This week the ladies take center stage as the top two, out of three Bronze Age comics headline female superheroes. This is just the beginning of this trend as both She-Hulk and Spider-Woman have a long climb up the popularity ladder. The 70s was a time of change and transformation in the country. Many women entered the workforce and the modern era had truly begun springing from the women's movement in the 60s during this Bronze Age. It quite honestly inspired comic books of the day to represent them more in comics even as headliners. Up until then, they had primarily been either villain or ancillary heroes, and even sidekicks.

This new age had people expanding the definition of a superhero to include those with "girl power." Anytime we can expand the comic book base of fans we should. It guarantees the genre will live on for future generations. This month Spider-Woman #1 and Savage She-Hulk #1 take the top two spots. Are these super-femmes profitable? Further, can we count on an ongoing series or movie with these two characters?

 

Spider-Woman #1

This is the new complete origin story and masks added to take up the cause of Spider-Power. Spider-Woman was created in her own title by Marv Wolfman with the art of Joe Sinnott and Carmine Infantino in 1978. This version of Spidey was a tad different in interesting ways: Jessica Drew (Spider-Woman) had superhuman strength and agility, gliding, pheromone manipulation, bio-electric energy, and of course wallcrawling. Can this multifaceted Avenger lead to a new era of Spider-Woman animation and movies?

 

 

 

She-Hulk #1

This is the origin and first appearance of the She-Hulk. She-Hulk smashed onto the scene in 1980 with a script by Stan Lee and the wonderful pencils of John Buscema. She is most directly tied to the Hulk as she is his cousin and was given a transfusion of Bruce Banner's blood to save her life. Which of course turned her into the sexy and powerful She-Hulk. This key part of her origin story makes for a solid origin storyline for her upcoming TV series. I expect She-Hulk to be as popular as she is another 4th wall-breaking superhero much like Deadpool. How far can She-Hulk go with value? Can this book eventually match newer heroes like Miles Morales Spidey?

Top Bronze Age (1970- 1984)
Title Grade Last Sale Return
Spider-Woman #1 9.2 $75 +58%
She-Hulk #1 9.2 $172 +29.7%
Spider-Man #252 8.5 $130 +74%

 

Spider-Man #252

Last but certainly far from least is Amazing Spider-Man #252. This is the first black Spider-Man suit in the regular series, it was created by Roger Stern (writer) and Ron Frenz (artist). It is a popular comic book and often in the top ten popular books for the Bronze Age.  Further, I find it pretty astonishing that the value of this book has shot up in the month of August and September to the tune of positive +75%.

Conclusion:

The numbers don't lie, the Bronze Age is percolating like the proverbial morning pot of coffee and the aroma is pure money. By the way, both are said to have TV series in the works, so check off the catalyst box. The ladies are obviously in the top spots and have a nice widening out of the grades that have an actual monetary value. This broadening of the mid-range grade gives these books staying power beyond just the hype. For this analysis, I choose the largest returns which coincidentally are mid-range grades 9.2 and 8.5 for all three books. It doesn't take a surge of bio-electric Spidey energy to snap to attention for these size returns. We will however need bulging green biceps to lift all these books processing through CGC after the results.