This week, Zenith is auctioning DC and DC universe related comics, games and merch’.
The DC universe has been around a loooooong time. Despite this DC has often been overshadowed by Marvel, but it has been at the forefront of innovation in the comics medium. Through a myriad of experiments, both successful (the Absolute line, Vertigo) and failures (Helix, DC Focus, Piranha) and development of comics as an accepted artform they are arguably more successful than Marvel, they published Watchmen and Dark Knight Returns after all. DC is perhaps hampered by being seen as a bit “stuffy” compared with the flashier, more street level Marvel, not helped by DCs intricate, convoluted and often contradictory continuity due to it’s age and that it is made up of a patchwork of various eras of comics and failed publishers (e.g. Quality, Charlton, Fawcett.)
Marvel was always flashier and more successful in the 1990s, whereas DC (though it had more than it’s fair share of big guns and pouches during the speculator boom) were quietly forging ahead and providing some absolutely excellent comics, like Sandman, Starman, Preacher and personal favourite Hitman. But you can go back further and look at the time when the Jack Kirby moved to DC from Marvel and was given carte blanche to create an entire line of titles, known as the “Fourth World Saga”. These included Mr Miracle, Forever People and The New Gods, and we have some of those original Kirby books up for grabs starting this week. Before his apparent fall from grace Neil Gaiman had written his most ground breaking work for DC and its mature readers imprint Vertigo, particularly with Sandman which had also seen famous work from Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon with Preacher, later adapted for a streaming series. Lately DC have managed to get ahead of Marvel again with the “Absolute” line, high sales and critical acclaim, particularly for Absolute Batman, Absolute Wonder Woman and the maxi series Absolute Martian Manhunter – some of which feature in this week’s auction.
Despite its poor showing at the box office, there was at least the prospect of high quality action figures from McFarlane, and we have Supergirl and Lobo related figures for auction, as well as some of the lesser known heroes from the DC Universe. Personal favourite Jack Knight Starman is there, along with Black Condor and Superman mainstay Gang Buster, along with The Batman versions of some of the Bat supporting cast.
Don’t forget the superhero themed video games, old and new.
To round things off, along with the rest of the crop of video games and cool stuff we have on offer, we have a small auction of sealed collectors sets of some tent pole titles.
There is nothing like an oversized box housing your (now critically endangered) game disc, alongside various merchandise related to the franchise to which you are playing, like a statue, action figure , or other paraphernalia related to the game you are about to play. Of course, you may not want to open it, in which case it will look very nice on your shelf (see TGC Collectables Sunday Shelfie feature for some examples).
Follow Zenith Collect for more themed auctions and cool collectables.
