I am the comic book aficionado's nightmare – an obsessive comics reader in adolescence whose entire collection of pulp treasures was discarded by his mother while his attention was diverted by social upheavals in the late '60s. Thus, I am capable of entering a comics store, examining the first issue of Daredevil (now selling for a cool US$1,000), and remarking, "Oh, I had this, but my mom threw it out," a phrase that makes the true comic connoisseur break out in a cold sweat.
I bring this up because lately I have been scanning ComicBase, a Mac database program billed as "The Ultimate Software For People Who Love Comic Books," and have been reminded of dozens of my old pulpy friends, now thoroughly rotted in some landfill. Anyone who seriously collects comics (particularly the superhero and action titles which seem to be the focus here) should find this a handy way to organize a collection and identify future purchases. Not only are thousands of titles and editions listed, along with the most recent prices, but you can search through them in various ways – you can seek out, for instance, the origin of Catwoman (Batman #62, going for $520 in near-mint condition) or the time that the rock group Kiss paid a visit to Howard the Duck (issue #112, yours for $4). An example of each title is pictured in a vivid graphic, with a little snippet of information.
The program is sufficiently open-ended to accommodate even severe degrees of fanaticism. You can customize it by allowing for various conditions of old comics, by tweaking the prices, and by adding new titles or issues – either manually or in planned updates to the program. (I also hear a CD-ROM edition is in the works.) It's even possible to scan in the cover art of new or obscure issues. Certain features are directed at dealers, including an ability to print price labels and a mode called "Comic Show" that turns the Mac into a revolving display of the specific comics on sale.
Complaints? A couple: ComicBase, written on the computationally inefficient HyperCard platform, is slow. Some of your comics may actually increase in value while you stare at the watch icon. Also, the designers neglected to include the dates of the comic books they list.
So, while I discovered that the first appearance of Superman's Bizzaro World Marilyn Monroe was documented in Adventure Comics #294,
I had no way of knowing when that was. Somehow that seems important.
ComicBase: US$149. Human Computing: +1 (408) 774 9016, e-mail: pbickford@aol.com.
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Comics Keeper
