It may sound absurd but don’t be naive. Even heroes have the right to bleed. I may be disturbed but won’t you concede even heroes have the right to dream? And it’s not easy to be me.” — From Superman (It’s Not Easy), written by John Ondrasik.

Do you think $4.99 is a lot to pay for a superhero comic book? A comic book first advertised as “one you can’t afford to miss?”

Either way, my guess is, unless you’re one of Trump’s chosen people you’d think laying out $15,000,000.00 for a single comic book is a bit too rich for your blood. This represents a 150% increase in value since 2024. Talk about affordability…

But that is what a CGC 9.0 (!!!) copy of Action Comics #1, June 1938, went for last week. For those who are zero-challenged, that’s fifteen million bucks. Of course, being CGC certified, this comic book is slabbed — another word for embalmed; so, if you want to destroy the plastic encasement and actually open it up, well, that’s $15,000,000.00 up in smoke.

For all we know the real comic book inside that slab might be a 40 year-old copy of Marvel’s Royal Roy. Unless Disney adds Royal Roy to Avengers: Doomsday, we might never know.

The purchaser of this expensive plastic trinket is “Anonymous.” Obviously, they have relatives, next of kin, who now are pissed about their inheritance. This book has something of an add-on “value” in that it was owned by actor Nicolas Cage, who is well-known to have been a world-class comics collector and who almost got (and sort of did, briefly) to play Superman in the movies. But it doesn’t look like that price point was hit because it once was owned by a great actor. As you can see from the photo, Cage didn’t sign the book. Continue reading “Brainiac On Banjo: $15 Million Here, $15 Million There…” →