Regret, not because of any value, but a few indie comics that I used to have, that have never been collected and no one has posted scans of them. One is a book, from Slave Labor, called Scarlet Thunder, from their brief Amaze Inc imprint. Dan Vado did the story, Rick Forgus the art. It was set during WW2, with a government project to create super-soldiers, with a pair of rival speedsters emerging as the result. There were 4 issues. It was a fun read and had some original ideas.

Another was The Dark, by Joseph Neftali and Mark Bright, from Continuum. It featured an immortal warrior (dressed like a superhero ninja), in the modern world. It had some of the better elements of Highlander and an intriguing storyline and George Perez did the cover of the 4th issue. I had the whole run, which was only 7 issues (in the second attempt at it, reprinting the 4 issues of the previous series, then 3 more). Nice little comic, ignored by the world, except the Perez cover.

I had the trade copy of Thomas E Sniegoski's Swords of Shar-Pei, from Caliber, which was a great little series, mixing anthropomorphic animals, ala Kirby's Kamandi, and samurai drama. I had the original comics and later bought the trade, but it disappeared when I last moved. I think I inadvertently mixed it in with books I gave away. I had intended to keep it. I do have scans of the follow-up, Guns of Shar-Pei.

Aside from that I wish I had room to have kept my collection of translated European graphic albums, like Vittorio Giardino's Max Fridman albums, Pepe Moreno's work, Andreas' Rork, my Schuiten Cities of the Fantastic series, Code XIII, The Survivor and my Igort album. I also had the dark Horse albums for Rocco Vargas and Juan Giminez' work, like Leo Roa. I do have digital of most of that; but the Giardino stuff is in French, Spanish or Italian. I can mostly follow the Spanish language editions, between what I can translate and the images; but, it would be nice to have English. The Igort one is the big one, as I have never found scans of that material. Not much from a story standpoint, but some really interesting art work, mixing in a lot of diverse influences, including Japanese art (traditional art, not manga). I also had a later album he did, of a crime story, where his art had greatly evolved. It was fine; but, I'm more interested in the volume that Catalan put out.

The one real regret is giving to a library my copy of the limited edition printing of The Monster Society of Evil. It was done privately, limited to something like a thousand copies, and came in a huge coffee table hardcover, with a slipcase. It was beautiful and I had a low number. I don't know what I was thinking, other than I needed to clear some space, when Barb moved in with me.

My aunt worked at a thrift shop, and whenever she got in any comics related stuff they didn't usually sell, she would box it all up and bring it to me. It was usually MAD or comics paperbacks, but once she gave me the entire run of FOOM. They were such an oddity for me. They weren't REALLY comics, just a bunch of articles with some pictures. I eventually gave them away. MAN, do I regret that.

I had a copy of a self-published comic called The Brute. I think it came from a cartoonist in New England. It really wasn't good at all, and at some point I decided it wasn't good enough to keep. Nowadays I love having weird stuff like this.

I took it to a con and sold it to someone for fifty cents, which is what I'd paid for it. The only good page in the book was a pinup-style picture of the hero's girlfriend, Anna Tomikul. Her name gives you an idea of the intellectual level of the comic.

Another regret is that I don't have copies of any of the four comics published by the company my father worked for. Logos International was a Christian publisher of the evangelical/charismatic variety. My parents went thru a born-again phase, which I did not join in. So even though I was one of the first people outside the company to see their first two comics, I didn't want to keep them. Besides not sharing the faith they promoted, I thought the art in Logos' comics was terrible. I've seen scans recently and they don't look as bad to me now. Not good, but Charlton-level competent.

My biggest regret is one of timing, rather than regretting selling a book. I sold my copy of Iron Man #55 1st Thanos for a price I was satisfied with, but it was 3 weeks before the release of the first Avengers movie in 2012, when that book went form a $350 book in high grade, to a $3500 book in high grade.

My other regret is that I discovered Usagi Yojimbo in the late 80s and had most of the Critters appearance, all the early Fantagraphics issues and even one of the Albedos (not the first one), but in the early 90s when I was at university, I sold a few bulk boxes of comics to be able to afford food, and I had stopped reading Usagi at the time, and they were in that bulk box.

I've missed out on some stuff when it came out and had to track it down later, but everything else I have sold, including my entire SA Marvel collection, I've been content with the decision to do so.

-M

My only regret is sticking with certain superhero titles longer than I should have, because it was a low period for the title, and I hoped some new editor or writer would turn things around. Thankfully, my loyalty to certain titles was not so strong that I spent money on things I did not want, but I did waste minutes scanning through titles on the rack to see if anything changed.

Over the years I've probably sold off, traded, or given away something like 7,000 comics but the only books I sincerely wish I'd kept are my copies of Fantastic Four #1 (autographed by Kirby), Amazing Fantasy #15, Iron Man #1, and Sub-Mariner ('68) #1.

Cei-U!
I summon the lost treasures!

I was thinking a few weeks ago of starting a thread with the title, "I snoozed and I losed", but I kept putting it off and now icctrombone has got there first. So once again I have snoozed and losed.

I have a bunch of them, Comics Regrets that is, as likely most of us do since we've been buying and reading comics for so many years. My first, and perhaps the most serious in a way, is the one Ive mentioned in passing many times before: getting out of comics three or four years in the early 70s - I can pin down exactly when I started reading and buying again (the spring or early summer of 1975) but stopping was a more gradual tapering off. So I missed a lot of great stuff, including some of what are now my favourite comics. Some were entire runs: e.g. Kirby's various DC series, and some were the beginnings and middle of things I picked up late in the run, e.g. MoKF, Killraven; and some were things I had started and enjoyed but missed almost all the middle, e.g. Man-Thing.

It's quite possible I appreciated these series more reading them as hard-to-find back issues and gradually piecing together a complete set - I might well have been too young to understand some of the things a writer like Gerber was doing in Man-Thing or Englehart in Dr. Strange. But I still regret missing that experience and having to play catch up.