Iron Man #416 Newsstand Edition
Considering Axol (Iron Man’s tile armor) has only been in three Marvel issues ever, you can probably guess that it’s not too difficult to track them all down. Iron Man #416 and #417 can be had for cover price in most comic shops, and Infinity: Heist #3 is no different. The All-New Iron Manual doesn’t tend to command much of a premium either.
Once those issues are taken care of…what’s next? I have all of the Iron Manuals that the Ablative Armor is in and all of the Iron Manuals that it’s not in. So what more can be collected? Well, the modern comic collecting world has given me the answer. It’s hunting down the newsstand editions.
Success!
Now, you might be saying to yourself, “Hey, that looks just like the regular cover of #416, which is the first issue that the Ablative Armor appears in. And boy howdy this website is awesome, the guy who runs it must be super-cool.” You’re right on all accounts. But there’s a tiny little difference that makes this at least a little interesting. It’s a newsstand edition.
What Is a Newsstand Edition?
People have written huge articles about the history of newsstand editions vs. direct editions, but here’s a quick rundown. From the 1930s to the 1970s, comics were sold at newsstands, spinner racks, grocery stores, and the like. These venues could return unsold copies of the book and get credit for them. As comic book stores became a thing, a new model emerged where comic shops would buy the copies outright. This was called the direct market. Newsstand editions got the UPCs and the direct market editions often had an extra little drawing where the UPC would be. (Early direct edition sometimes had a black line through the UPC.)
As comic shops got more tech-savvy, both the newsstands and the direct market sported UPC codes. But there still needed to be a way for distributors to tell the difference, so in most cases the UPC box just said “Direct Edition” and didn’t put any such words on the newsstand version.
The differences on Iron Man #416.
The past few years have seen some crazy differences in prices between newsstand editions and direct editions. This comes from the fact that unsold newsstand issues were returned and destroyed, or they suffered greatly on spinner racks. Direct editions, on the other hand, were more likely to be bagged, boarded, and cared for. Eventually, more comic shops meant that there was less of a need to sell comics at newsstands and groceries. Marvel’s newsstand market went away completely by December 2013. By that time, only about 1% of comics were newsstand editions, and all of them were going to either Barnes & Noble or Books-A-Million.
What About 417? What About I:H #3?
Iron Man #417 newsstand will probably show up one day no problem. Like with #416, I’ll be doing a casual search.
Infinity: Heist #3 is a different story. It came out one month before Marvel stopped its newsstand program, which means that it would have a tiny newsstand print run. Fact is, I can’t verify that it exists at all; if it had come out just two months later I’d know for sure that I didn’t have to search for it. There’s no guarantee that a relatively obscure series was even deemed worthy of hitting the newsstand shelves. Yet another question mark on the road to ablative completionism.
So I’m Rich?
Oh no. No no no no no. I doubt anyone would give me more than $7 for #416, simply because the issue isn’t in demand in any form.
No doubt, the newsstand edition of Iron Man #416 is more difficult to find than the direct edition. A good estimate is that newsstand copies make up about 3.5% of the print run, and then you have to factor in returned copies that were destroyed. The copy I got is about a 9.4, pretty much the best you can expect to get from a random seller on eBay. So is this issue rare? Not really, though it is harder to find.
But is it exciting for someone who runs an entire website dedicated to Iron Man’s Ablative Armor? Oh yeah!
