I admit to 90s comics being a guilty pleasure... I still hate speculators for almost ruining the medium.

I love the 90's. Rudolph Dirks' The Katzenjammer Kids, Richard Outcault's The Yellow Kid. So many classics.

@Dante19883

4 жыл бұрын

I know. Some 90s books have a certain charm to them for sure!

I fully agree with you about 90's comics, if you're into them you can find amazing work for dirt cheap just because nobody cares about any of it

@Dante19883

6 жыл бұрын

As a general rule of thumb yes, but unfortunately the prices of 90s comics are slowly increasing as well despite the fact the back issue market is full of them. According to this great article I read in the Overstreet guide, prices of 90s comics are slowly increasing as comic from other eras are becoming more and more unaffordable. Newer collectors are now restoring to trying to fill up their collections with key books from the 80s and 90s since they are more affordable than books from other eras. As always, thanks for commenting!

I have been enjoying your videos. I am 42 years old. I have not really been involved in comics for about 15 years. I drew, read, and collected comics for years. I still have ALL my comics. Watching your videos is inspiring me to start looking through my comics. This video really hits home. I still have my 3 issues of Spawn #1 and 6 Issues of Spider-Man #1. Todd McFarlane was my guy. Thanks for your videos. Very informative.

@Dante19883

6 жыл бұрын

Hi there! Thanks so much! I really appreciate it! I’m so happy to hear that I inspired you to go back and look through your comics again! It really is a fun pastime. McFarlane does rock. I like his stuff too! Glad to hear you are enjoying the videos. I hope to hear from you again on the channel sometime. Cheers!

5:25 there was another change in retail distribution. Before the early 1980s delis, drug stores, grocers, and candy stores that sold comics had agreements with the publishers to send back any unsold books. Once an issue left the shelf, it was gone except for second hand boutiques, until dedicated comics stores sprang up.

@Dante19883

5 жыл бұрын

Excellent point!! Thanks for that bit of info my friend!

@robertt9342

5 жыл бұрын

They had used book stores and even dedicated comic shops (boutiques?) since at least the early 70s, and a few early than that. People also had hand me downs from earlier decades. You could also go to conventions in the 70s. The change in distribution came about because of the increasing comic shops, while at the same time traditional magazine/news distributors were beginning to dump comics because of the low margin. At a point They didn't even send back unsold books because the cost of sending them back wasn't worthwhile to publishers or the distributors.

Collecting comics didnt ruin the industry. I was there, i lived through it. Ill tell you what ruined the industry, it was speculators. Comics collectors are people who buy comics to enjoy to read. And to maybe someday eventually pass down to their children something that they themselves enjoyed. Speculators arent comics collectors. Speculators may or may not even read comics they were buying (usu dont). Speculators usually buy multiple issues of the same comic 3 to 10 or even more. Speculators dont collect comics, they buy comics to flip, to hold for a short period of time and sell for a profit. Speculators were buying massive amounts of comics and driving up print runs by companies to massive sales numbers. Look and the print runs for Spawn v1 #1, Youngblood v1 #, X-Men (1991) v2 #1, This drove the prices of comics up becuse the werent just buying new comics they were buying and speculating in back issues to. When the speculators in mass were ready to sale their investment,’ there was enough ‘collectors’ or people there to sell to. So, they dumped their investment for whatever they could get out of it. This dumping in mass, caused prices to tank and the market crash. Companies making the comics werent completely innocent either. Marvel and DC and other publishers were pushing out new lines of comics just to sell #1s and adding new titles of the same character. Because they new people bought more of #1s and early issues of a comic. Selling more comics equals more money. They were just adding fuel to the fire. Basically speculating is like a pyramid scheme, eventually.

@Dante19883

3 жыл бұрын

Indeed

For those new to the hobby, this was extremely informative. Really great job, my friend.

@Dante19883

7 жыл бұрын

Thanks so much for your kind words! I'm glad you found the video informative and helpful. Thanks for watching!

Just found this doing some research into the crash of the 90s. Really informative, great work.

@Dante19883

4 жыл бұрын

Thanks! Glad you enjoyed it!

I quit comics for 10 years, from 94 to 04. I was 21 when I quit so, that also factors in a little. One thing you could have mentioned is the death of superman cash grab. That event left a lot of collectors feeling burned. The gimmick covers was another breaking point for me.

@Dante19883

6 жыл бұрын

Hello! Thanks for watching and commenting. I really enjoyed this comment. I was way too young at the time to remember the speculators bubble, but I can imagine how frustrating it must have been to dedicate so much time and money to those books only to find they were not worth much. You are absolutely right about the death of Superman. What a gimmick, although I did like the story though lol don’t get rid of those 90s books just yet though. According to some sources I’ve read, as older back issues become more and more expensive collectors are turning their attention once again to 90s comics to get their fixes. Will this be cyclical or a permanent trend? Only time will tell lol

@weekendwerewolf7157

6 жыл бұрын

Geekery with Dante D. Happy to hear you enjoyed my comment, very cool. I still have the 2 copies of superman 75 that I purchased back then, 1 I took out the bag long ago and 1 still in factory poly. I just picked up a bagged copy in really nice shape at a garage sale and I made a video of the haul, I just started doing vids. Maybe you can check them out. I just discovered the KZread comic book community but, I'm really liking it. 😁

@gonk4509

5 жыл бұрын

Captain Deadpool Just subscribed

@bryansteele832

3 жыл бұрын

I was into the Death and return of Superman for the character and the artform. In terms of the "collector/speculator"....fuck'em. It's their fault and should have known better.

Great informative video, Dante! There are a few other things I would have mentioned though....the proliferation of comics shops (I live in southwest Ohio and in the mid-90s we had over 15 comics shops within a 50 mile radius), the local comic book conventions that happened every 2-3 months (with the same vendors over and over again), the trading card craze (even boondoogles like Marvel's OVERPOWER CCG that was so simplistic you couldn't get autistic 9 years olds to play it now), the "bad-girl" craze that had empty 2-dimensional stories thrown together to sell a big bosomed wench drawn on the cover, and finally the move Marvel made just prior to declaring bankruptcy where they wanted to stop all relationships with comic distributors and sell their titles directly to the shops themselves (even rumoring that they would open their own shops and franchise them)….Don't get me wrong, the 90s were not a wasteland of comic fandom, but the same era that brought us X-Men AGE OF APOCALYPSE is also the same era that dumped the Spider-Man clone saga on us. The fact that comics survived that unholy mess is the only thing that leaves me with hope that they can survive this pandemic-forced hiatus today....we will see....

@Dante19883

4 жыл бұрын

For sure! And thank you for another insightful comment. I have really enjoyed reading your commenting. Hope to hear from you again soon!

I was reading a book of Scott Mccloud and he mention this 90s crash but you really resume it quite good, nice explanation.

@Dante19883

4 жыл бұрын

Thank you my friend! I really appreciate it 😊glad you enjoyed the video!

Please note that Fantastic Four #1 @ 6:13 does not have the Marvel logo (that came years later). Unbranded is how I bought the company's comic book titles when I was a kid. The only "branded" comics I saw on the newstand at the time were Dell, D.C., Harvey, Archie, and the occasional Charlton ("Gorgo"), and A.C.G.. I bought Classics Illustrated titles through the mail. I bought the first Fantastic Four (pictured); read it, was unimpressed, tossed it. I preferred the company's insipid "horror" titles, like Tales to Astonish. Steve Ditko was my least favorite artist because his characters had square heads. So no Spiderman. I had my standards. Incidentally, Dell abruptly going to 15 cents-- a 50 per cent increase-- nearly killed off comic books, at least for my brother and me. I still remember my shock at handing over 15 cents for Dell's "Yogi Bear in the Marines" (1961). D.C. wisely held back awhile and then increased to 12 cent; much more acceptable. Interestingly, Classics Illustrated was "always" 15 cents; but it was also a "prestige" brand and parent approved. The only comic book series I miss from childhood are the original 'Suicide Squad', which had a brief run in The Brave and the Bold in 1959, and The Fox and the Crow, which I read spottily in the 1950s and even occasionally in college in the late 1960s. Both were D.C. titles. D.C. canceled Fox/Crow (1951-68) after it was attacked as "racist", although by then the pair were playing second fiddle to the ghastly and kiddie-friendly "Stanley and his Monster" in their own comic book.

Whew! ... Glad you were bringing the video, I don't think I have pocket large enough to carry it myself.

I like the Catwoman comics from the 90's

@Dante19883

6 жыл бұрын

Hi there, thanks for watching and commenting! I have never read any of the Catwoman comics from the 90s; but I certainly will have to check them out. I didn’t even know she had a solo series back then. Learn something new everyday I guess lol Cheers!

I love 90s comics. Love the hologram and sparkle covers. Over the top characters... love it. Of course, I was a child in the 90s... so I am clearly biased. Maybe that helps prove that whatever decade you were a kiddo in, makes you appreciate that period...no matter how terrible it is viewed by the current public. Thanks for your video!

@Dante19883

5 жыл бұрын

Glad you enjoyed the video thanks for watching! I agree.. because I grew up in the 90s , I have a special appreciation for 90s everything.. toys, comics, trading cards, music and movies! Glad to hear form another 90s lover! Cheers!

@luismangiaterra1031

2 жыл бұрын

Those are old comics, comics were never better than right now

I got to used bookstores thrift shops and a lot of the comics come form stores that closed in the 90s a lot of them are in mint

@Dante19883

6 жыл бұрын

Oh wow! I never though of that. I should go and check out thrift shops and used book shops then. I love 90s comics. Thanks for the tip :)

you skipped over the effect of Tim Burton's Batman

@Dante19883

5 жыл бұрын

Oh yes! You are totally right! People went nuts over comics after that movie. Can’t believe I forgot that. Thanks for watching and commenting!

Who collected Valiant comics in the 90'?? I had a few back then, I quit collecting around the time the "Deathmate" image/valiant crossover happened LOL I think I turned 14 and promptly became obsessed with girls LOL then I sold my comics! Dammit! Im 41 now and I've had a fit of nostalgia! Been buying tons of 90's comics! I've found many of the issues I had 25 years ago ! I love valiant, X books and even Image!

One slight correction. You stated toward the end that Marvel, during the crash, went bankrupt due to not having a parent company like DC had with Warner, who could absorb the costs of the crash. That wasn't exactly the case. Marvel Comics Group was owned by the Andrews Group. Marvel Entertainment Group owned the television and film side of Marvel, along with subsidiary brands like Fleer, Skybox, Toybiz, etc. Later these two companies renamed themselves Marvel Holdings, Inc and Marvel Parent Holdings. A loose comparison would be Marvel Comics/Andrews = DC, and Marvel Entertainment= Warner Brothers. Marvel Entertainment could have, like Warner Brothers, helped the comics arm weather the comic crash if, like Warner Brothers, they had diversified their investments. Marvel Entertainment, under Ron Perleman, only owned businesses directly related to the comics and card industry. Heroes World, Painini, Fleer, etc were all dependent upon the success of the comics industry. Only Toybiz was profitable, as the action figure industry hadn't yet crashed. Ironically, the industry crash is what brought Marvel back into being a sole entity. Rob Perleman consolidated Marvel Comics and Marvel Entertainment into Marvel Studios, then merged it with Toy Biz. Marvel/Toybiz became the new Marvel Enterprises group. Once they were able to get back most of their film properties, Marvel Enterprises once again became Marvel Entertainment, and remained so until the Disney buyout. The lesson, to quote the great philosopher GZA, is that "you gotta diversify yo bonds, n*gga."

@Dante19883

4 жыл бұрын

Great to know, I didn’t know that. Thanks for the info!

The 90s comics were awesome, X-Men and Silver Surfer , Punisher, Dare Devil all had great stories and incredible artwork. Comic books did infact have value. If you looked inside the Wizard magazines, you would see alot of late 80s early 90s X-Men worth $25.00 an issue. After the X-Men movies in 2000s those comics listed on Ebay are now barely $5.00. I stopped collecting in the mid 90s because every calendar season there was a major crossover. This was in response to the success of the Infinity Saga. But the main reason was the comics price increase and within those 24 pages you had increased ads . It got to the point where the ad pages were so thick the comic book would arch. 24 pages with maybe 2 ad sections used to go for $1.00, but then it jumped to $1.75 with twice as many advertisements. So for me it was time to bail, but I wanted closure so I slowed down after Infinity Crusade. . Since then I would occasionally collect Dark Horse Star Wars or Punisher.

Really like your videos, keep up the good work. Greetings from Denmark

@Dante19883

7 жыл бұрын

Thanks so much! Glad you are enjoying the videos. So glad to this video has made its way to Europe :) Thanks for watching!

I keep thinking there should be sketches and prints on the walls in the background. I dig your videos keep up the good work.

@Dante19883

7 жыл бұрын

LOL funny you mention that! Its not visible in the video, but I have a giant framed Detective 27 poster not to far from where I am sitting in the video. I want to decorate our basement with more superhero stuff but I don't know if the wife will go for it lol. Thanks again for watching! Glad you are enjoying the videos. More to come in the near future :)

comics for mature readers is music to my ears have a boxes of comics

@Dante19883

6 жыл бұрын

I agree! :) Thanks for watching!

Len Wein wrote Hulk 181 but Marv Wolfman is close enough

90s comics look like a major success compared to 90s baseball cards

Great video! Maybe you can make a video on CGC. CGC has managed to standardize grading for sellers and consumers which is good but they are making a lot of money for their service and sellers are able to squeeze more money out of >= 9.8 when let’s be real, from a 9.4 to a 10, should the price, especially in modern cases, really be that much more? CGC is pretty much set as an intermediate monopoly of sorts. People want to keep trying to hit that 9.8 and CGC is happy to slab it up.

@Dante19883

4 жыл бұрын

Glad you liked the video. Thanks for the suggestion! I will look into the video on the CGC

The 90's was a undeniably disaster for the industry and a lot of crap was produced but it was also a time when some of the best and most iconic comics of all time were published.

@Dante19883

3 жыл бұрын

I couldn’t agree more. Among all the crap there are some of my all time favourite story arcs. Death of Superman and Knightfall are at the top for me

Multiple releases scheduled that were extremely or never produced didn't help the market at all.

@Dante19883

5 жыл бұрын

I so agree. Liefeld was especially bad for that!

I love his video, he hit all key points in all his video. I love that he give #1 Issue's on New and Old comic, That is defiantly affordable, get them.

@Dante19883

6 жыл бұрын

Thanks! I'm glad you liked the video and found it helpful! I really appreciate your positive feedback. Thanks for watching! :)

I think Marvel is better at crossovers and keeping their characters consistent. DC keeps rebooting their universe and changing characters. For example, Crisis on Infinite Earths and The New 52 are reboots and Batman isn't supposed to kill people yet he did it in his earlier appearances and a few times after that. I don't think Marvel has ever had to reboot their universe. DC is still good though.

@Dante19883

6 жыл бұрын

Agreed! You are right about that. DC definitely plays around with their characters and reboots their universes. I love DC, but yes you are right, Marvel seems to be more consistent with the characterization of the heroes in their roster. Even though Marvel keeps their universes essentially the same in comparison to DC, I feel that in today’s day and age, both companies are equally as guilty for consistently relaunching their books with new number ones regardless of changes in their respective universes. Thanks so much for watching and commenting!

@robertt9342

5 жыл бұрын

Honestly, if we are talking about launching number 1's, Marvel is far more guilty of this in the last 10-15 years, before that they were about the same.

To be honest, being a 90's kid I love all the comics from the 90's era, Remember I commented on the other video as Rob liefield being a good artist. A great boom for Image comics and birth of other comic book industries during this 90's. I like all your video for our similarities in opinion and being a collector I have a lot of 90's comics and still treasure those collection. Keep Up the good work !!!!

@Dante19883

6 жыл бұрын

Thanks so much! I really appreciate it. It’s nice to hear from another 90s fan! Stay tuned for more videos! Thanks for watching and commenting! :)

I think the Death and Return of Superman and Batman Knightfall trilogy are great. Death and return of sups was the greatest love letter to character and why Superman matters. And I thought the Knightfall trilogy was great because it was why Batman is not just about a costume or a symbol, but about the man underneath cowl. My Opinion, the collectors market is the biggest cancer to any art form. It eventually steers into dark places.

Great vid Dante I do watch alot of your casts, I can definitely see how the over supply of comics definitely added to the issue and demand dropped off so you get a crash, I often wonder aswell how much other mediums played apart in developing that drop in demand i.e 90 really was the birth of computer gaming systems and I think someone people left the comics hobby as they could get there geek fix somewhere else.

@Dante19883

5 жыл бұрын

Hey there! Thanks for tuning in! I’m glad you enjoyed the video, and I appreciate your positive feedback... yes, I totally agree with you... other distractions like video games certainly contributed to the decline in comics... the problem was, the interest in comics was purely superficial in the 90s. People bought them for investment and not enjoyment. Once they found that the comics they had were worthless, they left to pursue hobbies they were actually interested in. Although 90s comics are often dismissed... I think we are in the middle of a paradigm shift with respect to 90s comics. As pre 90s comics are getting increasingly more expensive.. collectors are turning more to 90s books to get their fixes... only time will tell if my prediction is correct, but I feel like 90s books will have their day again soon lol

@danielschindler707

5 жыл бұрын

Trying to make a quick buck! as a younger Collector (early 30's) 90's was my era, I grew up with TMNT and X-men cartoons and Venom. So I don't mind the 90's I have a decent amount of 90's x-men comics which I will keep hold off hopefully one day we might see onslaught or omega red on the Big screen!! I think omega red would make a great Villain

Thanks Man, your videos are very informative with this video in particular.

@Dante19883

4 жыл бұрын

Thanks! Glad you enjoyed it!!

i love your vid i love your style thanx man for this god bless you keep the good work

@Dante19883

7 жыл бұрын

Thanks so much! I appreciate your kind words. Glad you enjoyed the video!

For a beginning

The Siegel and Shuster story has been retold, BADLY, for many years but you're answer is pretty close! To sum up, they sold the character outright to DC without job protection or a merchandising deal! They were paid well for producing Superman stories but for some reason, when DC created Superboy, Siegel and Shuster decided to SUE DC, which led to their BOTH being fired! I don't remember exactly how it all ended but the result is they weren't wanted around the DC offices for YEARS until Neal Adams put his support behind getting DC to acknowledge them once again and pay them a pension of sorts! BTW Wolverine was created by (The Late) LEN WEIN and HERB TRIMPE (w/input by Roy Thomas and Jouhn Romita, SR.)

I blame the death of superman the second clone story of Spider-Man

great video. Hard truth.

@Dante19883

5 жыл бұрын

Thank you so much! Glad you enjoyed it! I appreciate you watching and commenting!

Comics were marketed to who was buying them. The kids that got hooked in 80s were now young adults with jobs and money in the 90s. I was one of them and they were cheaper back then compared to now cause I was averaging about 40-50 books a month. Yeah, some of them sucked, but some of them were epic.

I've seen a couple of comments that touch on the macro aspects of the narrative (which I think was ultimately behind the bust) while I think that your video may cover some of the micro points that drove the commercialism and consumerism of the late 90s comic boon. If 86 was a watershed year, it was bc the GenX generation born in the late 60s was coming of age followed shortly thereafter by the 70s kids. This generation was the first to set a hefty percentage of their income aside for disposable income, and their questionable purchases was felt marketwide - from $15.99 for a CD, to $3.99 for a 3-night movie rental, to $19.99 for a DVD, to over $50 for a pair of jeans, to over $100 for a pair of high tops, to $50 dinner dates at Olive Garden, to $70 for a bottle of scotch, to $60 for a PPV fight, to paying high prices for the HBO/Showtime, package deal, etc. [I did cable installation and I would go into apartments where CD/DVD racks lining the walls and reaching up to 7 feet tall were entirely stacked with a degrading/worthless form of media (if you are a GenX, calculate how much $$ you spent on disc media ie. DVD, CD, or Console in the 1990s)]. This was a generation primed in the 70s by superhero tv series (Incredible Hulk, Wonder Woman, Spiderman, Batman reruns), raised on superhero Saturday morning cartoons in the 80s (Spiderman & Friends, GI Joe, Transformers), drove record numbers for Batman 89 and TMNT, and rushed home to watch Batman The Animated Series. I think the finger wants to be pointed at speculators as the root cause behind why the bubble eventually bust because it wants to be attributed back to capitalism being tied to Baby Boomer nostalgia. I think it has more to do with the fickle spending habits of GenX circa 1990s. Were there speculators buying quantities of comic issues? I'm sure there were. However, were they buying quantities to the point that they were the ones directly responsible for driving sells numbers of a monthly copy into the million+ count? I don't believe so. What happened was for a flash moment, we GenX made a point to go to comic book shops on the monthly regular until our priorities changed (family, kids) or our interest waned. Don't underestimate the aspect of the monthly comic book release date. The introduction of Image made it very exciting to go to the comic book store every month, but eventually you missed a month, and then two months, and then just quit going altogether. This was one of those freak economic phenoms of buying patterns occuring en mass (kinda like how many people had the same idea of using their stimulus check to buy stocks in 2020) Were there people who thought they would get $1,000 for Spawn #1 a few years after it was released? No, not as many as the myth would have you believe. Most people had a short sell mentality, they thought it would go up to $20 or $25, so that would have been $50 to $100 if you were looking to sell the 2 to 4 copies you bought. I honestly believe this comic book bubble was more of a GenX fad than it ever was speculator's greed.

If you were a little older, you would have factored in "realisms" that allowed for comics to be defaced or destroyed. Marvel collector stamps, mail in order forms for seeds and novelties (sea monkeys) and the sort. To put it as immaturity, or disposable entertainment is only a fraction of the story.

@Dante19883

6 жыл бұрын

Great point! I was thinking of doing some sort of a remake as I did this video in my earlier KZread days. I will have to include that as it is a very good addition. Thank you for the suggestion!

well done!

Great video !

@Dante19883

7 жыл бұрын

Thanks so much for watching! Glad you enjoyed the video!

great vid!

@Dante19883

7 жыл бұрын

Thanks so much for watching! Glad you enjoyed it!

I'm not sure what the color of his walls are

@bryansteele832

3 жыл бұрын

Mocha brown?

@Dante19883

3 жыл бұрын

Cow manure brown 😂

Batman adventures # 12 first appearance of Harley Quinn?!?!?

@Dante19883

7 жыл бұрын

Ah yes that one totally slipped my mind! Thanks for reminding me. That is definitely a huge book from the 90s. Thanks for watching!

Every 90s comment I respond with Red Goblin and the Batman who Laughs.

Instead of calling it the comic book crash of the 90s,why not call it the 90's renaissance since so many new titles,companies,and characters also came out of that era.It really was a wonderful time to be into comics.

Were people really so dumb that they thought they could sell an issue for thousands of dollars only a couple of years after the issue's publication?

@Dante19883

5 жыл бұрын

Yeah I think so. They were misguided and influenced by the stories the media was covering of golden age comics selling for thousands... they didn’t want to face the real facts of what was going on at the time lol

1990 to 99, great time for bay area rappers, Missouri's rappers, & southern style rappers, a lot of classic pimp, gangster, drug lifestyle rap, that is classic today priceless...but! Most comic's in the 90s sucked!, not all but alot. I'm a classic marvel fan 60s,70s & 1980s marvel are by far the best...nuff said

So what I am hearing is that it's GenX's fault.. Jk to the GenXers out there.