Saturday 29 June 2024

Spawn #10 "Crossing Over": Rarities

Hi, Everybody!

ITEM!
Cerebus has come to HumbleBundle. $18 REAL American dollars (or more. They'll take all the money you wanna spend...) gets you all 16 volumes AND the Updated Cerebus Guide to Self-Publishing! Eighteen bucks! (Unless you wanna up your pledge to benefit The Global FoodBanking Network (GFN):
The Global FoodBanking Network’s (GFN) mission is to nourish the world’s hungry through uniting and advancing food banks. GFN unites and empowers organizations that support those in need by reducing food waste and cultivating sustainable relationships that save lives.
Or, adjust your pledge levels so Aardvark-Vanaheim gets more. Since you KNOW Dave's probably sending 25% of "the take" to Gerhard. (I think you can do that. I know you can give LESS to Dave and Humble, and more to GFN, not sure about increasing Dave's cut.).)

This deal ends in... I can't remember, but it's not sticking around forever.

ITEM!
Friend to the Blog Steve Peters has a NEW Kickstarter: Comicverse: Subspace Chatter Softcover Collection. While it DOESN'T have a new Dave cover (that's the NEXT Kickstarter after this one...) It does have Cerebus related content, and Manly Matt Dow Art. 

The NEXT Kickstarter Steve's gonna do has new Dave art. So, let's help Steve out with this one so he doesn't have his confidence shaken and not do the next one. $30 (including the shipping price) gets you the book. And he's got some original art in there too.

Eleven days to go. Come on. COMEON!

ITEM!
Over on the Cerebus Facebook group, Tim Stoltzfus shared a rarity, he's got the original script to Spawn #10:

He tells his story:
The original script to Spawn #10, signed by Dave Sim, including a concept sketch for the splash page that was the first piece of art done for the book.
Been meaning to post this bit of Cerebus history in here for a while. Long story coming, but sharing here in part because I know people who can contact Dave Sim directly to verify this item is legit and because I think it is time I find a permanent archival home for it so it doesn't disappear.
The Long Story:
Back when I was much younger, I had a comic store in Southeast Pennsylvania and was a Cerebus fan. I met Dave many times at cons in the region, had a few letters printed back in the day, too.
It was May of 1993 when Heroes World Distribution held a retailer conference/gathering at their warehouse in New Jersey. (I think it was in Piscataway? It's been a while.)
One night was a charity casino night/auction. Everyone was given 1k in chips to play with, and then after several hours, you could use the chips to bid on auction items. Naturally, they wanted to raise as much money as possible, so you could bid above the chips you had, you just had to pay cash.
A side effect of this was that bidding prices were done in increments of $100 of "play money", but $100 in play chip money was actually $10 in real money. So an opening bid of $100 cost $100 in chips OR $10 in real money.
When this item came up to bid, hey, I wanted it. After a few rounds of bidding, it came down to me and one other person. Part of the auction was that Dave would sign the script for you and do a head sketch the next day.
I should be more specific, it came down to my Mom and one other person. While I was running the stores, she was the person who took care of most of the money, so she had final say in how much we spent on this item.
The reason the front page says "...and Forty-Five Hundred, Thanks!" is because the bidding got to $450 before the other person gave in.
The next day when I caught up with Dave to get it signed, Dave saw me and said "Oh, of course it is you that won it! But I can't give you just a head sketch, you already have a couple dozen of them." So he drew the full body sketch.
He also shared that he wasn't aware of the money system, so when he was in another part of the room and heard the amount being bid on the script, he was freaking out, "Who in their right mind is paying $4000 for this thing?" is the quote I recall.
I meant to post this a long time ago in here, but my mother passed away back in July of 2022 after an extended period of illness and I decided I didn't want to let this go just yet. It's one of the gems of my collection and I have her to thank for it.
But, I feel it is time I make sure it ends up in a safe place in case something happens to me. It's a piece of comic history now that should be preserved.
I'm hoping someone here who has the contact can share this with Dave and provide confirmation and then I figure we'll go from there. Anyone is free to PM me about this if they have ideas.
Thanks for reading, and hope you enjoy the pics!






If you're a member, you can see the whole thing in a video.

I'm pretty jazzed, because I might get hi-res scans of the whole thing.

And IF I do, I'll have half the set.

See, back before they realized what a horrid little thief I am, I got to poke around backstage, and one time I stumbled on the scans of Dave's copy of Neil Gaiman's script and thumbnails for Spawn #9:
This is over thirty years old. If that address or those numbers are still good, I'll eat Cerebus' hat...


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OF COURSE I TOOK THEM! I JUST said I was a thief. Don't gimme that look! You woulda took 'em too!

I stole Todd's original cover to Spawn #10 too:
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AND Dave's note:
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I mean, how could I NOT?!?

Rigamarole:
__________________________
Heritage has Cerebus adjacent stuff.
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The AMOC TeePublic Shoppe: up to 35% off:

Sometime in July. When I know, you'll know.*
*Sale dates are not final and therefore subject to change.
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Annnnd...OH YEAH! My pals at the Waverly Press are running a "Summer Sale". Nearly EVERYTHING is reduced, with discounts between 20 and 80%! Until the end of June. (Sunday the 30th to be PRECISE.) Now's the time to buy that Cerebus #2 you had your eye on... Click HERE, and remember: Your dependents need Cerebus comics more than they need to inherit money when you croak... (I can GUARANTEE this doesn't apply to the NEW Spawn 10 Lenticular covers.)

The Waverly Press is ALSO running a new Kickstarter for a new Bobby Grossman book: Nobody Waved Goodbye.
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The Help Out Bill Messner-Loebs Go Fund Me, or buy Rodney Schroeter's book with proceeds going to Bill. 
___________________________
The Last Day Without nothing.
   "      "     "        "  Dave's signature.
   "      "     "        "  an Old Cerebus Remarque
   "      "     "     Auction catalog for the Panoramic Remarques
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Oliver' Simonsen's Cerebus movie: The Absurd, Surreal, Metaphysical, and Fractured Destiny of Cerebus the Aardvark it's currently available on "Plex", "Xumo", "Vimeo On Demand", "Tubi". If you're in Brazil..."Mometu", "Nuclear Home Video".
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Next Time: More stolen goods? Ya know, by reading this YOU'RE just as guilty as I am...

2 comments:

Travis Pelkie said...

Great post, I can't wait to actually read through it and not just skim.

RE: the Humble Bundle -- HB apparently takes 30% minimum, so if you do the minimum $18 and do the custom donation adjustment, you have to give them $5.40, and the other $12.60 you can split between Dave and the Food Bank. I usually try, with an $18 donation, to give HB their cut, and maybe 5 bucks to the publisher, and as much of the rest to the charity. I might split it a little more evenly between Dave and the charity this time. And maybe try to up my donation some more.
Also, as far as I know, HB doesn't require you to download this stuff right away. I have some I donated to ... awhile ago, and still haven't downloaded the comics from it, but they're still available to me. I wouldn't be sure in this case though.
And it appears it will end on July 18 at 2PM Eastern time. They've been extending some comics ones recently, but I wouldn't count on it for this one.
HB also has The Boys from Dynamite, Godzilla comics from IDW, and the IDW run of TMNT collections. I love getting all these digital comics that take up just computer space, not physical space :)

Philip Frey said...

I don't really do digital comics, but they *are* useful for the wiki. So I may have to do this one...