Action Comics #1 holds an almost mythical status in Comic history, the début of Superman and the birth of the Superhero comic as we know it. It’s been available to read online before, but never in a quality quite like this – not surprising, as this is the most valuable, pristine version of it ever sold.
This particular copy of Action Comics #1 made big news a few months ago when a CGC-graded copy of it popped up on eBay. The comic had been rated a 9.0 on CGC’s scale, indicating it as near-mint quality – incredible for a 76 year old comic book, and the rarest of the already extremely rare comic (less than 100 originals are thought to still exist, barely any of that number in as good quality).
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The book eventually sold for $3,207,852, officially making it the most expensive comic ever – and now you can read a digital scan of that very issue, provided by the CGC from when they graded it and now released online.
Sure, the story within the pages might be a familiar one to us, but it’s still fascinating to leaf through the comic and see the condition it’s in – no obvious damage, not even the pages have been stained over 7 and a half decades of existence. It’s almost like you have to carefully click through the scans out of the fear that you’d somehow tarnish it (god, I bet whoever had to do these were bricking it, $3.2 million dollars worth of comic book in your grasp!).
There’s more to Action Comics than just Superman though – there’s plenty of other stories in the issue, from the début of master magician Giovanni Zatara (you might be more familiar with his daughter, Zatanna) to stories from lesser known classics like ‘Scoop Scanlon, Five Star Reporter’ and cowboy Chuck Dawson. It’s a fascinating bit of history to flick through.
Check out the full scan over at CGC’s website.
[via Comicbook.com]
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