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Overheard a kid calling a key issue a 'variant cover' and felt old
Was at a con last Saturday and some teenager pointed at a Batman #423 and called it a 'variant cover'. I had to bite my tongue. Back in 1989 that was just the newsstand copy, no one called it a variant. Made me think about how the whole collecting scene flipped since the speculator boom of the 90s. Now every book has 5 covers and the word 'variant' lost all meaning. Anyone else feel like the language around comics got way more complicated than it needs to be?
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riley_price18d ago
Right there with you on that. The whole "variant" label feels pretty meaningless now when every book drops with five different covers from day one.
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That Batman #423 thing hits close to home. I actually still have my old newsstand copy from 1989, the one with the Joker on the cover, and I remember paying like a buck fifty for it at the local 7-Eleven. My question is: do you think the term "variant cover" actually helps new collectors figure out what they're buying, or does it just make everything more confusing? Because I've seen people on eBay list a regular second printing as a "first print variant" and charge triple the price, and that just feels like gatekeeping with extra steps.
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