The Walking Dead was a phenomenal event that punched its way into our collective Zeitgeist in 2010 with the TV series. It crawled onto the scene filled with the zombified homeowners that had lost all their equity and credit. Walking around in shell-shock, after the Great Recession, we saw zombies across the financial board; banks that suddenly blew away as if they had been undead the entire time. Brokerage houses that had been around forever suddenly stopped shambling forward and disintegrated into dust.

After the housing crisis stalked a new show, about the undead apocalypse. Everyone could relate to the end of a way of life; because it had almost happened to the entire financial world. Into this milieu hops Charlie Adlard and Robert Kirkman with their new show based on The Walking Dead comic book series. The Walking Dead became a huge hit and a good metaphor for larger financial institutions and their imminent collapse.  The very last Walking Dead #193 hit the shelves July 2019. An epic run for a comic book series that lasted just shy of 16 years!

 

The Walking Dead #1

This book will hold value like Star Wars #1 and the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles #1 because in the beginning there simply weren't that many fans and the print run was smaller than usual. The total Census in CGC is very small for such a popular book, only 3116 issues slabbed. The Walking Dead #1 is the first appearance of several key characters but the most compelling and probably the reason America fell in love with this story was the Rick Grimes character. His touch of Gary Cooper handsome and innocence was refreshing. It made you root for him. Small town sheriff versus the zombie apocalypse. Everybody ended up loving Rick! This book has many first appearances: Shane Walsh, Morgan Jones, Duane Jones. All big in the TV series, even though Duane's character was only there for one episode.  With the wrap up of the series let's take a look at some of the numbers surrounding numero uno. After all, it could be a good time to buy this pricey comic. The TV show will go on, but the comic is a wrap and one heck of a piece of storytelling.

 

Long-term

  • Grade 9.8 $2050 FMV returns negative -6.3%
  • Grade 9.6 $1300 FMV returns negative -19.8%
  • Grade 9.2 $975 FMV returns negative -8.5%
  • Grade 8.5 $850 FMV returns negative-6.6%
  • Grade 7.0 $700 FMV returns positive +8.9%
  • Grade 6.0 $700 FMV returns positive +32.1%
  • Grade 5.5 $700 FMV returns positive +29.5%

Conclusion:

The Walking Dead has run its course but still has life in the TV series. This could provide a small amount of support for current low-grade prices, which I think is what we are seeing here. That said, this series just wrapped and we should see further price declines over the next year or two. This is a book only collectors should purchase right now. Speculators have no upside, investors are going to be stuck in this book quite a while before they can profit. The earlier CGC Census showed 3116 slabs, not a huge number by any means.

Avoid the zombie apocalypse while you can. There is no reason to buy any of these books now. If you must purchase, I believe the higher grades for The Walking Dead #1 are the place to be. Why spend $700 on a grade 7.0 when for $600 more you can own a grade 9.6? In the final analysis, you don't want your investment dollars to end up in the zombie apocalypse. Learn from the metaphor of the comic and hold onto your Walking Dead dollars.

 

 

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