Sunday, August 22, 2021

Austin Books and Comics (and Half Price Books) Haul August 2021

It's interesting to look back at how I've grown as a Batman collector. When I was in my teens, I spent a couple of dollars here and there on Batman magnets, stickers, etc. As I started to make my own money, I went on to buy Batman stationery, dolls, t-shirts, some action figures, DVDs, a few graphic novels. Then came the Funko Pop wave which I've since grown out of (thank goodness). As I've grown financially and mentally, I now found myself investing more in Batman art. This includes prints, original art (which I would have never dreamed of affording as a teenager), and even more comic books based on the artist.

I almost never bought individual comic book issues growing up because I didn't want to have to follow release schedules. I thought the entire comic book collecting experience was overwhelming and didn't want to be sucked in. I stuck with tradebacks because they were easy one-and-done experiences. This means that I would miss out on a lot of cover art on the individual issues. To be honest, I still primarily buy tradebacks, but now I find myself buying individual issues mostly to support my favorite artists or, very specifically in this case, Dustin Nguyen. As a Batman fan today, it feels like more and more the best use of my nerd money is on those people who create the content.

All that to say is that I bought a lot of comic books this weekend, all featuring Dustin Nguyen art, across 1 trip to Half Price Books, and 2 to Austin Books and Comics.

We dropped by Half Price Books right before lunch just to browse and I ended up with some great finds, Batman Beyond #39 and Batman: Streets of Gotham #5-6. I'm late to the game on both of these runs, but since I knew Dustin Nguyen worked on them and we were just a block from Austin Books and Comics, we decided to drop by to see what else we could find. At the end of the day, I ended up with Batman: Streets of Gotham #1-16, #20-21, Batman Beyond #39, and Dustin's variant of Super Sons #6. The Super Sons variant was a nice find since I already started buying some, but I'm missing a few. Check out photos of the full haul below and let me know which is your favorite cover.





















I also bought the final issue of Jeff Lemire and Dustin Nguyen's Ascender, issue #18 on a separate trip to ABC. If you haven't already, make sure to pick up both Descender and Ascender (the sequel). They're both wrapped up now so you can binge-read them!


Let me know if you've read any of the above and your thoughts. I'm sure this won't be my last comic book haul or Batman haul in genreal so hopefully be back here again soon!

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