Dark Horse Comics' Black Hammer series has quietly gained value for two years, and it's only getting hotter now that Legendary Entertainment has optioned the title for possible movie and television projects.
For the past couple of years, I have been worried that Dark Horse Comics was drowning.
The company has Hellboy and a new movie is being released this year, but Dark Horse lost two major franchises to Marvel - Star Wars and Conan the Barbarian. Once Disney has full control of the Fox properties, it stands to reason that the Predator, Aliens, and AVP titles will all shift to Marvel. Despite that, the independent publisher still has great stories to share, and Black Hammer has been among its most talked about.
The basic premise is that a handful of golden age-inspired superheroes save their city from the Anti-God. In the process, they are thrown into the multiverse, where they end up on an old-fashioned farm, which they name Black Hammer after their fallen comrade.
With Legendary Entertainment looking to bring the world of Black Hammer to big and small screens, the series is getting added attention. Legendary is no stranger to comic adaptations, either. Most notably, the company produced Christopher Nolan's acclaimed Dark Knight trilogy, Frank Miller's 300, and Watchmen.
Black Hammer debuted in 2015, but it has been so popular that it has spawned a number of spin-off series. Two years later, the first issue has been steadily chugging along. It's fair market value has picked up steam in the past 12 months, and 2019 is poised to be a big year for this key comic.
In 2017, only seven graded 9.8s were bought and sold on eBay, but that figure jumped to 33 in 2018. The prices are moving along with the sales volume. Back in 2017, that 9.8 averaged $65. Last year, it had a fair market value of $107, but it was in November that Black Hammer #1's prices began to soar. From August to the end of October, most copies sold in the $50-$80 range. Then came November, and almost every sale was for $100 or more. Most impressive were the two most recent sales of $220 and $210, both of which were over the previous record-high sale of $150.
Like all modern comics, Black Hammer #1 has multiple covers. The variant edition at a 9.8 sold for a record-high $185 in December, but the bigger prices are attached to the convention edition. Over the course of the 16 recorded sales of a 9.8 convention edition from 2016-2017, no single copy sold for more than $130. In 2017, it averaged just $72. In 2018, it has skyrocketed. At this grade, it didn't sell for below $121 all last year, and most copies brought $200 or more. That's nothing compared to its sales figures for the past 90 days, when it has averaged $416, and the last three sales were all between $399 and $450.
As news for Black Hammer quiets, prices for Black Hammer #1 will ebb. With Legendary backing the movie/television adaptation, it will likely make it to the screen. When that happens, prices will surge, and you'll want to ride that wave to a solid profit if you invest now.
