I used to look down on people who only collected variant covers...

For years I thought it was a waste of money, buying the same comic three times just for a different cover. Then last month at a con in Portland, I saw a guy trade a rare 1:50 ratio variant of Amazing Spider-Man #300 for a full run of Silver Age X-Men. That's when it clicked for me - these covers aren't just art, they're a whole separate economy with their own rules. Now I've got about 12 variants on my pull list and I actually look forward to seeing which one shows up each week. Has anyone else had a moment where they suddenly understood a different type of collecting?

2 comments

2 Comments

wyatt_ross271mo ago

That guy trading a 1:50 for a full Silver Age X-Men run sounds like he knew something you didn't. What was the specific variant he walked away with?

uma_lopez1mo ago

Look, the Amazing Spider-Man #300 is actually the first full appearance of Venom, not a variant cover situation. That book came out in 1988, way before the 1:50 ratio variant craze really took off in the 2010s. You might be thinking of the Todd McFarlane cover which is the regular version, but there was a 1990s platinum edition variant that's worth a lot less than a full Silver Age X-Men run. The guy probably traded a modern variant for something else, or maybe you're mixing up issues in your head. Either way, welcome to the variant game, just make sure you know what you're actually looking at before you trade anything.