David Whelan of Comic Castle in Beckley, West Virginia saw Scott R Moore's comments about unavailable copies of WWIII #1 and #3 (see 'Scott R. Moore of Galaxy Comics on DC Reorders') and believes odd shortages are due to mishandling and speculators.

The answer is simpler than you think: damage replacements, packing errors, and prospect buyers.  I was only able to hit my shelves with 2- of the 4-issue miniseries myself.  The shipping company, not naming any names, once again, mistook the UP arrow on the boxes to mean 'throw in this direction.'  All of my WW3 #3s were a loss.  Half the #2s were, etc.  When you add that type of variable with possible packing errors (I noticed that there is only a slip in a box that says 'Packed By Team X' about half the time) you are likely to end up with shortage of some of the arc because they use those to fill those voids in the next shipment.

Prospectors have something to do with it, too, I am sure.  I doubt the print numbers were the same for all four issues.  How many more #1s--'oooooooh, it's a first edition, I'll take 10 copies.  I'll sell this in a year and make a mint... OR maybe I'll hold on to it like my Death of Superman and eventually retire on the proceeds...'--were printed than #3s, I wonder.   (Yes, I do still have people get mad at me because I won't give them $1,000 for their beat up black bag issue.)

So I doubt any store ordered much in the way of uneven numbers for the different issues, but I bet a lot stores reordered them or needed replacements in uneven numbers.

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