All you wanted to know about Agent Carter

You may have seen her in Captain America: The First Avenger or just caught the premier episode of Agent Carter, if you don't you should watch it. Either way you may be wondering about how a Agent Carter got her star in comics.

First Appearance
The woman that would one day become Agent Carter made her first comic book appearance way back in Captain America Comics #1. Yes one of the earliest Marvel comics, the first appearance of Captain America also included Agent 13. The issue hit newsstands in 1941. Created by  Joe Simon and Jack Kirby. Many years later, it would be revealed that "Agent 13" is actually  Peggy Carter, Captain America's love interest during the war. 
Captain America Comics #1 is a highly sought after and historically important comic book has sold for as high as $323,000. Even a beat-up copy can sell for $10,000. If you can afford it the is an issue you truly want in your collection.

First Modern Day Appearance Her first modern-day appearance was in Tales of Suspense #64, Jack Kirby again was the artist and Stan Lee wrote it.  In the issue Captain America is fighting nazis and runs into a woman who calls herself Agent 13. She is also fighting a Nazi. Captain America, Bucky, and Agent 13 defeat the Nazis .

This appearance is much more affordable ranging in price from $200 to $20. 

Comic Book Origin

Peggy Carter was a girlfriend of Captain America during World War II. She was an American agent serving with the French Resistance during World War II. Later she was she ordered to protect a secret laboratory, posing as an old store, but actually housing the Super-Soldier Project. Agent Carter was disguised as an old shop-keeper and was there when Steve Rogers became Captain America after he was injected with the Super-Soldier Serum. At this time she was called Agent 13.

In the Movies

Peggy is played by Hayley Atwell. Peggy is a British officer in the American Army and a member of  Strategic Scientific Reserve. She first meets Steve Rogers while working soldiers. Rogers is chosen as the first candidate to take the Super Soldier serum, he becomes Captain America. The two later fall for each other.  
Agent Carter has appeared in Captain America: The First Avenger (2011), Marvel One Shot: Agent Carter (2013), Captain America: Winter Soldier (2014), and Agent Carter series (2015). She will also make a brief cameo in Avengers Age of Ultron.

There has yet to be an Agent Carter official action figure released yet but it is just a matter of time. We will keep you posted.

Good Luck on Your Hunt!

The first appearance of Ant-Man/Henry Pym

With the release of the Ant-man movie this coming year and his participation in the highly anticipated Avengers 2, Henry Pym, a.k.a. Ant-Mans early comic book apperances should become highly sought after comic books.

First Appearance of Hank Pym
The first appearance of Henry Pym occurred in Tales to Astonish #27, cover dated January 1962. Written by Stan Lee with art by Jack Kirby and  Steve Ditko. Yes the fathers of Marvel comics.

In this issue Hank Pym discovers a formula that allows him to shrink or enlarge objects. He then tests the formula on himself and he shrinks to a size that will prevent him from reversing the change. He decideds to hide in an anthill where he almost drowns. He then meets a friendly that helps him get ack to the lab and grow back to regular size. He does not become Ant-man officially at this time.

Tales to Astonigh #27 can be hunted down for about $20,000 for a near mint copy and around $1,200 in a lower grade (CGC 3 or 2). A CGC graded 9.4, the highest existing graded copy sold this past September for $75,000. This values will surely increase as the character grows in popularity.

First Appearance of Ant-Man
Hank Pym returns to Tales to Astonish in issue #35 again written by Stan Lee with art by Steve Ditko and Jack Kirby. Issue is dated September 1962.

Issue #35 contains the first appearance of Hank Pym in his Ant-Man costume. Pym again uses his serum to reduce him to the size of an ant, re-telling of story from Tales to Astonish #27. He also creates a special helmet that allows him to communicate with the ants.   Pym then gets a government assignment to create a special gas which gets the attention of enemy spies who want the formula. Pym uses the shrinking serum and helmet to get help from the ants. 

Tales to Astonish #35 can be found for much less then issue #27, it sells for around $5,000 in mint condition and in the mid-hundreds for lower grades. 

Interesting Copies of Tales to Astonish #27 & 35
Currently on eBay there are copies of both issues up for auction, these two copies are both graded and signed by Stan Lee. Tales to Astonish #27 is CGC graded 8.5 and can be yours for $25,000 while #35  is graded 9.2 with a hefty $35,000 price tag. You can view the eBay auctions for Tales to Astonish #27 and Tales to Astonish #35

Good Luck on Your Hunt!

Red Raven #1 - Marvel Comics One Issue Wonder

In October of 1939 Timely Comics, the publishing company that would one day become Marvel Comics, released their first superhero based title called Marvel Comics #1. They followed up this high selling comic with among other titles Red Raven Comics #1, which was released in August 1940. It was the first and only issue under this title, issue #2 was renamed after one of their most popular characters The Human Torch.  Red Raven Comics was in fact the first Marvel superhero to have his own title and it contains Jack Kirby 1st work at Marvel but Red Raven wouldn't be heard from again until 1968. This issue #1 became extremely rare and somewhat impossible to find. It is valued at around $500,000 in CGC high grade.

Along with Red Raven a number of other characters were also introduced in this issue, the Human Top, a character named Mercury,  originally presented as the Roman god but later revealed to be one of the Eternals.  Also introduced were Magar the Mystic, the all-seeing Eternal Brain, space adventurer Comet Pierce, and hapless policeman Officer O'Krime. None of these characters would appear in the Human Torch title.

Red Raven

A small child is the only survivor of a crash on the floating island of the Bird-Men. Their King raises him and on his 21st birthday sends him back into his world with a gift of artificial wings as the Red Raven. Once in the human world, he fights the demons Zeelmo and Ratoga who are draining the world of its gold. Red Raven would not appear in a comic book again until 1968 when he appeared in X-Men #44, which in itself is a great issue to add to your collection.

The most well known copy of this issue comes from the Edgar Church Collection sold by Mile High Comics.

This is another one of those historic comics that I would just like to see in person and take a photo of. Very few issues are known to exist. If you see one and can afford it pick it up it is truly a piece of comic book history.

Good Luck on Your Hunt!
#jointhehunt 

Adam Warlocks Cocoon in Guardians of the Galaxy

The comic book community has been abuzz with some of the clues to future characters found within the Collectors menagerie. One of the big ones is Adam Warlocks cocoon. Seen in the background in a container (see above photo)
The cocoon made its first appearance in Fantastic Four #67, it would later hatch in the issue and Him would emerge. Him would later become Marvel hero Adam Warlock. Confused, you are not alone. We wil make it much clearer in a future post, this one is about the cocoon only.

First Appearance

Alicia is lost in Lock 41, while there she comes face to face with the cocoon of Him, the artificial being asks for her help. The Fantastic Four rescue Alicia before Him full hatches and passes judgment on his creators, which he destroys upon his full emergence from the cocoon.
The issue was released in October 1967, written by Stan Lee with art by Jack Kirby. You can add a high CGC graded copy for about $700 and an ungraded issue in a lesser condition for $30. This issue comes from the Lee/Kirby duos when they were hitting their full stride.

Okay so if you have some time go to a convention this weekend and buy this issue and all the other characters that appear in GOTG, you can find more information in our Guardians of the Galaxy Character Guide

Good Luck on Your Hunt!

#jointhehunt

Englishtown Flea Market - On the Hunt in New Jersey

As our loyal readers will remember we often go comic book and collectible hunting at Flea Markets.  Many flea markets have vendors that sell comics and collectibles, you can often get great deals at flea markets on them.

Earlier today we visited Englishtown Flea Market in New Jersey. It was a rainy day so it was empty which was good but not all the outside area vendors showed up, not so good.

We did find one comic book dealer in side, where we made some awesome finds. For only $12.00 we purchased 9 comics.

Of the 9 comics 5 of the were issues of Jack Kirby's The Demon series from the early 1970's. I have always been a big fan of Jack Kirby, not only is he one of our favorite artist of all-time but he is also one of the most influential artists/writers in comic history. The fact that we only paid .50 an issue for a total of $2.50 for 5 of his comics is a huge score in my book.

The successful hunt at Englishtown doesn't stop there, we also picked up Kirby's Omac One Man Army #2 for .75 and His Mister Miracle #2 for $2. Mister Miracle happens to be one of my favorite character and I have been looking for the Kirby issues for sometime.

To road out the comic portion of our hunt we also purchased a Copy of The Champions #1 and DC Wanted #8, which includes a Flash story. We picked up The Champions #1 because we really enjoy the 1970's Marvel titles.

Along with the comics we also found a Justice League Unlimited Blue Devil figure on card for $5.00, we always look for JLU figures. One vendor even had the impossible to find Volcana Figure in the 3-Pack.

While we were walking around we came across this little mixed-up number. Yes Spider-Man with Batman with Buzz Lightyear and more. This is a What the? item.

So based on everything we purchased or saw we will certainly be going back to Englishtown and if your looking for some great deals we recommend you go hunting there as well.

Good Luck on Your Hunt!
#jointhehunt

Groot from Guardians of the Galaxy

Since the movie Guardians of the Galaxy premiers tomorrow we decided to cover two characters today, Gamora was first and now soon to everyones favorite tree, Groot. Get ready to hear this a lot the next couple of week "I am Groot." Groot made his first appearance in Tales to Astonish #13. The issue was written by Stan Lee with art by Jack Kirby, released in November, 1960.
A mint graded copy will cot you about $5,000 while an ungraded average copy will be about $300. These early Lee/Kirby monster tales are highly sought after by collectors, value will continue to increase based on the popularity of Groot.

About Groot
Groot was originally the Monarch of Planet X, after being destroyed he was reimagined as the Flora Colossus from Planet X, the capital of the branch worlds. The Flora Colossus are tree-like beings who are highly intelligent but due to their anatomy their language consists of  repeating the phrase "I am Groot". 

First Appearance

After landing on planet Earth Groot the Monarch of Planet X absorbs wood objects into his body, growing larger. He then uses his abilities to control trees to try to take a small town back to Planet X so that it can be studied by scientists. A scientist from the town uses a specially breed colony of termites to defeat Groot, who many believed to be dead after the encounter.

In Guardians of the Galaxy

Groot will be CGI and voiced by Vin Diesel whose only lines will be "I am Groot", he becomes a member of the Guardians of the Galaxy with his partner Rocket Raccoon.

Tales to Astonish #12 like many other issues in this monster themed title are very hard to find and should get harder to find after the Guardians smashes it at the box office. So go and hunt down a copy for your collection, make The Collector proud.

View our Guide to Guardians of the Galaxy to find out information about other characters.

I am Groot

#jointhehunt

Ronan the Accuser in Guardians of the Galaxy

Guardians of the Galaxy is almost here and to celebrate the theatrical event here at CBH&G we are going to be looking at the first appearance of characters in the movie so you can go out and hunt these down.
We start with one of the villians the Guardians will face, Ronan the Accuser made his first appearance in Fantastic Four #65 which can be hunted down for about $250, high grade can cost you about $2,000. Worth it for this super villian created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby.

About Ronan

Ronan is a member of the alien race called the Kree. he is a member of the Accuser Corps, who are like our military governors.  The Supreme Intelligence appointed him "Supreme Accuser of the Kree Empire," so he took the name "Ronan the Accuser".

First Appearance
In Fantastic Four #65, Ronan the Accuser is sent to investigate the defeat of the robot Sentry-459 by the Fantastic Four. You can guess what happens next, the Fantastic Four wins, so the Kree Empire decides to spy on and assess Earth.

In Guardians of the Galaxy
Lee Pace of  Pushing Daisies fame will play the role of Ronan the Accuser, who will be leading  the hunt for Starlord and the mysterious orb (Infinite Gauntlet Gem) he has stolen. The main villian in the movie. 

So why are you still sitting there reading this post, get out and start hunting for your copy of Fantastic Four #65 along with other Guardians of the Galaxy characters first appearances.

Good Luck on Your GOTG Hunt!
# jointhehunt

Sci-Fi City - On the Hunt in Florida

Recent, we reviewed the Orlando based comic shop Sci-Fi City. As a follow up we wanted to look at the spoils of the hunt.
We have been on many hunting trips as we gatherer more and more treasures for our collection. We have rarely had as much success on a single hunt at a comic shop then we had at Sci-Fi City.

First off Sci-Fi City sells their back issues for cover price, which is awesome. We went through boxes of older comics which went as far back as the Silver Age, yes the Silver Age. For those older comics they round up to a $1.00

Jack Kirby
We picked up two issues Of Jack Kirby's New Gods. Issues #8 and Issue #9 are great examples of Kirby's work with DC comics. The story goes that Kirby had a falling out with Stan Lee so he moved to Marvels competition DC comics. DC gave Kirby free range to do what he wanted, so he created a new universe with all new characters. We are huge fans of Kirby's work adding two more issues to our Kirby collection for a buck apiece made this trip worth it for us all by itself. We did buy more.

Late 1980's/Early 1990's issues
We have made it pretty obvious in recent posts that we are huge fans of the comics that were produced during the late 1980's through the early 1990's. They were much lighter then they are today, and there was an infusion of comedy throughout comics, especially DC titles.

We picked up another Crisis Cross-Over, we are always on the look-out for Crisis Cross-over because Crisis is still our favorite large scale story arc. This one was the New Teen Titans #13, paid cover price $1.25.

Also picked up more of the Hawk & Dove run as we continue our way to completion. Hunted down issues 6-12 for $1.00 each.

We also continued to fill in X-Force picking up issues 4, 6 and 7,$1.25 each. We like Rob Liefeld art, always have, always will.

For us when we are hunting finding Annuals always presents a problem, not sure why but we never seem to be able to find them. Not true this time, we got as the 1990 Justice League of America Annual #4. Love the cover.

Finally our back issue search landed us a Punisher War Journal #15 guest staring Spider-Man. This is an early Jim Lee cover.

Variant Covers
We have really enjoyed DC comics title wide monthly variant covers. June was bombshell cover month. These variants come in much smaller quantities then the regular covers and are extremely difficult to hunt down. Finding a couple more and at cover price (some stores mark them up) was another score! We added Superman/Wonder Woman #9 and Earth 2 #24, my daughter is a big Hawkgirl fan. If you are interested in all the Bombshell covers we recently posted about all of them.

If you are in the Orlando Area take a trip to Sci-Fi City it is worth every minute of it, you will spend a bunch of money and time there.

Enjoy your hunt!
#jointhehunt

Sunday Salute to the Troops- World's Finest #8

Each Sunday we will look at an issue that in some way pays tribute to the troops. This week we look at the issue I personally think of when I imagine a comic book cover that was created to salute the troops- World's Finest #8.

Released on October 39, 1942, which was right smack  in the middle of World War II, this issue of World's Finest does contain a couple of stories that directly relates to the troops overseas and one fantastic cover that advised those of us who were still at home to buy War Bonds. The cover shows Batman, Superman and Robin inside a stand handing out war bonds to a group of boys.

If you haven't heard of war bonds before, War bonds are debt securities issued by the government to finance military operations and other expenditure during World War II and at other times of war. Basically the government is asking civilians to help finances of the war effort. During World War II
Bond rallies were held throughout the country with famous celebrities, and comic books were used to reach out to children to also play their part in helping our troops. A true sulfate to the troops. Over the course of the war 85 million Americans purchased bonds totalling approximately $185 billion.

DC comics played a large role in helping sell War Bonds, they used many of their most popular characters in the effort. The cover of World's Finest #8 is a prime example. 

If your ever on the hunt for this issue, which original sold for .15 on the newsstand, it will cost you based on recent sales between $400 and $600. 

The issue contains 11 separate stories. 1. Talent Unlimited (Superman) -- 2. Tanks For The Memory (Drafty) -- 3. The Magic Lantern (Zatara) -- 4. Private Pete -- 5. Stripesy, Solo Sleuth Inc. (Star Spangled Kid and Stripesy) -- 6. The Luck of the Lepparts (Boy Commandos) -- 7. The Unluckiest Man In The World (Green Arrow) -- 8. The Minuteman Answers the Call -- 9. Smoked Out -- 10. A Double For Trouble (The King) -- 11. Brothers In Law (Batman)

I includee an image of the first page of the Boy Commandoes story the Luck of Leeparts because it was done by Jack Kirby and Joe Simon, two kings of the comics.

Good luck on your hunt.
#jointhehunt