Expert: Chris Brown - 1/22/2005

Question
Hey Thanks so much for respinding so quickly and finding out the info for me to me it makes perfect sense to me.  I sent my uncle your awnser and he however being as stubern as he is replyed by stating the follwoing


OK here's the thing: Marvel used to issue reprints of older Star Wars comics in bags to grocery stores and stores like K-mart 3 issues to a bag for 99 cents. All the comics had the diamond number and the Spidey face in place of the UPC code. My first 6 issues I got this very way. As I got older I subscribed to Marvel and got all my issues from them through the mail. Not once did Marvel send me an issue with a diamond number or a Spidey face.

I am now completly addicted to this subject now and I have to figure it out lol.  I was just wondering what your take was on his reply.  Also just curious but if I was to sell these Spidey face star wars issues would I be able to sell them to someone or someplace for the same price as the upc ones?  I guess the real question is do most people consider the spidey face a first print for when I resell. Thank you again for your time I really apreciate you helping me out with figurering this all out.
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Followup To
Question -
Hello how are you?  Im thinking about ordering some of the Marvel Star Wars comic books from a website.  Now my uncle has been collecting these comics since he was a kid he was even on the mailing list back when they were coming out but he had some holes in his collection and wanted some better copys so he ordered some of the same website.  Some of the comics he recieved had the barcoade in the coner and others had the box with the spider man face.  Now being a long time collector he knew that the originals were the barcodes and the reprints were not so he called up the company saying he felt they ripped him off by selling him reprints.  The company said that in the later issues on the comic they started replacing some of the barcodes for spiderman faces and they are a first edition as well and only the competly blank conners were reprints.  With the hassel of mailing them back and what not my uncle just let it go and is now curious if he was right or if the company was.

I have been trying to do research on the internet for this and came across a somewhat similar question you had awnsered and thought Id see if you could awnser mine.

Throught the entire comic book series of Marvel Star Wars are the first editions the barcodes only or are these spiderman faces first editions as well?  Thanks for your time I really apricaiate it cant wait to finaly be certain on this topic.
Answer -
Hi Alex

I will tell you my understanding of this, which a couple other people on a comic-related chat group I participated in confirmed for me.

Independent comic shops started competing with more traditional newsstands and party stores right about the time Star Wars comics were being issued.  A major difference between the comic shops and the newsstands was that newsstands could return unsold comics to Marvel for a refund whereas comic shops could not.

To make sure that comic shops didn't circumvent this rule by having a newsstand return their unsold comics, Marvel issued slightly different covers on comics sent to each.  Since most comic shops didn't have UPC scanners anyway, they got rid of the UPC code and replaced it with a Spidey face on the issues sent to the comic shops.  Only the newsstand issues got the UPC codes.

So in this case, both these variants would be originals and not reprints.  Someone mentioned to me that they believe the early Star Wars reprints had the issue number in a diamond in the upper left corner of the front cover.  However, later on Marvel started putting the issue numbers in diamonds on original issues as well, so a diamond will not necessarily indicate a reprint.

Hope this is helpful and not too confusing.  Let me know if it is unclear, and I will let you know if I learn anything else about these issues.

Chris  

Answer
Hi Alex

I got another opinion from someone who was a comic book seller/dealer in that time period.  He stated that to his knowledge only the first six issues, telling the story of the original Star Wars movie, were ever reprinted.  For those six issues, he said,

"It's not the bar code box that is the key - it's the upper left hand corner. If
the corner says

STAR WARS
30c 1
July


in a square block, it's an original. If the issue # is in a big diamond, and no
date is shown, it is a reprint. And the UPC box is usually blank. Now if you
run across any 35 cent editions of issues 1 through 4, you really have a rarity.
Most copies were priced at 30 cents."


He believed as well that if any of the later issues were reprinted, that would be indicated in the indicia on the bottom of the first page.

It sounds, from your uncle's info, like people with subscriptions got the newsstand editions rather than the direct market/comic shop editions.  An interesting puzzle to unravel!

As to the two different editions and resale value, the comic book price guides do not distinguish between them and I have not heard of any collectors having a preference for one over the other either.  I think you would be fully justified in selling them as first editions.

Chris