50 Keys I Couldn't care Less About
HTML-код
- Опубликовано: 7 фев 2025
- I've seen 'em too many times, got too badly burnt on e'm, or maybe I just never got the appeal in the first place! These are 50 comics that really just aren't for me, despite the large population loving 'em!
#Scams #stupidity #seller
Email:
jamisonshreds@gmail.com
Ebay:
www.ebay.com/usr/minthuntercomics
IG:
/ minthuntercomics
Sentiment Depot Antiques and Collectibles
238 W Delaware Ave, Pennington, NJ 08534
(609) 669-1566 (Shop Phone Number)
Join this channel to get access to perks:
/ @minthuntercomics
Totally agree with not caring about "new armor keys" I always see them as a cash grab because "ohhh look it's Spider-man but shiny" but hey it looks good on covers and covers are half the battle in moving "low keys".
Its okay to not care about a lot of alleged keys . . . because the concept of what constitutes a key has become so watered down over the years.
Keys change as story relevance change. What mattered in 90’s is essentially irrelevant now.
I remember in my area Bishop’s 1st appearance was selling for around $20, in a neighboring city it was $10 or so, I bought it two years ago for less than $5. Books we used to think mattered will only matter for as long as readers/collectors are interested.
Miracleman #1 is incredibly easy to find on its own, it’s finding the later issues, 14 on that become difficult.
The original eclips trades run even higher.
Regarding the porn, cover comics: I’ve been trying for the past 30 years to explain to my wife I buy a comic book for the art and it’s hard to argue that when you have nude women on the cover.
There are plenty of nudes in art museums.
I have seen so many ASM #300 and Secret Wars #8 that I don’t get that wow factor anymore.
Miller & Mazzuchelli on Year One is a classic in both story AND art. I agree with you on the McFarlane Spidey covers. Absolutely NO ONE is interested in Valiant books. It's a dead company with uninteresting characters. People love nude/porn covers/books. Sex sells! Weren't return books supposed to be trashed? That means that all those return books still in circulation actually add to the numbers of what we think is out in the wild. Weird. Last, but not least, regardless of price guide or Ebay sold prices, people have their own highs on certain books. Price guide might list the book as $50, but people know it's not a $50 book and refuse to pay that. Great vid!
You could argue that the first Patch was actually the first appearance of Wolverine’s new armor… for his eye.
First of your vids I've seen, and just subscribed because you really spoke to my feelings on two of these types of books.
Homage covers. For me, we've been in a time of creative bankruptcy that rivals Hollywood and all these covers do is try to capitalize on nostalgia. Cue member berries "Member when people had their own ideas? Member when comics didn't need a gimmick to sell?
Nude covers. These things offend me. Not in the sense I have an issue with nudity (I'm a published erotica author, so I'm no prude" its the fact these are freaking comic books and these are not real women. These things are for forty year old slobs in mom's basement stroking to molesting Red Sonja FFS.
I give you credit for still running a brick and mortar store. I have one from 2001-2009 in Rhode Island, and I closed up for a variety of reasons. I have no idea how anyone does it, or even wants to these days. Props to you.
...if you have a 9.8...never crack it for a sig. Not worth the risk.
Great video, James. I agree with almost everything except the McFarlane spider covers. They’re not all great, but some of them are just incredible 😄
As an Aussie who got hooked on Marvel and Jack Kirby in 1967, couldn't disagree much more about Strange Tales 107. There is absolute dynamism between the two figures. And of course fire and water. Not so big on JIM 89, either, tho. Kinda bland. I stopped collecting in the early 70s, in no small part because Kirby left Marvel. I'd started reading and collecting when the cover of Tales of Suspense 92 caught my eye in a spinner rack when I was 11. Still one of my all time favourite covers. I got back into reading, and eventually collecting again in 1987, when the cover of Batman 407 caught my eye, again in a spinner rack. Still reckon Year One is the best story arc i've read in comics.. And love Mazzucchelli's moody, noirish rendering of the seedy streets and low life, here and in Daredevil. Love your channel, keep up the great work.
I think the deal with New Mutants 14 is that there is no official "1st appearance of Ilyana Rasputin as Magik" as a set key (also showcased by KeyCollector's search of the character) and for some reason the market has settled on that book as the definitive one to get
The High Republic hate because too many first appearances to write on the back got me 😂😂 Same!
I'm not a Batman person at all, but the Year One artwork is masterclass comics. That said, I would have hated it as a kid.
Batman 423 I got when I was a kid from a friend. My favorite cover at the time. A hurricane hit my house and destroyed 20 plus years of comics collecting. Years later was out in a barn on the property and I found it in a stack of books, bagged and in mint condition. How it was the only comic to survive is behind me. It hurts paying $200 for a book I bought off the shelf when I was a kid.
As a Silver age Marvel fanboy, I can say I burnt out on X-Men a long time ago. I did have the early books, but traded them at comicons for Spiderman books. I essentially gave up a whole title at this point. I've found that right now, it's a great time to get books at far lower prices. Best to all.
I agree with most of your picks either the exception of DD 160. I love this cover! Bullseye smiling as he strangled the Black Widow with the chord of a hair dryer. Maniacal!
Bullseye is a ranged combatant there is no good reason he should win a hand to hand against someone with the skill of black widow.
Strange Tales 107- one of my favorite covers of all time.
I love the cover of Journey Into Mystery 89, high on my want list. As for returned comics, I definitely don't collect them now but when I was a kid my grandmother worked at Woolworths and would bring me stacks and stacks of them. Being pretty poor, it was a great thing at the time.
That's a cool story! I've seen some comics with half ripped comics, but didn't know the reason why they were that way. I wouldn't mind having 1 for historical purposes, but not for any other reason.
If I’m honest, most x men “keys.” There’s so many characters, it feels like every other issue is a key. Don’t really care.
That is indeed trrue as the uncanny x men run has 223 keys which is the amount of keys on a run spanning from 1963 to 2011 while runs like the first batman run has 215 keys and it ran from 1940 to 2011. That means that the batman run has 3 keys per year while the uncanny x men run has roughly 5 keys per year. It is ridiculous, however, i still like some of the minor x men keys such as characters joining like Psylocke joins the x men in 213 or Dazzler joining in 214.
Gets even worse when you think about the push to make "coming attraction" ads or FOOM previews considered first appearances.
Homages are awesome
Walking Dead issue 100 was the first comic I spent with my own money in 2012. I always read the issues online but never owned them. That issue is monumental to me. I got that exact issue signed by Robert Kirkman during Walking Dead day in Cynthiana, KY. I have multple copies of issue 100 as well. Maybe I have problems lol
Totally agree with your pics
I just knew Batman 423 would be here. Even Todd admits he was under deadline and took a lot of shortcuts.
I just want this to complete my Batman run but I don’t want to pay 3 figures for it!
Well to be fair paying 3 figures for a comic book hurts almost all the time unless it is something really special like a first appearance.
I love how you admit some of this list is just either "sour grapes" or "been there, done that" or my fave "I lost it so now I hate it"!! Shiiiiidddd I could do a whole video on that one or "key books my mom threw out" or my personal favorite "key books my junkie relative stole from my father and sold for a hit" (Hulk #1 and FF#1).
sometimes keys aren't that big a deal to someone till they actually need it.
Armor/Suits - Cool for run or character collectors that like to see changes in the character over the years. Perhaps a 'Minor' key at best but more of cool foot notes. I'm a run collector so I personally like those change over issues where the design is changed. But outside of that definitely barking up the wrong tree if you want dollar value.
Thanks for your honest opinion on comics. I think people are taking things a little seriously these days 😎
As a casual observer, I feel like the word “key” is getting thrown around too loosely, particularly all the “first appearance of [character no one gives a crap about]” keys.
Well, for me is Anything Batman or Superman.
There's a guy in our local Sacramento collecting community who hoards New Mutants 14s. It's his thing, and I find it kinda awesome in a highly amusing way.
Hard disagree with you on Superman 233 and ASM 301. Superman 233 is arguably first "Bronze Age Superman" - he transitions from newspaper reporter under Perry White to broadcast TV reporter under Morgan Edge. It's the sister book to Adams & O"Neil's Batman 217, when Dick Grayson goes off to college and he boards up the Batcave to move downtown to Wayne Towers to fight 70s white collar crime. And ASM 301 was impossible to find in CGC 9.8 for *years* - easily the hardest of the McFarlane Amazing run in grade. Hence why it's $1,400.
I believe Neal Adams himself said that Superman cover was one of his worst covers. But I can't remember for sure, but its never been well regarded. I bought that Batman McFarlane cover for $2.00 back in the 1995. I still don't think its worth much.
I can’t agree on that Silver Age Strange Tales and the Journey into Mystery. Totally agree on Night Nurse, and I agree on that McFarlane Batman cover.
I know you like 1990s Superman but those death and funeral and Doomsday issues are as common as dirt.
Yeah and I don’t get nudie covers either. I do see vintage books like Reform School Girl or various vintage good girl/bad girl books. But not comic book porn.
Staying late at work to finish up some shit while listening/watching James shoot the comic bullshit. The best! 😂
Miracleman #1 is my favourite key I own, but that's mostly because mine is signed by Alan Moore. I'm covered for the character's actual first modern-day appearance since I also own copies of Warrior #1 and #2.
That’s cool. Did you met him or just buy it signed?
@dr.decker911 I got it signed in person at a signing he did at the Forbidden Planet store in Nottingham back in the late '80s.
@@carlgibson285 wow thanks for sharing.
I would love to get #15
Fun list. I’m dollar bin fan, I would say so many 90s books (Deathlok, Darkhawk, Terror) were so over printed and uninteresting to me b
I agree on the homeage covers! When artists do these its because they're simply lazy and unimaginable!
Great T-shirt!!!
Speaking of lost books...I thought I had Nyx#3 but I went through my collection and didn't find it. It took me about a week and a half to not find it. lol. great video.
Those McFarland asm covers are cool but there are a few that are jus ok they are not all super hot
Lol. You are always entertaining. I really admire your point of view and honesty. Keep em coming!
Agree with almost all except Strange Tales #107 and Daredevil #160. Great list.
8:15 THANK YOU! This is seriously the ugliest cover and I hate that it's such a cool key. I have the venomized Vulture Variant myself to avoid this atrocity.
I did not realize that spider Gwen had a pig face on that cover. You made me laugh out loud. It’s pretty darn terrible.
Bro it's ROUGH
@ The face actually reminded me of some of those old plastic dolls from the 1970s or 80s that my sister would feed with a little fake baby bottle and it would suck - called Baby Alive
Problem with Magik is her first appearance is GSX #1 which is out of most people's price range and she is only a child in that book. The next key after that is X-Men #160 where she goes to limbo and ages up. I guess New Mutants #14 is like the 1st time the character is fully fleshed out using her teleportation and becoming Magik. I'm just shocked how cheap the Magik & Storm mini series is, nobody wants those.
Great video! Love your honesty even when I occasionally don’t agree. But I definitely agree about Riri Williams & a lot of those covers.
Honestly I feel the same way about a good chunk of this list. Then again I also am just sick of how much people (companies tent creators especially) try and push the value of books with their “I don’t know why this is so cheap!”
I stopped being a "key" collector after I realized how unrealistic it is to collect all the ones I think are cool. I stick to my specific categories and that's it, or else I'll go down a collecting rabbit hole
A lot of keys are dumb and they are so common, it's sickening. I like more obscure , smaller press books.
Just buy everything with Thor on it.
No homage covers? Batman 227 paying homage to Tec 31 is a classic 🤙
I have no problem with a “good” homage cover, but they are starting to be over done in recent years. Maybe we should go more original more.
I love this concept. There are a great many "keys" I couldn't care less about. There are many first appearances of characters I know nothing about. Give me a great Superman or Batman book, a beautiful John Byrne cover, a pretty lady like Catwoman or strong woman like Wonder Woman. Otherwise, I hold onto certain comics issues I loved reading. My grails are rare Golden Age covers I will never have enough money to purchase. Haha
Batman 423 and hulk 340. There i said it.
Love this list and agree with your take on most of them
Do a vid on what actually is a “key”. Most of these are not keys, not even close.
Not a fan of the art in Year One?!? I… I… I don’t know how to respond to that.
Came out guns blazing with this one!!
What is the consensus about the first appearance of Marvelman in Warrior? I value that above the Eclipse reprints. Just when you thought that the chalice could not contain anymore poison, Neil Gaiman self-immolates. Nobody is taking a drink from that cup again. Miracleman will never return.
I can't stand homage covers. Every time I see a ASM 300 homage I want to destroy it.
what kind of collector are you who dislikes Neal adams superman covers and todd mcfarlane spiderman covers.
An honest one. I’m not afraid to voice an opinion. (Also I love Neal Adams. I said in the video 233 is not even in my top 50. He has plenty of other covers that I think are amazing. That one’s boring)
From being in a comic shop, if I could get half of the price listed on 90% of the books you showed that’d be nice. Idk what goes on at Key Collector but I find in the key is 100 bucks or cheaper, their mint price is almost always wrong.
Outstanding video. Agree with everyone of these.
It's better if not everyone cares for the same things. Some of my favorite books are keys that nobody but me care about and that just makes them more special. Imagine how boring it would be if everyone had the same grails.
Im so sick of collectors showing off they're Longshot #1! The art is horrible and the writing "sheeah" is horrendous!
Another key (air quites) I despise is Z Factor #6 1st Apocalypse! Louise Simonson writing is some of the worst at Marvel! It left a bittee taste after i read it! I believe you hit a nerve with this video. 😅
Agree with you on the nude covers. It's like comics were made for kids and especially since like marvel and DC and all that is supposed to be marketing towards kids. Don't you think that's a bit strange I just don't agree with showing that to kids and you can't really sell them either because no parent in their right mind is going to let their child read that. So I completely agree with you on the nude covers. They need to stop making those
I agree with your take on nude covers. I collect Rogue and I didn't buy any of the savage land nude covers. They're just not as attractive as the clothed ones. Our southern Belle can go skimpy, but she'd never go nude. A fun mini series to check out is Deaths Head 2 with the X-Men - the artist really showed compounding uniform damage from the big fights. Little is left to the imagination.
I think some of these comics are important is because of the Marvel Strike Force game . The characters Moon Knight especially are part of a very good team.and people want to know more.
When I actively collected comics (about 30 years ago) I always tried to find oddball stuff in high grade condition. I had every variation of the 1966 Marvel Mini Books, most of the treasury-sized books, a lot of the Marvel comic magazines, FOOM, etc. I never and mean NEVER found a high-grade copy of any issue of Night Nurse.
I’m sure it’s out there somewhere!
This was a fun video!
Mostly agree. But I do love a good homage cover🍻
I can’t stand any printings past “5”. Good Lord stop the presses! If it’s that great other artist will pay homage to it!😮
The old saying goes "Don't hate the player, hate the game"... This should apply to your Conan #23... Don't hate the book, hate the grader.
Never do Signature Series with CGC. 60% of them get downgraded from 9.8 to 9.6.
FACTSSSS
All variant covers and new volumes of books. I'd much rather my book be Incredible Hulk #800 instead of Incredible Hulk #19 vol.4.😵💫😢🧐
The cover on WOSM 100 is excellent. But it's just Spidey's umpteenth appearance.
Gotta disagree on Year One, Batman #404’s cover is GREAT!
dude i would love to take a walking dead and a miracleman issue off of your hands! me and my girlfriend were already planning a trip up to your store for one of the next upcoming weekends
I'd swear you hate McFarlane if you hadn't mentioned otherwise.
New mutants were big sellers.
I like the spider armor personaly, man you are brave no McFarlane Spiderman
Great video!! Lol...I so appreciate your self awareness and humor!! I can understand and respect your take on your dislike for them as you've seen a lot of comics and multiple copies often I'm sure. I'm not a huge fan of homages that are over done (looking at you at ASM #300, 301, Wolverine #1 Limited Series just to name a few!!), however, even worse are when artists homage THEMSELVES!!! (Yes looking at you Todd "The God"). Really artists? Let others respect your work, no need to be all narcissistic about your own "genius".
Some of this comes across as old comic book guy grumpy but this is coming from a grumpy old comic book guy 😂
If Rogue joining the Xmen is only like a $10-$15 book, then Illyana joining the New Mutants should not be a $25 book.
I couldn't agree more
I agree with most of these picks, except X-Force 11 being Domino's first appearance. It doesn't really matter if it technically is the first appearance, she is on the cover of this one and not the other one, that is the determining factor. (like Gambit, and Archangel's second app being accepted by the market, and Bishop's cameo appearance being accepted, its all about the cover.) Plus she is getting her butt kicked on the cover, I'd say that's rare for a first appearance.
I'll die on the hill that New Mutants 98 is her first appearance, because I was reading the books as they were released. The "just kidding - that was just Copycat *pretending* to be Domino" was a retcon nearly a year later.
It's funny because Sentry 1 and the Adam's Green Lantern stuff are some of my favorite books in my collection. I'm really sorry you had them ruined for you.
I think we need to move away from the idea of key books. While a first appearance is cool, it’s usually later stuff that makes us care about the characters. I’d much rather pay for a good book over a key. That said, I get that ‘good’ can be subjective so keys helps maintain the market
Great video! For me its Wolverine 1. Its been like one of the "It" books but I just don't like the cover for the hype. Just my opinion
I've never liked John Buscema's art, so this book only has collector's value to me, not any personal value.
Wow! Was I thrown out of comic shops when I spoke my mind on those early McFarlane covers. Those 90s wannabee artists and their massive egos ( can you spell Liefeld) made me quit collecting all together. And what the Heck is a Pineapple Momoko anyway!
That was a rough time for comics!
That’s an awesome shirt! Also, I wonder how much selling books has impacted your enjoyment of them. Do you think you’d feel differently about some of these if you hadn’t been invested in whether or not your wallet took a hit?
This is a great list. Admittedly I chased a couple of these over the last few years (1st Jubilee, 1st Nathaniel Richards). I would love a mulligan on a lot of purchases over the last 5 years!
Certainly some hot takes on your list, but any one of us making a similar list would have something(s) on it that would be considered a hot take for sure.
Here's a few books that I don't give a rip about:
ASM #300 (throw #298 and #299 in there as well)
New Mutants #98
Punisher limited series #1
New Teen Titans #2 (which is a shame because I want to get that whole Perez-Wolfman run but the prices for a very mediocre character are stupid).
The Dark Knight Returns #1 - yeah, I said it. I own it in tpb but I have no intention of ever chasing down the 4 individual issues.
I think New Mutants 14 is the first time Illyana uses the moniker Magik.
Totally agree with next wave agents of hate.
I think the definition of “keys” gets a little stretched, because a little bit of hype goes a long way. But with that said I like some of these. Micronauts 1 will never leave my collection I’ll die with it 😵
Hey now
That web 100 is an awesome book!!!
Morbius #1, Eternals #1 and Uncanny X-Men #200: couldn't agree more. Plus that's the worst Magneto costume ever.
Journey Into Mystery #89: the cover looks like it was drawn by a 7 year old.
My pick is Strange Tales issues with Brother Voodoo: what has he done in the Marvel Universe to justify these excessive prices? He's a B-lister who only appears once a year so Marvel can retain copyright on the name.
James, there's an easy way to turn a returned comic into a coverless comic.....
And is that Ripley's cat Jones from "Alien"? Great t-shirt.
On what if...how is what If v1 #10 worth what it is?
Hot Takes: Not a fan of Ditko. THE HAWK AND THE DOVE is garbage, written and drawn by a middle schooler. Most of Jack Kirby’s DC work, muddled and just not interesting to me. THE LONG HALLOWEEN with Batman was boring and derivative. I couldn’t wait for it to end. Anything with Harley Quinn. So sick of that character, not interesting, not clever, not sexy, just dullness and sameness over the top.
I agree about todd mcfarlane marvel stuff it's to expensive for what it is outside the key stuff. I love his work but gosh.
My complaint is facsimile editions why are they so expensive.