unique. Just pick one that suits your tastes, go to your local comic shop, and start buying. Here are some of the many different ways in which you can gather a collection.
PUBLISHER
There are many different publishers to choose from. You have the big boys (Marvel and DC) as well as lots of smaller publishers. Maybe there is an Indy publisher that operates out of your home town or you like the books that DC is putting out right now (they definitely have some great books coming out right now). Ian Levine who is know to many on the comicspriceguide.com message boards (and who can be heard talking about his collection on Metropolis Comics "The Comic Zone") has every comic book that DC has ever published.
CHARCTER
There are thousands of characters to choose from, everything from Batman and Superman to Sammy the Skunk (I saw this book mentioned on comicspriceguide.com). I started out buying Batman books in 1989 because I had watched reruns of the Adam West Batman show and the movie with Michael Keaton and Jack Nicholson was coming out around this time as well. The character was someone I was familiar with. If the character also belongs to a superhero team, this would add to the number of books needed to complete your collection. For example, Wolverine has tons of single appearances as well as appearances in such team books as X-Men, Uncanny X-Men, Astonishing X-Men, and New Avengers.
YEAR OF BIRTH
This is a neat way to assemble a collection...purchase all of the comics from the year you were born. Depending on the year, you would have a great collection or a rather forgettable one (I feel bad for anyone born in the early to mid 90's). This collection would have a set number of issues in it so you wouldn’t have to worry about picking up the newest issue of Superman each month.
VARIANTS
There are many different types of variants. Some are simple reprintings of the original books (the different printing is usually noted in the indica) or the cover has been recolored (many of the new printings from Indentity Crisis were done like this). The variant issue can also feature a new sketch entirely (too many of these to mention) or a tribute to an earlier cover (the various printings of the Marvel Zombies books featured “Zombiefied” sketches of classic Marvel covers).
There are also variants made of Marvel and DC books by third party companies (Whitman and So Much Fun). The DC books done by Whitman look just like the original books except that the publisher logo is different than what was on the original book (the DC circle was replaced by the Whitman logo). The Marvel books that were produced by Whitman had a different price symbol than the original printings. The “So Much Fun” variants are similar in that they have covers that closely resemble the original books, but usually “So Much Fun” is printed on the cover of the book.
CREATOR
This is a great way to show the evolution of your favorite creator. You may be a fan of Grant Morrison, John Romita, or Chuck Austen. Collecting this way would expose you to a number of quality books. Morrison has written such books as Animal Man, JLA, New X-Men, and Batman while John Romita is know to many for his long run on Amazing Spider-Man (his son John Jr., also has appeared on this book). You can also choose to collect every issues created by one particular family (the Kubert and Romita families have produced hundreds of books over the years).
GRADED BOOKS
This a fairly new development. Third party graders (CGC, CGG) will, for a small fee, grade your book and put in a plastic case so as to not change the grade. You can decide, for instance to collect only books that have a grade of 9.6. This method of assembling a collection can get rather pricey because people pay a premium for books in higher grades.
There are many ways to assemble a collection. The biggest thing to remember is to enjoy what you collect and collect what you enjoy (I’m pretty sure someone else has said this, but I am not able to remember who that person is). If you buy every appearance of Superman, but you are really a fan of Spider-Man, you are not going to be really happy with your comic book collection. My collection started out as buying just Batman books, but soon branched out into comics produced by both DC and Marvel featuring appearances by Batman, Superman, Spider-Man and a host of other characters.
Clyf started collecting in 1989. His interests mainly include Spider-Man, Batman and the X-Men.
His collection is 5,900 strong and growing.
