Comics retailer Brian Hibbs doesn’t like variant covers that have proliferated in comics over the past several decades.

I personally, as an individual with an individual opinion, have no respect whatsoever for anyone, anywhere, who charges, under any circumstances whatsoever, more than cover price for any comic that is less than 30 days old. We shouldn’t shit where we eat.

Hibbs covers the history, the economics, and the ethics of variant covers in his Tilting at Windmills column.

I’ve never bought into variants. I’m a reader, not a collector.

But in the 90’s DC Comics pulled a dick move where the Teen Titans spinoff, Team Titans #1 had five variant interiors. Each of the variants had a different cover featuring a different team member, and an 8 page story featuring that character that tied into the main story (which was the same in all variants, meaning to get the whole story, you had to buy a lot of redundant paper)

Mercifully it was a stunt that, to my knowledge, hasn’t been repeated.