Set Description:
The year is 2001. I’ve settled into the dorm for my freshman year of college, and the internet is all abuzz over this newly released Wolverine Origin series. Could it be? Is Marvel finally going all the way back to tell us about our hero’s past? The answer -- is yes. Copies of Origin 1 are selling like crazy, at pretty much equally crazy prices
There you have my introduction to the Origin series. At the time I was still wading my way back into collecting since I had only been pulled back in about 10 months ago by Wolverine 145, so I wasn’t exactly up to date on all the latest and greatest comic happenings. That, and my parents still had dial up internet back then. Not exactly the easiest way to surf the web for all the most recent comic news.
Naturally I started collecting the series, buying multiple copies of each issue for present and future grading, and had a 9.6/9.8 set put together within a year. Then I sold the two 9.6s for some reason, and never replaced them. That was largely due to my 1988 set grabbing the vast majority of my attention (and money!), especially once I dove into the Signature Series, but also because it seemed like every show I had an opportunity to get signatures at, there was no sign of Jenkins, Isanove, Quesada, or Andy Kubert.
Finally, fourteen years later, we find ourselves in 2015. Shortly after picking up an SS 9.8 copy of issue #2, I said to myself “Enough waiting, let’s knock this thing out.” After a few months of searching I obtained 3-6 in one fell swoop. Issue 1 would roll in shortly after, making time to completion of this SS 9.8 set about 8 months from start to finish. Hooray!
What I did find amusing during the process is that it turns out there are SS 9.8 copies for sale all the time, but you’d be amazed how hard it is to find one that ISN’T signed by Len Wein, Herb Trimpe, and/or John Romita. Yes, I know they were instrumental in the character’s creation. And that was also in 1974. Since I’m particular about collecting signatures from an actual contributor to an issue, I took some extra time to find my Quesada, Jenkins, and Kubert signed copies rather than take what I consider the cop out route to completing this set.
With that said, browse and enjoy the first of hopefully several sets to be completed in my collection.
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