This is scary: Collectors of old comic books have always been antsy about the condition of their collectibles — so much so that, years ago, it was a not uncommon joke in fanzines to write about folks who were afraid to ever take a comic out of its plastic bag in order to actually read it. Lately, Reality, as it tends to do, has caught up with Satire. A group called the CGC (which somehow stands for Comics Guaranty, LLC) is in the business of grading comics, assigning them point values for their condition and then sealing each into what is called a "slab" — a hard plastic shell that prevents the comic from being touched or, God forbid, opened. This is to ensure that the assigned grade is maintained and that the book suffers no degradation…but, of course, since a buyer cannot examine it, the grade on the little label is all they have to go on. If they open the slab to see if the Near Mint comic is really Near Mint, it's no longer officially Near Mint by CGC standards. Those who care most about condition are now operating wholly on faith.
I don't entirely understand the CGC scale. A "10" means the item is in mint condition and a "9.9" also indicates mint condition. Back when I cared more about the collecting world than I do now, it was commonly held that mint was mint, period. An oft-quoted saying was that if you had two allegedly-mint copies of the same comic and you could tell the difference between them, at least one of them was not mint. Now, apparently, there's mint and then there's mint. There's also Near Mint/Mint (9.8), Near Mint+ (9.6), Near Mint (9.4), Near Mint- (9.2), Very Fine/Near Mint (9.0) and so on. A numeric value of ".5" indicates Poor condition, which is a relief. I was expecting it to denote "Lower End Mint."
In any case, the silliness of it all is evident in the above picture. The whole thing probably makes some sort of sense with regard to very rare Golden Age comics. I mean, if I had a perfect condition copy of Batman #1, I don't think I'd be reading it or letting others do so. But folks are grading/slabbing pretty recent, easily available books. Someone recently offered on eBay a copy of Groo #1, as published by Image and now sporting a 9.9 CGC grade, which I guess means it's mint but not really mint. They put an opening bid of $89.95 on it with a "Buy It Now" price tag of #149.95, but there were no takers at either price. This is a comic that usually sells for around ten bucks in non-graded excellent condition and, if anyone cares, I have in storage an unopened crate of 500 copies, straight from the printer and I think Sergio has more than that. Vastly more recent — and less in-demand — comics have also been graded, slabbed and offered at ten times their usual going price.
Curiously, the Groo offer also stated that — and I quote: "A hand signed certificate of origin with your name will indicate that you are the first owner of this comic." Leaving aside the value of a certificate signed by someone you never heard of, how could you be the first owner of a comic published in 1994? Who has owned it since then? Does the guy selling it not own it? No, because elsewhere in the offering, he states: "This comic was purchased at the time it was published directly from the distributor and placed in storage until now. Comics were never on display at any convention or store shelf and are guaranteed to be unhandled by prospective customers." So the mint copy that's not totally mint was purchased but has never been owned. Got that?