Thursday, March 24, 2016

Dick Tracy Comics Monthly #56 (1954)



A niche area of comic collecting that has grown the past 20 years is pre-code crime (and horror), a label referring to those genre comics published roughly from 1948-1954.  The most sought-after books in this category tend to be those with the most shocking or gruesome cover imagery and graphic story content.  The more violent and gruesome, the better!  This apparently is driven by a nostalgia for and/or interest in the halcyon days before Frederic Wertham and the nanny state revoked toddlers' right to enjoy depictions of beheadings, zombies, lingerie and torture in their comics.  Basically, anything that would be considered not politically correct or inappropriate for kids today is hot and getting hotter.  Books like Fight Against Crime #20 and Crime Suspenstories #22 are examples.  These are well-known (and therefore valuable) books, but here I am going to talk about a run of comics with graphic covers that are cheap and overlooked by many.

Dick Tracy began in newspaper strips in 1931, and was published in comic books starting in 1939.  Dell published his adventures until 1949, when Harvey picked up the series at issue 25. Whereas Overstreet highlights particular issues of other series of the era with notations like "severed head cover" or "torture cover", for the Dick Tracy series only #28 gets a notation for depicting bondage (actually, torture).

I picked out issue #56 as the focus of this post only because I consider it the most graphic of the run, but #28 and #56 are also good (bad?) covers.  Below is a list of several more with graphic-content covers (comic cover blood is actually very rare, but this run features plenty).  Even this list excludes other covers depicting scenes of violence against women and children, for example, and you may want to browse them and see what catches your fancy (sicko!).


IssuePubl.Comment
# 28Jun 1950Torture cover
# 36Feb 1951Man slugs woman
# 37Mar 1951Torture cover
# 52Jun 1952Man stabs woman with pipe
# 53Jul 1952Blood (Dick Tracy's mouth)
# 55Sep 1952Dead man lies in trail of blood
# 56Oct 1952Mans beats woman with blackjack; woman bleeds profusely
# 58Dec 1952Bleeding head wound
# 59Jan 1953Dog mauls man; man bleeds from face and torso
# 65Jul 1953Criminals bleed from arm and head
# 69Nov 1953Criminal bleeds from head
# 70Dec 1953Dog mauls criminal's arm
# 71Jan 1954Criminal bleeds profusely from head
# 74Apr 1954Criminal in pool of blood
# 75May 1954Criminal bleeds from face
# 78Aug 1954Criminal shot through hand



Here is a copy of #56 which recently sold for $9.98:



Several File copies of these books hit the market a few years ago and generally sold at guide ($40 for a VF, for example).  Guide values are $12 (VG), $40 (VF) and $105 (NM-).  This hasn't changed in at least two years which means these books are really, really under the radar.

April 1955's issue 86 cover is the first to feature the seal of the comics code, and the fun was over!

Why aren't these books more widely known?  I have some theories.  Firstly, the crime genre is not the most widely collected.  Secondly, Dick Tracy is a character much more famous for his newspaper strips.  Thirdly (and this is an important note), many of the stories were reprinted from the newspaper strips. Series featuring fully reprinted material (such as Famous Funnies) have historically been shunned by collectors and guide values reflect that.  The good news however, is that this is vast unexplored territory.  Information at comics.org is scarce, with many of the books containing blank listings.  Archivists/volunteers have not begun to sort through them and figure out exactly what is original material and what is not.  If I had to guess, I would bet that the interiors of #56, to take an example, has a mix of original and reprinted material (would you know, I don't have my copy on hand at the moment to flip through, but I will update this post when I do).  All covers are almost certainly original to the comic.  As an example, here is the original cover art for #28.

Here is a $173,000 sale of a comic with a cover featuring a bound woman with Nazi and KKK imagery by Alex Schomburg. Investment in comics with striking cover imagery is a category of its own which I will discuss more in future posts.  Since attraction to particular cover subject matter is subjective, this can be tricky.  There are certain things that have proven value however, and if you get the hang of it you can be successful at identifying undervalued winners.

Meanwhile, enjoy the gallery below with a couple more of the cheap Dick Tracys, followed by graphic-content covers that will cost you considerably more than $10!

Thanks for reading!

- www.heronext.com










Tuesday, March 8, 2016

Secrets of Haunted House #31 (1980)



A late Bronze Age book I want to spotlight today is Secrets of Haunted House #31, for the simple reason it is a cheap book featuring a cover-featured first appearance of a 35-year old DC character with much potential.

Quick history: Mister E was the star of standard vampire-hunting stories in Secrets of Haunted House #31-41, then 10 years later was used by Neil Gaiman in Books of Magic as one of the "Trenchcoat Brigade," an informal "team" who taught Timothy Hunter about magic.  He's in pretty good company there, as Dr. Occult is a Seigel & Shuster creation predating Superman, Phantom Stranger's first appearance from 1952 is a thousand-dollar book in CGC 4.0, and Constantine's first appearance in CGC 9.8 peaked at close to $700 due to anticipation of his TV show (before coming down to around $425 currently).

Mister E was in a couple of Vertigo mini-series, then after being absent for 10 years was reintroduced in the New 52 with an altered appearance and a different explanation for his blindness.  His bibliography totals only around 50 appearances in the four decades he's been around (compared to 300 for Madame Xanadu).  I really have no idea why he has not been used more.  It is just a matter of time before a writer or film producer taps this character for bigger and better things, but for now his first appearance is very affordable.

The Overstreet guide lists this at $16 in NM-, $2 above surrounding issues.  Currently there are zero 9.8s of the mere 7 that have been graded) which is kind of odd, and it would make a fun quest to find the first certified 9.8.  I have found a few nice 9.0 - 9.4 range copies discounted from guide, in the $10-$12 range.  This is definitely a book to memorize and try to find high-grade copies at your LCS or at shows.

Mister E in the "Trenchcoat Brigade":



Mister E's debut in the SOHH #31 backup story:






SOHH # 35 sports an eye-catching Mister E/Frankenstein monster cover by Rich Buckler: