How Much of a Completist Are You?

[Darkshadow]

Started out just collecting all of the FF main title. Once I got down into the teens, and books were hundreds of dollars a piece just for a 4th(!) appearance of Doom, I side stepped a bit. Got all the Annuals. Then got all the other main line series (Unlimited, Unplugged, Fantastic Force, and MK4). Then went for the one shots and minis. But I was always a stickler for the main, 616 universe and that universe only.

Well, I got all those and wanted more. So then I went and got all the alternate universe stuff (Ultimate and random minis and one shots I didn't have for that reason).

Now I guess I'm back to whittling down the main series again.

Being a completionist sucks. In my head, I'm telling myself I will stop at 10, and then just get good quality reprints of 1 through 9 because realistically I will never pay 50k total for 1-5.

Own every Micronauts book. Own every ROM book.

Drew the line on Silver Surfer at vol 1. I own zero vol 1. I figured if I would have to spend hundreds per book again, I will finish my interest of FF instead.

[shooshoomanjoe]

I have over 50k comics but the only ones I'm a completest with are the x titles, avengers, spidey and defunct indie shared universes.

[Tony Stark]

Started out just collecting all of the FF main title. Once I got down into the teens, and books were hundreds of dollars a piece just for a 4th(!) appearance of Doom, I side stepped a bit. Got all the Annuals. Then got all the other main line series (Unlimited, Unplugged, Fantastic Force, and MK4). Then went for the one shots and minis. But I was always a stickler for the main, 616 universe and that universe only.

Well, I got all those and wanted more. So then I went and got all the alternate universe stuff (Ultimate and random minis and one shots I didn't have for that reason).

Now I guess I'm back to whittling down the main series again.

Being a completionist sucks. In my head, I'm telling myself I will stop at 10, and then just get good quality reprints of 1 through 9 because realistically I will never pay 50k total for 1-5.

Own every Micronauts book. Own every ROM book.

Drew the line on Silver Surfer at vol 1. I own zero vol 1. I figured if I would have to spend hundreds per book again, I will finish my interest of FF instead.

Still that's one hell of a collection you have. Congrats.

[krazijoe]

I once read all the Rom's...Then hated myself because they were terrible. Then hated myself again because the 1st ex made me sell my comics because they were taking up too much space...

[FFJamie94]

It's dependant for me.
In terms of complete books, the only two ongoing titles I have in full are Ultimate Spider-Man (from the origin all the way up to Ultimate Fallout, I have a reprint of UF4 however, and that includes annuals, the wizard issue, ultimate marvel team-up and his appearance in Ultimate X-Men when Bendis wrote that series) and Uncanny Avengers.
The later is more because I read Uncanny X-Force and wanted to read more from it, and then I found the complete volume 3 for cheap.
Otherwise, I try to at least get full stories. I bought every issue of Hickman's Fantastic Four partly because it leads into his Avengers, and I thought it'll be weird to have one part of the story in trades and the other part in monthly floppies.
Same with his X-Men, only thing I didn't buy from that era which he wrote was the Empyre mini.

Otherwise, I just like reading all the way through.

[matt levin]

First, I should write that I've been actively accumulating...uh, collecting, that is, comic books since 1974. By the time Frank Miller took over DD, I'd completed a collection of DD from maybe issue 40 (maybe earlier, maybe an issue or two later) as well as many other series, Marvel, DC, whatever was out there. I had (to that time) very complete collections by character (appearances, cross-overs, et al.) for Red Sonja, DD, Captain Mar-vell, and others I enjoyed reading about. But with Miller's DD came yet another 'origin' story-- in fact (as I remember), the third in maybe two years, following, of course, a few retellings from the decades prior. It was too many repeats. I began re-reading DD with the express purpose of determining: do I enjoy this issue, or am I keeping it simply because it's (for example) issue 113 between issues 112 and 114? If the later, it went into a 'must get rid of this soon' pile. And soon, I began culling issues from the whole multi-box collection. Since then, if I somehow buy a new issue I really don't care for, I wish it well and ditch it. I have more than enough comics to impress anyone, without a need to impress by completion. Thannnnnk goodness!

[phonogram12]

Broke out of that mindset long ago. It's best to just collect what you enjoy. The collector mentality is pretty close to hoarder mentality if you feel you must buy something to complete a run.

Pretty much. And life's too short to waste your time on books you don't enjoy, anyway. Even if they feature some of your favorite characters. I mean, what's the point of reading about these characters if you don't enjoy how they're being written?

[Sutekh]

I *was* a completist when it came to the Legion of Super-Heroes, but I missed an issue or two of the latest relaunch and Legion vs. Justice League stuff and I am surprisingly (for me) not all that worked up about it. But I'll even go so far on the old stuff to buy collections of Edward Hamilton's science fiction stories because they 'feel' like his golden age Legion stuff or old Dave Cockrum X-Men stories because Nightcrawler was originally designed as a potential Legionnaire (or collect adjacent or homage teams like anything to do with the Shiar Imperial Guard).

[Lonewolf36]

I *was* a completist when it came to the Legion of Super-Heroes, but I missed an issue or two of the latest relaunch and Legion vs. Justice League stuff and I am surprisingly (for me) not all that worked up about it. But I'll even go so far on the old stuff to buy collections of Edward Hamilton's science fiction stories because they 'feel' like his golden age Legion stuff or old Dave Cockrum X-Men stories because Nightcrawler was originally designed as a potential Legionnaire (or collect adjacent or homage teams like anything to do with the Shiar Imperial Guard).

A true Legion fan!

[jwatson]

Not even a little bit.

[FFJamie94]

Pretty much. And life's too short to waste your time on books you don't enjoy, anyway. Even if they feature some of your favorite characters. I mean, what's the point of reading about these characters if you don't enjoy how they're being written?

To be fair, I've only read a small handfull of comics that I didn't enjoy, especially in recent years.
Only two books that I didn't enjoy off the top of my head were Bendis' Justice League and X-Corp. The former I dropped and the later I felt had good enough artwork and I liked the covers enough to keep them around in my collection.

Otherwise, I don't tend to buy comics I don't enjoy.
Bad comics on the other hand... those I'll say I have plenty. I mean Ultimates 3, it's so bad that I can enjoy it.
I tried to get Trouble just because it looks so out there in how bad it is that I know I'll enjoy it for "wtf" alone.

[jwatson]

I am like a squirrel in the digital age though. Like if there are things i'm interested in or i like a run i will still buy the issues but may not be inspired to read them yet. like i've bought shang chi all the issues but i'm 3 behind or eternals, now two behind, or thor. so i will "collect" a run until i don't like it. Which sometimes works in the writers favor because i then like the later issues. lol

[captchuck]

I want more comics than I have room for in my house. I guess I'm sort of obsessive.

[Iron Maiden]

I stopped trying to have whole runs of comics because of lack of space and the cost. I use Marvel Unlimited to read stuff I may have missed. I really need to consider tossing out some stuff. Unless you have something really rare, you're not going to make anything selling it. Most comic shops I go to are full of back issues that no one buys.