A visit to London's monthly comic mart

Sunday's mart was an even shabbier affair than usual. Those dealers selling expensive bronze and silver age comics wore the look of desperate men. Several of the more established faces have ditched their expensive comics altogether, joining the ranks of stallholders knocking out tatty books for 25p a throw. Those that have gone down that route were busy, but everyone else seemed to be struggling to drum up any business. I saw a couple of blokes in their 40s handing over ridiculous amounts of money for Claremont Byrne issues of The X-Men, but punters like that are disappearing fast. After all, who really needs to pay £40 for a book that they can get for a fiver on e-bay or read as part of a £10 Showcase or Essential?

So what did I spend my dosh on? Well, 25p comics of course. I picked up a stack of beat up old silver and bronze age books including Strangest Sports #13 which I scanned in yesterday, this Bob Haney/Jim Aparo classic from 1974...

And this copy of World's Finest #159...

Alright so both copies are dog rough, but for 25p I'm happy.

Elsewhere I bagged a few issues of the late '70s Marvel puzzle magazine Fun and Games which feature some rather pretty mazes, including this beauty...


and this Dr Strange effort which I like a LOT...

Both images are worth clicking for the big scans.

I also lashed out £5 for a Devil Dinosaur heroclix, which makes me something of a sucker I suppose, but hey, it does look mighty fine on my desk.