DOCTOR STRANGE, SORCERER SUPREME #24

Cover shows strong gloss and sharp corners with no visible creasing or spine stress on the front. Colors appear vivid and unfaded, and the UPC barcode box confirms newsstand edition. Slight softness at the top right corner is visible under close inspection, and the book is protected in a plastic sleeve. Interior and back cover were not assessed, so grading is based solely on the front cover's visible condition.

Doctor Strange, Sorcerer Supreme #24 closes out the four-part Dark Wars storyline, scripted by Roy Thomas and Dann Thomas with pencils and cover art by Jackson Guice, inks by Doug Hazlewood and color by veteran George Roussos. The issue draws together the title's core supporting cast and its most durable antagonists: Dormammu and Umar of the Dark Dimension, Baron Mordo, Clea, Rintrah, Sara Wolfe and Imei. It sits in the early stretch of the third ongoing Doctor Strange series, launched in 1988 to capitalize on renewed interest in Marvel's occult corner, and it is representative of the Thomas run's approach of building extended arcs out of established Ditko- and Englehart-era material rather than introducing new figures.

Market profile is that of a common Copper Age mid-run book. Print runs in 1990 were large, survival rates high, and the issue carries no first appearance, origin or death to draw speculative attention. Raw copies circulate steadily through eBay, dealer bargain inventory and want-list fulfillment services, where they function as run-completion material and move at bulk pricing regardless of whether the copy is a newsstand or direct edition. Certified examples are scarce on the census not because the book is rare but because grading fees exceed any plausible return, which means the few high-grade slabs that do trade are priced against thin, occasional comps rather than an established market.

Buyers are almost entirely run collectors filling the 1988-1996 series, Doctor Strange completists, and readers assembling the Dark Wars arc. Across grades the spread is compressed: a well-worn copy and a solid mid-grade copy differ by only a couple of dollars, and meaningful separation appears only at the very top, where a certified near-mint example commands a multiple driven by scarcity of graded copies rather than underlying demand. Newsstand distribution matters mainly to specialists tracking print variants of the period, and the sensible acquisition strategy here is to buy the sharpest raw copy available at run pricing rather than pay for certification.