Rembert Parker of Reader Copies in Anderson, Indiana saw the news about the challenges surrounding Captain America #25 (see 'Death of Cap Press Overwhelms Retailers') and is concerned about a return of temporarily inflated comic book values hurting the industry:

With all the noise about Captain America, it's easy to miss some of the other signs that things may be headed where we've been before.

Yesterday a customer who regularly buys new D&D books and dice and nothing else came up to the counter with Dark Tower comics.  To quote them exactly, 'Isn't this how you buy comics--one to read and one to save as an investment?'  I sighed and informed her that the way to buy comics was to buy one copy of each comic they were interested in, read them, and then put them back in the bag and board to keep them in good shape for the next time they wanted to read them.  Further discussion revealed that she was a Stephen King fan who was simply interested in the new information in the comic book series, and I assured her she didn't need to finish reading all the books before she read the comics.  She put the two extra copies back on the shelf and bought the ones she wanted to read.

When people are paying $50-$100 for a copy of Captain America #25 on eBay, it's pretty clear that they aren't planning to simply read the comic and put it back into a bag and board to protect it until the next time they want to read the comic--they must think they are making an investment of some sort.  When the second wave of the first prints hits next week, the prices of the comics will crumble, and we will again hurt people who have paid inflated prices for a 'comic book investment.'  Worse yet, Marvel has asked us not to talk about a second print, although my customers already knew about it from the web--shouldn't I be able to assure curious customers that I will have a copy of the comic for them at cover price in two weeks and urge them to avoid paying too much money if what they really want to do is read the comic?

The black bagged Superman started a fever pitch of speculation, and I can't help but worry that there is more than enough proof that we're headed into that again--multiple variant covers of the week, a death issue pushing prices incredibly high inside a week, and innocent bystanders who think all comics are investments.  It's incredibly ironic that (at our store at least) Civil War brought an enormous number of customers back into the store looking to read comics because they had heard there was an exciting storyline, but the end of Civil War is now leading us right into another potential deathtrap for retailers.  As long as people are looking for entertainment from our wares, we'll do fine, but I still remember seeing stacks of the white bagged Supermans collecting dust everywhere we looked once they shipped.  White bags that spelled doom for the speculator boom and so many retailers who bought into it.

I'm pretty sure we're about to see a substitute Captain America, but at least Marvel hasn't announced plans for four different Caps trying to take his place.  Maybe Tony Stark can simply toss Cap's body (dead or alive) back into the polar oceans and let it drift around in a frozen block of ice until we need to unthaw him again.