COMICS SELL FOR MORE THAN $650,000

Copy of Action Comics No. 1, the 1938 introduction of Superman, sold for more than $2.1 million last year

While the onscreen versions of the Marvel Comics superheroes are racking up dollars at the box office, their printed incarnations are commanding premium prices at the auction block, too. An illustration of Spider-Man that ran on the cover of one of the wallcrawler’s comic book adventures from 1990 was sold on Thursday for more than $650,000, while 1960s comics containing the first appearances of that publisher’s Avengers and X-Men teams each sold for six-figure prices.

The auction house Heritage Auctions said that the original cover artwork from Amazing Spider-Man No. 328, drawn by Todd McFarlane and depicting Spidey as he lifts the Hulk over his head (and smashes him into his logo) had been sold for $657,250. The company said this was the highest auction price ever paid for a piece of comic-book art; another illustration by Mr. McFarlane drawn for the cover of Spider-Man No. 1, a series published in the 1990s, was sold at this same auction for $358,500.

The Hollywood Reporter said Heritage Auctions had also sold a copy of X-Men No. 1, the 1963 comic that introduced that mutant ensemble, for $492,937.50, and a copy of Avengers No. 1, which that same year united Iron Man, Thor and the Hulk under one roof, for $274,850.

These represent some of the highest prices paid for comics of the so-called Silver Age of the 1950s and ‘60s. But they still can’t touch the figures generated by Golden Age oldies like Action Comics No. 1, the 1938 introduction of Superman, a copy of which sold for more than $2.1 million last year. — NYT