Trade Paperbacks, Hard Covers, and collections

[Lobster Johnson]

Hi everyone,
This is a question I was thinking about earlier today: What are your favorite kinds of comic book collected editions? I think Dark Horse makes the best collections, particularly their library editions and the hardcover Usagi Yojimbo Saga books (a friend of mine has one of the signed Usagi hardcovers, and it is a very cool book). The Dark Horse paperbacks are also very nice (the Hellboy universe ones and the Usagi ones especially). I like DC and Marvel's deluxe editions, but I do not like the quality of their other trades or hardcovers as much.
What does everyone else think?

[Usagi-chan]

The Usagi Saga hardcovers are fantastic, but they are sooooo expensive. I have vol. 2 and it's great.

[Maka]

It seems to me that Dark Horse collections (not limited UY Saga - that is expensive) is less expensive than the Marvel/DC collections. For example the Mind MGMT hardcover collections are $20 each. A hardcover of Marvel seems to be between $30-$35. I feel like I get more comic pages with Dark Horse than the big two. Peace, maka

[Lobster Johnson]

It seems to me that Dark Horse collections (not limited UY Saga - that is expensive) is less expensive than the Marvel/DC collections. For example the Mind MGMT hardcover collections are $20 each. A hardcover of Marvel seems to be between $30-$35. I feel like I get more comic pages with Dark Horse than the big two. Peace, maka

I agree. The paperback UY saga books are a great price, and I feel like Dark Horse books have more extras (sketchbook, etc.) than Marvel or DC books.

[jabba359]

Of all my hardcover collections, I think that the Hellboy Library editions strike the best balance between price and quality. For $50 MSRP, you get a much larger page size, really nice paper, and a clothbound hardcover. Of course, you only get 2 TPB worth of material in each (vs. 3 per UY Saga), but it still ends up cheaper than the UY Saga books on a per TPB content basis ($25 per Hellboy TPB vs. $27 per UY TPB). The bonus for the UY Saga books is they come signed, but for someone like me that sees Stan a couple times a year and can get the books signed then, I'd much rather have the larger format. The UY Saga hardcovers, being limited, increase in value a lot (Hellboy libraries are open production, so don't command high prices), but I don't collect for the investment so I'd rather have a book be easily obtainable than super limited.

If price is no object, the IDW Artist Editions are fantastic; reproducing the art at full size. They are a bit unwieldy, but I don't haul my hardcovers around anyway, so the superior art reproduction is worth the non-portable factor. I haven't seen any of Dark Horse's Gallery Editions, so I look forward to seeing how those compare.

Fantagraphics made a very nice hardcover set for Usagi. The paper is nice and slick (which makes the blacks pop), the books are well constructed, and the slipcase box is a cool bonus. While the now make a paperback version, the hardcovers are hard to find and usually very expensive if you do.

I checked out the Wolverine Adamantium collection at a used book store the other week. It's gigantic! It's sized similarly to the IDW Artist Editions, but at 720 pages long it's almost too big to read. At least the IDW books are closer to the 200 page range, which doesn't completely crush my lap when reading. It's one that needs a table to read properly.

[Steve Hubbell]

Of all my hardcover collections, I think that the Hellboy Library editions strike the best balance between price and quality. For $50 MSRP, you get a much larger page size, really nice paper, and a clothbound hardcover. Of course, you only get 2 TPB worth of material in each (vs. 3 per UY Saga), but it still ends up cheaper than the UY Saga books on a per TPB content basis ($25 per Hellboy TPB vs. $27 per UY TPB).

I don't agree with your logic on this since each Usagi TPB contains nearly twice as much material as each Hellboy tpb, I think the Usagi Saga volumes have to be a better value if you judge them by the page count.

Every Usagi Yojimbo Saga Volume is over 600 pages, but only one of the hellboy Library editions breaks the 400 page barrier and most of them are closer to 300 pages.

(Ok, it took forever to edit that quote down to this segment on my stupid phone )

[jabba359]

Of all my hardcover collections, I think that the Hellboy Library editions strike the best balance between price and quality. For $50 MSRP, you get a much larger page size, really nice paper, and a clothbound hardcover. Of course, you only get 2 TPB worth of material in each (vs. 3 per UY Saga), but it still ends up cheaper than the UY Saga books on a per TPB content basis ($25 per Hellboy TPB vs. $27 per UY TPB).

I don't agree with your logic on this since each Usagi TPB contains nearly twice as much material as each Hellboy tpb, I think the Usagi Saga volumes have to be a better value if you judge them by the page count.

Every Usagi Yojimbo Saga Volume is over 600 pages, but only one of the hellboy Library editions breaks the 400 page barrier and most of them are closer to 300 pages.

(Ok, it took forever to edit that quote down to this segment on my stupid phone )

Haha, I hate trying to edit down large chunks of quoted text on my phone!

You are certainly right that you get more page count for your money with UY Saga Ltd. than HB Library. I did the math based on the page counts listed at darkhorse.com and here's what I came up with:

For the first 3 UY Saga limited books, we're averaging 640 pages per book. At $80 MSRP, we're looking at 12.5¢ a page.

The six Hellboy Libraries average out to 329 pages per book. At $50 MSRP, that comes out to 15.2¢ per page.

So while the UY Yojimbo Sagas are cheaper on a per page basis, I still think the Hellboy Library offers a better value, because the page size is significantly larger, the paper is much thicker stock, and the quality of the semi-glossy paper is exceptional (as I noted in my first post, the blacks really pop on the HB pages). Don't get me wrong, the UY Saga is a great value as well and uses quality materials, but I don't think it beats out the HB Library editions for overall quality and for such an insignificant price difference, I think the HB Library gives me a better value as far as materials are concerned. Sure, the UY Saga limited includes a signature plate (which adds value), but for me the most important part is the presentation of the stories themselves, which I still think I get a better overall presentation of the stories from the HB Library editions for a small increase in cost per page. This slightly higher cost per page for HB is more than offset by the paper size and quality, which -for me at least- ends up giving me a better value for my dollar.

Just a quick disclaimer, I posted this based on the OP asking about the quality of various trades and hardcovers, and I assumed he was asking about the physical quality of the collections, and not referring to the more subjective quality of the stories themselves. If we're taking into account how much I enjoy the stories, then the UY Saga offers the best value by far, as I like reading Usagi Yojimbo far more than anything else (sorry Hellboy!) and get the most enjoyment per dollar spent from the UY stories. In my perfect (or at least slightly improved) world, the UY Saga Ltd. would have been printed on the same size and quality of paper as the HB Library. Sure, that would have increased the MSRP, but for me, it would be worth the upgraded reading experience.