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Spawn or Deadpool who is the king of the 1990s for new character?
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188 posts in this topic

Everybody keeps saying how popular Deadpool is and the prices for NM #98 show that.

I would counter that Spawn has success that only Deadpool could dream about with Spawn movie, videogames, animated HBO series and action figures.

So two questions.

Why is New Mutants #98 considered a bigger key then Spawn #1?

Why is Deadpool considered more popular than Spawn?

 

Spawn.jpg

 

 

300px-New_Mutants_Vol_1_98.jpg

Edited by ComicConnoisseur
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My take is, Spawn started bright and has since dimmed. Spawn #1 forever changed the comics industry, but since then, intrest has fallen.

 

Deadpool started slow but has been steadily growing in popularity over time. Marvel has been aggressively marketing him for a long time.

 

It's easier for the big two to orchestrate the slow burn because they have a diversity of characters. They can hold focus groups and if you don't like one, they will trot out another. With Spawn, there wasn't much else to offer so they had to ride that horse until it died.

 

Also, Spawn 1 had 3-4x the print run, and it was hoarded in massive quantities. This perception of ubiquity has made the comic seem less special.

 

Personally, I think Spawn 1 is the more important key. It kicked off a comics revolution that contributed to the near collapse of Marvel in the late '90's and introduced a creator owned renaissance, drawing many more older people into comics.

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Deadpool is a bit like the Punisher in that it took lots of guest appearances over the years for him to take off.

 

If you're talking about "King of the 90s", we're clearly talking about Spawn. Deadpool was a niche character in the 90s, his 90s series is so collectible because very few people read it. Only in the last 5 years has he become a superstar.

 

Spawn 1 is not an "ooh ahhh" collectible because everyone who collected comics in 1991 (and there were 10X as many then as now) owned 10 copies of it. I own 20 copies of it and I was never a modern speculator/collector. Had there been a Spawn 1 "Platinum" at the same time with a 50-100K print-run it would be an expensive book now...maybe not hysterical like NM 98, but who knows. Heck, look at Spawn Black and White...and that came out 6 or 7 years after the real #1! If ASM 238, NM 98 and ASm 300 have tought us nothing else, it is that a book with a decent size Marvel print run can still go for big bucks 25 years later, but that high six figure and seven figure print-run titles have a really tough time doing that.

 

Now Spawn is something of a niche character, with 20-25K loyal readers still following the book. Though are Deadpool's #s that much higher? He is in like 8 books a month though.

Edited by the blob
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And all that is why I agree with the first two comments and own a Spawn #1 9.8 and have a Batman Adventures out being graded right now. Deadpool is everywhere now and I've never really been interested in him as more than comic relief. I know he's popular to a lot of people but nothing there for me. If you gave me a NM98 I would get it graded and probably trade it for something else. Just sayin.

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And all that is why I agree with the first two comments and own a Spawn #1 9.8 and have a Batman Adventures out being graded right now. Deadpool is everywhere now and I've never really been interested in him as more than comic relief. I know he's popular to a lot of people but nothing there for me. If you gave me a NM98 I would get it graded and probably trade it for something else. Just sayin.

 

vader-haters-gonna-hate_1_.gif

 

:baiting:

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Spawn was king of the 90s.

 

Ubiquity.

 

I think the book suffered for two reasons:

 

1. The movie was pretty terrible and ruined perceptions.

2. Todd was too distracted by the business-side of Spawn to write a quality book overtime. He was too proud to hand over writing responsibilities to a quality author...and by the time he did hand it over, the boat had already sailed.

 

Todd took back over with issue 185 and has been trying to rescue the title, but I don't think his writing chops are up to the task.

 

I wouldn't say it's totally horrible - it's certainly no worse than most of its popular competition at the time, but I wish Todd would hand things over to some real talent with a solid vision for the character.

 

While I think Szymon Kudranski is the right artist for the job, I am getting pretty sick and tired of all the digital copying and pasting going on lately.

 

But anyway, back to this king of the 90s thing...Spawn by far. The title dominated the charts for a very significant amount of time in the 90s.

 

I will say that people who gave up on Spawn really missed out on some awesome covers....if nothing else, Spawn had the most wicked rad covers around (just check out issue 153, for example).

 

Spawn #1 is a more significant key by far - it was a game changer and the biggest selling independent comic of all time. It's just viewed as "trash" by speculators because there are a bazillion of them floating around.

 

 

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Todd took back over with issue 185 and has been trying to rescue the title, but I don't think his writing chops are up to the task.

That's why I am not taking the movie serious, as much as I want to. With McFarlane producing, directing, writing, dolly gripping and everything else he has volunteered to cover, I'm not sure where that train is going to stop.

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Everybody keeps saying how popular Deadpool is and the prices for NM #98 show that.

I would counter that Spawn has success that only Deadpool could dream about with Spawn movie, videogames, animated HBO series and action figures.

So two questions.

Why is New Mutants #98 considered a bigger key then Spawn #1?

Why is Deadpool considered more popular than Spawn?

 

Heck, right now, Bishop is even hotter than Spawn! lol

 

Bishop will be in the upcoming X-Men movie, he was in videogames, an animated series, and had action figures, all before Spawn did. :whistle:

 

Not to mention his first appearance comics, which were also printed in massive numbers have broken the $100 mark in 9.8. :o

 

Just think, less than a year ago, those books were quarter-bin fodder. lol

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Heck, now Spawn is even falling behind Bishop! lol

 

Heck, right now, Bishop is even hotter than Spawn! lol

 

Bishop will be in the upcoming X-Men movie, he was in videogames, an animated series, and had action figures, all before Spawn did. :whistle:

 

Not to mention his first appearance comics, which were also printed in massive numbers have broken the $100 mark in 9.8. :o

 

Just think, less than a year ago, those books were quarter-bin fodder. lol

 

I'm going to guess that you feel Bishop has surpassed Spawn. But I may be wrong.

 

:baiting:lol

 

But it is crazy that Bishop books are going for so much. And I even like the character.

 

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Heck, now Spawn is even falling behind Bishop! lol

 

Heck, right now, Bishop is even hotter than Spawn! lol

 

Bishop will be in the upcoming X-Men movie, he was in videogames, an animated series, and had action figures, all before Spawn did. :whistle:

 

Not to mention his first appearance comics, which were also printed in massive numbers have broken the $100 mark in 9.8. :o

 

Just think, less than a year ago, those books were quarter-bin fodder. lol

 

I'm going to guess that you feel Bishop has surpassed Spawn. But I may be wrong.

 

:baiting:lol

 

But it is crazy that Bishop books are going for so much. And I even like the character.

 

I love that books that were bought for 25 cents or less are actually worth more than $1.00 each! :insane:

 

 

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