In the latest Drawing Crazy Patterns, where we spotlight five recurring themes in comics, we examine five times that modern comic books became valuable based just on their covers alone.

The world of iconic comic book covers is an interesting one because so much of what we think of as "iconic" tends to relate to the contents of the issue itself. This is not knocking the quality of the comic book covers themselves, of course, as we're often talking about some excellent comic book covers to be sure, but the reason that the covers have become iconic is because of the comic OVERALL, and not so much the cover (even when the cover is absolutely gorgeous).

For example, Frank Miller's cover for Batman: The Dark Knight #1 (now better known as Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, which was the name of the first "book" of the miniseries), featuring Batman silhouetted against the night sky and a lightning bolt, is an amazing cover, but the reason it is particularly well known is because it is the first issue of The Dark Knight Returns. Two of the most homaged covers of all-time are the covers for Action Comics #1 (the first appearance of Superman) and Fantastic Four #1 (the first appearance of the Fantastic Four). They're both good covers, but the reason they're so special is because of the importance of the issue, and less so the cover itself.

Even when an issue's cover isn't famous because of a first appearance, iconic covers are often tied to the importance of the issue itself. Todd McFarlane's iconic Incredible Hulk #340 cover showing Wolverine actually DOES feature a fight between the Hulk and Wolverine. John Buscema's amazing Silver Surfer #4 cover showing Thor and Silver Surfer is because the two DO fight in the issue. Similarly, Amazing Spider-Man #50's "Spider-Man No More" cover by John Romita is notable because Spider-Man DOES quit being Spider-Man in the issue.

However, sometimes, just the covers of the comic books themselves lead to a comic book being a highly desirable collectible. This is especially true about modern comic books, which tend to have smaller print runs than the comic books of the past, so when a comic book becomes desirable, there is inherently a lower supply of the covers, which drives the price up. Here are TEN examples of comic books that came out in 1988 or later that are valuable almost solely because of their covers.

Amazing Spider-Man #301

One of the hottest comic books of the 1980s period was Amazing Spider-Man #300, which is treated as the first appearance of Venom (of course, we can debate whether the answer is #300, or whether Venom's appearance in Amazing Spider-Man #299 counts as his actual first appearance). Venom began life as Spider-Man's black symbiote suit, which bonded with Eddie Brock after Peter Parker rejected the costume. Eddie and the symbiote became known as Venom. At the end of Amazing Spider-Man #299, Venom visits the residence of Peter and Mary Jane, and Venom torments Mary Jane.

Naturally, then, when Spider-Man defeats Venom in Amazing Spider-Man #300, Mary Jane no longer wants Peter to wear the cloth version of his black costume, so he goes back to his classic red and blue costume. That happened in Amazing Spider-Man #300, but McFarlane then celebrated the return of the red and blue costume on the cover of Amazing Spider-Man #301, in an homage to his work on the anniversary issue in the previous issue. So while Amazing Spider-Man #301 isn't anything historic in and of itself, its McFarlane cover has made it a hot commodity on the secondary market, selling regularly four-five times the price as the following issue.

Batman #423

This was an interesting issue by Jim Starlin, Dave Cockrum and Mike DeCarlo, where three Gotham City police officers get together at the end of their shift, and each talk about their respective encounters with Batman that night. Each cop saw a very different side of Batman, and thus, their views of Batman were wildly different from each other. It's not a bad issue by any stretch of the imagination, but nor is it all that notable...except for the cover of the issue by Todd McFarlane, who was JUST becoming the regular artist on Amazing Spider-Man around this same time, which would make him one of the most popular artists in all of comics.

This cover came out less than a year before the Batman movie came out, making it more of a big deal, as well. Also, Batman creator Bob Kane infamously copied McFarlane's artwork for a series of pieces nominally by Kane during the second "Batmania" that followed the 1989 Batman film.

A non-graded copy of the issue recently sold for over $100. The issue after recently sold for $3.

Wolverine #17

One of the most successful costume changes in comic book history happened when John Byrne introduced the brown and tan update of Wolverine's costume in 1980, soon before Byrne left drawing X-Men. Typically, major changes to costumes only last for a little while before people clamor for the return of the original. That wasn't the case for Wolverine, who wore his Byrne-designed outfit into the 1990s.

After leaving Marvel in the mid-1980s during his time rebooting Superman for DC, Byrne returned to the company in the late 1980s, and in 1989, he drew a few issues of Wolverine, and he showed off his stunning take on Wolverine's costume on the cover to Wolverine #17, which regularly sells for at least DOUBLE the Wolverine issues surrounding it. A copy recently sold for over $40 (while most Wolverine issues of that era sell for less than $10).

Wolverine #27

I recently wrote about the controversy surrounding Jim Lee's current commission rates, which sees the superstar artist (who is currently the head of DC Comics) charging over $20,000 for an 11x17 commission. That just shows you how much comic book fans love Jim Lee, that that commission rate is perfectly understandable, because his original artwork sells for MORE than that on the secondary market.

Similarly, when Lee made a prominent guest appearance as the cover artist on Wolverine in 1990, after only recently becoming the official artist on Uncanny X-Men, that issue, which features Lee's variation on Byrne's cover ten issues later showing Wolverine leaping out at the reader, goes for roughly double the other issues of that same exact storyline. So the story obviously isn't the draw for that issue, but the cover alone.

Wonder Woman #72

Few artists draw quite as much attention to their stints as cover artists on titles as much as Brian Bolland. Following George Perez's departure from Wonder Woman in the early 1990s, the new writer, William Messner-Loebs was lucky enough to have Brian Bolland come on board the series as the regular cover artist for a few years. A number of the issues with covers by Bolland have been more collectible than usual.

The most notable one has been Wonder Woman #72, which has admittedly died down in the wake of Wonder Woman's movie career not being as prominent as it once was, so you can find copies of this one with some disappointing bids, but one ungraded copy recently sold for $80 (while the issues surrounding it don't even sell period recently, but when they do, they go for about $6). During the heyday of the first Wonder Woman movie, this cover would frequently sell for a lot more.

X-Men #11

In the early 1990s, a speculator's boom led to tremendously high comic book sales, and most of those sales centered around specific popular artists, like Todd McFarlane (whose first issue of his solo Spider-Man series set sales records at the time), Rob Liefeld (whose X-Force broke McFarlane's sales records), and Jim Lee (whose X-Men #1 broke Liefeld's sales records). However, soon after Marvel launched a brand-new X-Men series that Jim Lee would draw and plot himself (with his studio mate, Whilce Portacio), Image Comics launched, a creator-owned comic book company. One of the founding members was, of course, Jim Lee (along with McFarlane, Liefeld, Erik Larson, Portacio, and Jim Valentino).

Before he departed the X-Men, he drew the whole team on the cover for X-Men #11, the finale of a storyline involving Dazzler and Longshot, and that cover shot by the legendary Lee has led to the issue selling for a lot more than the previous issue (and even more so than the one that followed it). The prices aren't crazy, since these books were SO successful that they printed a lot of them, but however miuch it goes for is purely on the basis of that great cover.

Amazing Spider-Man #601

Like Bolland, when J. Scott Campbell does a stint as the cover artist on a series, it typically gets a good deal of attention. Campbell has done a few different quick runs as the cover artist on Amazing Spider-Man, but his most famous covers came in 2009 when he did a few covers here and there for the series. This issue, celebrating the return of Mary Jane Watson to the series, is the most famous (we just had an homage to it by Rod Allen in this week's Line it is Drawn).

An ungraded copy recently sold for over $100.

Amazing Spider-Man #606

Campbell returned a few issues later for a striking cover featuring Spider-Man locking lips with the Black Cat, as Mary Jane looks on in shock. This one tends to be more around the $50s, but an ungraded copy just sold the other week for $100. These covers are also very popular for homages, and references by other artists.

Detective Comics #880

This stunning Jock cover featuring the Joker is one of the most famous Joker covers of all-time. It came out in 2011, right before DC rebooted its comic book line for The New 52, and as a result, the last few issues of the books people knew were now going to be ending in a few months tended to have lower print runs PERIOD, so couple that with a stunning cover like this and you have a comic book that frequently sells for over $100 ungraded.

Amazing Spider-Man (2018 series) #55

Few modern comic book covers have caused quite the sensation that Patrick Gleason's cover for 2020's Amazing Spider-Man #55 has, with Gleason practically turning this "Webhead" cover into a little cottage industry of similar covers for other series. Gleason's brilliant visual of a spider's web forming Spider-Man's profile caused a major push for this cover.

That it was releasd during the COVID-19 pandemic made it harder to find, and due to the uptick in collectibility that arose during the COVID-19 lockdowns, and this issue became a bit of a "thing" at the time. Nowadays, even the second printings of the cover can sell for over $100.

Remember, everyone, that these lists are inherently not exhaustive. They are a list of five examples (occasionally I'll be nice and toss in a sixth, and this time, I've updated to give you TEN!). So no instance is "missing" if it is not listed. It's just not one of the five examples that I chose. If anyone has suggestions for a future Drawing Crazy Patterns, drop me a line at brianc@cbr.com!