Comic Hell

In all of my life, I never thought I would be one of those comic collectors. By that I mean, I never thought I'd be hunting down comic books. As mentioned before, I like trades. Trades just make everything so much easier. The story is all there, composed in book form. There's no fear of missing issues - even though you still have to buy them in volumes. They are easier to find and order than a single comic book (or so my experience has lead me to believe).

I previously explained my dilemma about The Last Unicorn comic. When I called to order it, I never dreamed I would have a problem. Even Sharyl mocked me, when I expressed a worry that the comic may sell out. "I really don't think people are clamoring to buy a comic on The Last Unicorn" she remarked. Oh how we were all wrong!

After not hearing anything for a month from my comic book store about the progress of my order, I decided to check IDW and was perplexed that Issue #1 was still available. Digging around the site a week later, I was even more surprised that Issue #2 had been released on June 30th, and was completely sold out in less than a month. I tried contacting my local comic book store but didn't really get an answer.

Instead I immediately tried to search down the first two issues online. I found that websites either had one or the other, or were completely sold out of both. I ordered Issue #1 from IDW directly, and ordered Issue #2 from My Comics Shop. The next day I received confirmation and shipping emails from both companies, within half an hour of each other. I didn't feel like springing on a huge amount for shipping, so I went with standard. My Comics Shop covered their ass by saying "up to 21 days" due to customs. I am hoping they both arrive next week sometime. I also hope that they don't get lost, or I don't have any problems, as I have decided to subscribe for the other issues and pre-order them with My Comics Shop.

Of course, after I placed the order, I found a Canadian website that had them both. I've booked marked them just in case.

But that brings me back to my first point, which is, I can't believe I've become so obsessed with finding this comic. After some research I found that the comic was being published in small quantities as they weren't too sure how popular it was going to be. Clearly IDW knows nothing about three things; Women, Female Nerds and Peter S. Beagle.

In my experience, a lot of women love The Last Unicorn, and women who especially love it, are nerds. Nerds like to collect things. I myself want this for my Last Unicorn Collection. I have the anniversary publishing of the book, the VHS, the first release DVD, the 25th anniversary DVD and the SF&F collection with Beagle's short story follow up to the original story: Two Hearts. I'd love to get the soundtrack, and the deluxe version of the book containing both stories but I'm not that willing to part with my money... yet. The first publishing of this comic will just fit nicely with my collection and the other comics I own. I don't have a large collection of comics, and most of them are just trades. For someone who loves Batman so much (more about that in the future), you'd think I'd have more.

For a final attempt, I went to the popular Silver Snail in Toronto while there for other reasons (Miss Saigon!). I spoke to someone at the store, who tried looking for Issue 2, but told me he was sold out of Issue 1. He said he was surprised it went so fast. He told me that there was a good chance that IDW will release the comic as a trade. I hope so, because you can bet your ass, even if I manage to get Issues 1-6, I will be getting the trade as well!