ESSENTIAL COMICS VALUES ALL IN COLOR! COMICS SHOP is the reliable reference for collectors, dealers, and everyone passionate about comic books! THIS FULL-COLOR, INDISPENSABLE GUIDE FEATURES: • Alphabetical organization by comic book title • More than 3,000 color photos • Hundreds of introductory essays • Analysis of multi-million dollar comics' sales • How covers and splash pages have evolved • An exclusive photo to grading guide to help you determine your comics' conditions accurately • Current values for more than 150,000 comics From the authoritative staff at Comics Buyer's Guide, the world's longest running magazine about comics, Comics Shop is the only guide on the market to give you extensive coverage of more than 150,000 comics from the Golden Age of the 1930s to current releases and all in color! In addition to the thousands of comic books from such publishers as Marvel, DC, Dark Horse, and Image, this collector-friendly reference includes listings for comic books from independent publishers, underground publishers, and more!

The modern comic book shop was born in the early 1970s. Its rise was due in large part to Phil Seuling, the entrepreneur whose direct market model allowed shops to get comics straight from the publishers. Stores could then better customize their offerings and independent publishers could access national distribution. Shops opened up a space for quirky ideas to gain an audience and helped transform small-press series, from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles to Bone, into media giants. Comic Shop is the first book to trace the history of these cultural icons. Dan Gearino brings us from their origins to the present-day, when the rise of digital platforms and a changing retail landscape have the industry at a crossroads. When the book was first published in 2017, Gearino had spent a year with stores around the country, following how they navigated the business. For this updated and expanded paperback edition, he covers the wild retail landscape of 2017 and 2018, a time that was brutal for stores and rich for comics as an art form. Along the way he interviews pioneers of comics retailing and other important players, including many women; top creators; and those who continue to push the business in new directions. A revised guide to dozens of the most interesting shops around the United States and Canada is a bonus for fans.

This book discusses the overall history of the comic book, paying special attention to girls’ comics, showing how such works relate to a female point of view. While examining the concept of visual literacy, Jacqueline Danziger-Russell asserts that comics are an excellent space in which the marginalized voices of girls may be expressed. This volume also includes a chapter on manga (Japanese comics), which explores the genesis of girls’ comics in Japan and their popularity with girls in the United States. Including interviews with librarians, comic creators, and girls who read comics and manga, Girls and Their Comics is an excellent examination of the growing interest in comic books among young females.

Critical Approaches to Comics offers students a deeper understanding of the artistic and cultural significance of comic books and graphic novels by introducing key theories and critical methods for analyzing comics. Each chapter explains and then demonstrates a critical method or approach, which students can then apply to interrogate and critique the meanings and forms of comic books, graphic novels, and other sequential art. The authors introduce a wide range of critical perspectives on comics, including fandom, genre, intertextuality, adaptation, gender, narrative, formalism, visual culture, and much more. As the first comprehensive introduction to critical methods for studying comics, Critical Approaches to Comics is the ideal textbook for a variety of courses in comics studies. Contributors: Henry Jenkins, David Berona, Joseph Witek, Randy Duncan, Marc Singer, Pascal Lefevre, Andrei Molotiu, Jeff McLaughlin, Amy Kiste Nyberg, Christopher Murray, Mark Rogers, Ian Gordon, Stanford Carpenter, Matthew J. Smith, Brad J. Ricca, Peter Coogan, Leonard Rifas, Jennifer K. Stuller, Ana Merino, Mel Gibson, Jeffrey A. Brown, Brian Swafford

A history of the comic book, in which a noted cartoonist demonstrates the aesthetics and power of the medium

Collects Marvel Comics #1, Saga of the Original Human Torch #1, Marvels #0 and Marvel Comics #1 70th Anniversary Edition. The book that kicked off the Marvel Universe back in 1939 - presented in glorious hardcover, with an extensive array of special features! MARVEL COMICS #1 promised action, mystery and adventure - and it delivered! The original android Human Torch blazed his way into readers' hearts, and Namor the Sub-Mariner made a big splash! Golden Age pulp star Ka-Zar swung into comics, and costumed detective the Angel made his debut! Plus: Western adventures with the Masked Raider - and terror in the jungle! And from this one issue, published 80 years ago, grew the entire Marvel Universe! Now, MARVEL COMICS #1 is collected along with retrospective stories, bonus artwork, insightful essays and more!

Contributions by Bart Beaty, T. Keith Edmunds, Eike Exner, Christopher J. Galdieri, Ivan Lima Gomes, Charles Hatfield, Franny Howes, John A. Lent, Amy Louise Maynard, Shari Sabeti, Rob Salkowitz, Kalervo A. Sinervo, Jeremy Stoll, Valerie Wieskamp, Adriana Estrada Wilson, and Benjamin Woo The Comics World: Comic Books, Graphic Novels, and Their Publics is the first collection to explicitly examine the production, circulation, and reception of comics from a social-scientific point of view. Designed to promote interdisciplinary dialogue about theory and methods in comics studies, this volume draws on approaches from fields as diverse as sociology, political science, history, folklore, communication studies, and business, among others, to study the social life of comics and graphic novels. Taking the concept of a “comics world”—that is, the collection of people, roles, and institutions that “produce” comics as they are—as its organizing principle, the book asks readers to attend to the contexts that shape how comics move through societies and cultures. Each chapter explores a specific comics world or particular site where comics meet one of their publics, such as artists and creators; adaptors; critics and journalists; convention-goers; scanners; fans; and comics scholars themselves. Through their research, contributors demonstrate some of the ways that people participate in comics worlds and how the relationships created in these spaces can provide different perspectives on comics and comics studies. Moving beyond the page, The Comics World explores the complexity of the lived reality of the comics world: how comics and graphic novels matter to different people at different times, within a social space shared with others.

Um... stories from Mike Mignola's Hellboy, AND Stranger Things? Yes, please! In Hellboy, "The Fortune Teller," Hellboy consults a crystal ball- reader for help solving a murder, but things go off the rails when she gets distracted reading Hellboy's own future. Then, in Stranger Things, "Deliver Me From Evil," Argyle and Jonathan swap fantastical and scary tales as they make one last pizza delivery for the night.

Horror comics were among the first comic books published--ghastly tales that soon developed an avid young readership, along with a bad reputation. Parent groups, psychologists, even the United States government joined in a crusade to wipe out the horror comics industry--and they almost succeeded. Yet the genre survived and flourished, from the 1950s to today. This history covers the tribulations endured by horror comics creators and the broader impact on the comics industry. The genre's ultimate success helped launch the careers of many of the biggest names in comics. Their stories and the stories of other key players are included, along with a few surprises.

Journey to a galaxy far, far away with the younglings from the hit Disney+ streaming series Star Wars: Young Jedi Adventures, and guest-starring characters from the hit Dark Horse comic series Star Wars: The High Republic Adventures in "Sky Parade Rescue!" Then, in the Plants vs. Zombies short story "The Origin of Zomboss," a Brain-Z Entertainment film crew explores the many past jobs of Dr. Zomboss and what led to him forming the zombie army!