[ Heroic music] ♪ ♪ >> Hello and welcome to Comic Culture.

I'm Terence Dollard, a Professor in the Department of Mass Communication at the University of North Carolina at Pembroke.

My guest today is Travis Landry, owner of Landry Pop Auctions.

Travis, welcome to Comic Culture.

>> Thank you for having me, Terence.

Excited to be here.

>> So Travis, before we get into, I guess, your big claim to fame, let's talk a little bit about what a pop auction is compared to, let's say, the auctions that we might see for real estate or for farms.

>> My focus as an auction house is specifically comics, trading cards, video games, toys, just everything that falls into my umbrella of pop culture.

And the other thing that, outside of it, if it's cool, relates to pop culture, that's what I'm all about.

>> For years, comics have been, I guess, the standard of the pop auction scene.

And I think of the other auction houses that have pretty much traded in comics and maybe some original comic art.

I see that there's a trend lately towards, I guess, things that millennials and Gen Z collect.

So I know that there's a big move towards video games.

So what sort of trend do you see in the pop culture auction market that is shifting from what people my age might like, like a Frank Miller Daredevil cover, to what a contemporary or modern buyer might be looking for?

>> So outside of comics, which I consider really the bread and butter of my business, my second strongest point where I've really kind of carved my niche is in trading cards, TCG, with the big three being Magic the Gathering, Pokemon, and Yu-Gi-Oh!

Pokemon has been, obviously, that is a worldwide phenomenon.

It lights the world on fire for the demand that's there.

Where Magic the Gathering, it's a much smaller community, but it is a very serious body of collectors that take a, for lack of a better term, highbrow approach to collecting.

So for me, I see Magic as the blue chip trading card.

>> And what about video games?

Because I'm noticing lately that a lot of times we're seeing, maybe it's going to be the Sega Genesis that's coming up, or it's going to be the mint in box Mario Kart.

So is that something that collectors are looking into?

>> Right now, my opinion for the video game market, it's still very new.

The whole concept of grading video games and putting a numerical score to it like we do comics, is really something that developed, I would say, through the COVID pandemic.

Prior, there was VGA, which was part of AFA, and they were encapsulating video games, but they were doing the same standard that they would give to toys.

So it would be like a 70, 75, 80.

Whereas once WADA came along, and now CGC grading video games, they've adopted the same point system to where after 85, 90, you start hitting those 0.2 intervals, 92 all the way to 98.

I think there's a lot of room to grow in the video game market.

I think because it's so young, we see a lot of volatility.

Prices skyrocketed through 2020, '21 into '22.

Now in 2025, we see a lot of market correction.

But where I see the heart of the video game market would be in original Nintendo, NES, Super Nintendo, N64 games.

There is demand for Sega Genesis, early Atari games, Factory Sealed.

Cuz Nintendo, I feel, is like that's the brand, right, for when it comes to the video game market that everybody loves and follows.

So I see the strongest results with NES and Super Nintendo games.

I think Factory Sealed, Dreamcast games, and Factory Sealed, ColecoVision games.

Yes, there is a demand there too, but it's not as widespread.

>> It's strange to some that we're used to seeing these fine art auctions, and yet we're talking about a very robust marketplace for pop collectibles like comics, like video games, like action figures and trading cards.

So if somebody is watching and they're thinking to themselves, I've got this or I've got that, or I've always wanted this, is this something that is going to either make you a ton of money?

Or is this something that's going to cost you a lot of money if you wanted to maybe get involved in some way?

>> Well, narrow it down to comics.

The birth, obviously, this comics pre, right, this Platinum Age, this Victorian era comics.

But when we look at Golden Age, 1938 Action Comics, one birth of the modern era of superheroes as we know them.

We're going on, you said there was no math, I gotta do some quick math.

87 years, right?

87 years of superheroes with regenerated interest, new fans being born every day.

So it's like if I was someone looking to have an investment approach to collecting, I'd be buying pre-war Golden Age that relates to all the big characters because I don't feel this hobby is dying anytime soon.

I don't think comics are gonna be the stamp market in the next 10, 15 years.

100 years from now, I don't have a crystal ball, but it's just to see how much love there is for these characters.

And across all media, film, television, video games, the comics themselves, they've become so intertwined with everyday life that I think putting your money into good comics is a good idea.

And especially right now, while the market is slightly depressed compared to what we saw three, four years ago.

>> You mentioned Action Comics number one, and before we started, you dropped it, you have a copy of Detective Comics 27 that you're going to be auctioning off this week in New York.

So I'm just wondering, first off, it's the first appearance of Batman, and you've got a copy of this, a 4.0.

How do you acquire something like this that you're going to auction off, and how do you make sure that, you set a reserve for this?

How do you get the price just right?

>> So this was like a true natural find where if you would have asked me the day before I got the email to be like, Travis, are you gonna uncover a Detective 27 in your lifetime?

I would have thought, no.

You would imagine that in today's world, with everything that is out there, people would know if they have these things, or have a concept of it.

This was a collection, a woman reached out to me, talking about A Christmas Miracle, it was the day after Christmas.

Watched a rerun of Roadshow, sends me an email, hey, I saw you with some comic books, I have my father's funny books.

And I love that, that she was calling them funny books, not actual comics.

And she starts sending me some photos, I see a 1936 Flash Gordon one, I see a Del Funnies number one, it immediately clicks in.

It's like, wow, this is early stuff, this is 1936, 1937.

Day two comes December 20, cuz she emailed the 26th, first photos came on the 27th, 28th, I get another round of photos, and I see Action Comics 8 through 17 laid out.

And just that is enough for me to get my heart pumping, but she also finds her father's handwritten inventory for when he took a group in 1980, '81 when he documented it.

And on the list, I see Detective Comics 27, 30, 31.

I didn't know if they were there or not, so I call the woman, and I'm like, listen, I gotta hop on a plane, I need to come see you.

My schedule coming up, I'm gonna be at Fan Expo in New Orleans next week.

I have another auction the following week, it's like my time is now.

So it's the 29th, I'm on the phone with her, I'm making plans to fly out the next morning on the 5 AM flight to head out to LA.

And so she can't believe it, in a total whirlwind, fly to LA, it's two hours out, two hours east, inland, desert area.

She's bringing these comics out of the closet in trash bags.

And there was a Superman 7 coverless, Superman 8 with a bunch of silverfish damage, all eaten, all insect.

And then right underneath it's like, there it was, the Detective 27 in all its glory.

I remember asking her, it's like, do you know who Bruce Wayne is?

She's like, no, not really.

I was like, do you know who Batman is?

Yeah, Adam West, 1966, I love Batman.

I'm like, this is the first appearance of Batman, this is it.

This is the first time the world was exposed and it didn't really click.

To explain to her that she had several hundreds of thousands of dollars in comic, it was like, you could immediately see the sense set in, the feeling like, is this real?

And there was also the 31, the iconic Bob Kane cover with the castle, exceptional condition, and it ended up coming back as a 7.0.

And that's now gonna be the highest graded example to ever hit the market publicly.

Prior to this book, there was only a 6.0 that surfaced.

There's a 7.5 and an 8.0 on the census, but they've never been seen.

And it's a true natural find to where they just have her father's comics.

She's the youngest, I forget, either the youngest or the middle daughter.

Her father was born in 1923.

So by the time you get to 1939 with Detective Comics 27, he would have been 16 years old.

So it's actually late in his comic book reading.

That's why most of the collection is actually pre-Hero 36 to early 38.

And we call it the Paperboy collection because the story was her father was a paperboy in rural Maine.

We have a photograph of him with his bicycle and his satchel from 1937.

And then the family moved from Maine in 1951 to California, dry desert town.

And that's why these books were able to stay preserved so well for 70 plus years after moving.

>> That is absolutely amazing because we always hear about, when I was a kid, I had this comic and my parents threw it out.

And here's a kid who not only has the comics from when he was younger, but takes them to just the absolute climate so that they're preserved for decades and decades.

So that later on you can come and find them and share them with the rest of the world.

You dropped this while you were saying you said the Roadshow.

And I just thought I'd just point out that you are one of the appraisers for Antiques Roadshow on PBS.

Recently you had done an appearance in North Carolina when Roadshow came there.

And you found a copy, somebody brought you a copy of Amazing Fantasy 15 that you did the appraisal for.

So how did you get involved with Antiques Roadshow, which is sort of the gold standard for everybody in the United States when it comes to collectibles?

>> I grew up watching Roadshow every single week with my parents.

And that's how I got into this business.

I've only worked in an auction house environment since I was 12 years old.

I'd go to weekly auctions with my mom and dad.

My dad would always ask, what's it worth?

What's it worth?

And I just, my life's goal was to get on Roadshow.

And I was introduced to the executive producer, Marsha, when I was like 17, 18 years old.

I wasn't ready then.

But then finally when I was 20, they circled back around to me and my boss at the time, Travis is ready to roll.

And my first stop was Green Bay, Wisconsin, which was the last year that we were filming in convention centers.

And I can't believe that's already nine years ago, it blows my mind.

And I just remember that feeling, being 20, walking onto the Roadshow set.

And I'm like, here are all these people that I've watched my entire life.

And to be there with them is a surreal moment for me.

And yeah, it's crazy, I'm thankful.

It's like literally living the childhood dream.

It still makes me laugh and chuckle every day.

>> It's gotta be a lot of fun to travel, but I understand, I mean, from what I have read, they aren't paying you to go there.

You sort of have to go on your own dime.

Is that the right way to look at it?

>> Yes, we do not get paid for Roadshow.

We're volunteering our time, our companies sponsor us to cover the expense.

But you do it for the fun, the camaraderie.

And this is gonna make me sound like such a loser.

But in my mind, it's like I look at Roadshow as the all-star game, right?

The NBA or football where it's like we have all these different people coming from different sectors of the business, private appraisers, people that are specialists for the biggest auction houses across the country.

And we get together five days a year to work as a tight-knit team to put an A+ production product out there to create this show and to educate America.

And I don't know, it's a very special thing.

It might make me sound like, I don't know, I'm not trying to be soft or emotional about it, but it's a really special thing.

And it's something where every city we go to, we never know what we're gonna encounter.

They hand out X amount of tickets, each ticket's good for two items.

And if you experience it when you come to the show, you come up to me at the collectibles table, you have something that's junk.

You'd have no shot of getting on TV.

It's like I got 60, 90 seconds, whatever, a couple of minutes to make you laugh.

Sentimental value's priceless and shuffle you along.

But when that great thing comes up, it's like, whoa, hold the phone.

Are you interested in going on camera?

And that's why you have to know your stuff.

You have to know what you're looking at in the moment.

And I've never had more than 45 minutes to an hour before from seeing the item at my table to getting on set.

So it's really like it's fast-paced.

The action is nonstop all day.

We walk on set.

I like to get there a little bit early.

And besides, it's like the night before filming, I could never sleep.

So I'm usually there 6, 6.30 in the morning.

We're at our table for 7.

And it's just nonstop, person after person, until about 4.30, 5 o'clock, sometimes later, depending on how big of a line we get.

And the interesting part is when I first started, collectibles was a smaller table.

We didn't get as much action.

And now in 2025, we're up to six appraisers that we put on the collectibles table.

We always have the longest line because collectibles are hot.

And there's a lot of variety.

And it's like the wild factor.

You never know what's going to come through the door.

>> It's fun, too, because having gone to an Antiques Roadshow, there's a sense that even if you know that what you have is probably not going to get you on camera, it's almost like it's a lottery that maybe you'll get picked or you'll see your favorite appraiser.

I remember when we went in North Carolina a couple of years back, the gentleman who does the watches.

And I've been watching him for years.

So I made a point of saying, hey, we love watching you on the show.

We took a picture with him.

So it's got to be fun that you get to interact with people who are not just people with collectibles, but people who know you and have watched you as you've evolved on your nine years on the show.

So when you're doing this, it reminds me a little bit of when I'm doing a comic convention.

You kind of meet the comic creators.

I'm on a slightly different path than they are.

They're there to do commissions and whatnot.

I'm there to interview them.

So are you seeing some similarities?

I'm sure you go to conventions.

I know that a lot of times these pop conventions are at comic conventions.

>>So I was just at C2E2 this past week in Chicago.

And it was amazing.

Because in my mind, I was thinking Antiques Roadshow, slightly older demographic.

I don't expect the 25-year-old to watch it all the time.

But because of also the social media aspect of the show, it's amazing.

Like, hey, I love watching your roadshow, that Pokemon segment you did, or whatever.

Or like, the most recently, I had a double telescopic Darth Vader.

And that blew a lot of people's minds, right?

You have a loose Star Wars figure that looks like your everyday Vader.

That would be a $20, $30 thing.

But because it has the double telescopic lightsaber, it's $6,000 to $9,000.

And in the Star Wars community, that's like common knowledge.

Everybody's like, oh, of course you know to look for a double telescopic saber.

But to the average person that dabbles in collectibles, they typically don't know to look for that slight little variant.

So getting to share that knowledge and teach people about the material and seeing the excitement that they have to share with is really cool.

>> OK, so you just said a double saber Darth Vader.

And I'm just thinking of the collectibles in my house right now.

What should I be looking for?

Because I have things like a double saber Darth Vader, and a double saber Obi-Wan Kenobi, and a double saber Luke Skywalker.

So as somebody who just comes across stuff at thrift stores and whatnot, is there a resource that you could recommend for us to just say, hey, this is my retirement money?

>> You know, there's not one true resource.

You know, it's really hands-on experience.

And you have to make sure you have a real-- not to burst the bubble, but a lot of people think they have the double telescopic lightsaber because they go, oh, I slide it out the arm, it goes back in, and it's not that, right?

It's the difference of same and similar.

But if you look, and yes, you're right.

Luke Skywalker, Obi-Wan Kenobi, Darth Vader, the three characters, you could have a double telescoping saber on.

And it's where the exterior part of the lightsaber is a hollow tube, and there's an extra extending part.

So if you have a two-segment, then you have a real double telescopic saber.

If it slides out the arm, and you just have that thin part that extends, but it's one molded piece of plastic, it is not.

You know, another good one is a vinyl cape Jawa.

That's always a hot variant to find.

Blue snaggletooth, you know, he was only available in the Sears Mail Away two-pack, regular snaggletooth is red and short, blue snaggletooth is taller with the silver boots.

I don't know.

I've only done this my entire life.

I have no other life skills.

So if you ask me to swing a hammer or do an oil change, you're going to be out of luck.

But yeah, it's just experience, digging, and never stop learning.

You know, you've got to be hands-on.

>> And you know, I guess that never stop learning, and I guess the ability to be flexible.

Because as I've watched Antiques Roadshow, I've noticed that things that were popular back 20 years ago, the value usually goes down because that cohort is no longer collecting.

So maybe it's the metal pedal car from the 1950s that someone remembers from their childhood, and then now it's going to be something, again, that video game that somebody remembers from their childhood.

So as you have your career going on for several decades, what have you noticed in terms of what you think has sort of aged out?

I know comics are always going to be evergreen, but what else is on that radar that we should be paying attention to?

>> Well, OK, if you want the Travis speculation of things, I am buying that.

And you know, I don't preach anything that I don't actively do.

And the general rule of what I think about is, what is a novel concept?

What is new, something that never existed before?

So I have been hoarding, like crazy, original first period Beyblades.

Hasbro, 2000 to like 2007.

The original-- because it's a toy that you have the character concept, the monster with the chip that goes into the blade, and it's a toy that you would have to assemble.

So to find them in factory sealed condition is really hard.

It was a great cartoon.

It was a great manga.

It has all the properties around it.

And Beyblades are having a resurgence now.

And you know, they're slowly getting traction.

So that's something I think you're going to see a market really develop.

I also really believe in Bakugan as a property that is going to grow in collectability because it's a trading card game.

Yet you have these orbs that you roll, and a magnet clicks to the card, and then the ball automatically transforms into the monster creature.

Very cool novel concept.

And there are Bakugan already that are worth $800, $1,000, $1,200.

But in the grand scheme of collectibles, $1,000 is nothing, right?

When you think of how high the market can go.

So Bakugan, Beyblades, those are my top two picks right now.

I've also-- I've always loved Digimon, you know, that.

But it hasn't really caught on yet.

So you know, I'm always thinking, right?

I'm always like theorizing, believe what the trend is, because you always want to be ahead of the curve.

You know, if you're buying at the absolute peak for investment, that's bad, right?

If you're buying it because you love it, and you're just in that prime age of where the market is at its all-time high, then yeah, that's great.

But if you're trying to buy, to speculate, to-- you know, and I think it's a smarter speculation than cryptocurrency or things like that, in a sense.

It's fun, because at least you have something tangible.

Yeah, you just, you know, take shots and be ahead of the game.

Now, you said you were in New York right now, and you are getting ready for an auction.

So what goes into planning an auction for you?

And how do you make sure that, you know, you're not spinning your wheels?

With this sale, because of the caliber of the books, you know, it's been online for three weeks ahead of time with pre-bidding.

We've done previews.

We were at Megacon in Orlando in February.

We were at Little Giant, which is like this great old school comic show in Concord, New Hampshire.

We're in like the town hockey arena.

But it's just serious comic dealers, some artists, and people travel from across the country just to come to the show to buy and trade.

We were just at C2E2.

You know, it's like, it's all about marketing and exposure.

But with books today, and especially when you have a following, you know, it builds the machine.

But you just, you want to make sure you're spreading the word and you're pushing it to as many ears and eyes as possible.

>> I'm assuming that the auction that you're holding this week is featuring some of the ,I guess you call it the Newsboy >> I'm sure it's not going to translate well on camera.

But yeah, that's the Detective 31 7.0, the 27 4.0.

This is another crazy book.

Super scarce, right?

Like Action Comics 10, third ever Superman cover in a 5.5.

Like that's almost unheard of.

There's less than 20 copies of these in a blue label.

You know, so it's just a whole of these books.

It gives me chill.

And the crazy part, even the Detective 27, before it entered the CGC slab, I read it at my dining room table, cover to cover.

I flipped through, read the book.

And that's like my thing.

Whenever I get a big book that I've never handled before, I want that experience.

So in my mind, I'm like, I'm the second person in theory to read this comic right now since it was purchased in 1939.

Because at the end, yeah, it's a first Batman.

It's worth a bunch of money.

But it's just a comic book.

And comic books are meant to be read.

So you can't hurt it.

>> And you know, one of the things that I talk about is I don't particularly care for slabbing.

Because to me, it's taking something that should be enjoyed and taking it and making a commodity.

But I can see how it becomes a very valuable way to keep the value up of a book like Detective Comics 27 if you're going to spend that money on it.

So I mean, as you are getting these books graded and slabbed, I'm glad that you're enjoying them beforehand.

But do we generally see the value hold steady?

Or does the value increase?

And because it's a 4.0, you don't have to get it graded again.

You could just sell it at that higher rate.

>> So typically, golden age books are the least volatile.

And just they incrementally go up every year.

You know, if you look at a short time period, like a two, three year span, yeah, you might see some dips.

But if you look at a 10 year span of the golden age market, it just-- they go up.

And once they're graded, yes, you can get them re-holded.

You can get a new case.

But that's it.

They're safe.

They're in the inner well, sealed in the bag.

And they're preserved.

And at the end of the day, it's like, hey, I know guys who will buy a Hulk 181 and 9.6 and crack it out of the case because they want the feeling of a near mint, like off the newsstand Hulk 181 to read.

That's wild.

But they've got to be preserved.

You know, yes, you can't open it again in theory because it's slabbed.

But at the end of the day, today, you can go read a digital copy online and keep it preserved.

You know, I'm a little bit self-willed.

I've got to read it first.

I'm like, if it's in front of me, I need to read it.

You know, and obviously, it's a four-0.

It's rough, right?

It's been around.

It's been as creased as the spine.

It has some issues.

So you can't damage it.

You know, I'm not going to read a 9.8 Hulk 181.

Obviously, not that.

But you know, comics are meant to be enjoyed.

>> Speaking of enjoyed, I've enjoyed our conversation.

But they are telling us that we are out of time.

I want to thank you so much for taking time out of your schedule to talk with me today.

>> No, thank you.

Hopefully, I didn't go down too many tangents for you.

>> No, it was great.

I'd like to thank you again.

I'd like to thank everyone at home for watching Comic Culture.

We will see you again soon.

[Heroic Music] [Music Playing] Comic Culture is a production of the Department of Mass Communication at the University of North Carolina at Pembroke, giving broadcasting majors professional experience and on-screen credit before they graduate.

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