MEDIA IMPACT STUDY · SHE-HULK: ATTORNEY AT LAW
The Savage She-Hulk #1
CGC 9.8 NM/M · Universal · Marvel Comics, 1980
The price peak came early.
The premium did not last.
A recorded-sales study of She-Hulk’s 1980 debut: the 2019 series announcement, the 2021 price peak, the 2022 streaming launch, and the subsequent retreat.
01 / THE STUDY TIMELINE
The monthly peak preceded the series debut.
1,544 recorded sales, 72 monthly medians, and eight dated media and publishing milestones.
Dots retain recorded sale dates. Monthly medians sit at mid-month; connecting lines do not estimate daily prices. Empty periods break the line. Bars show recorded transactions per period. Scroll horizontally on smaller screens.
Feb–Jul 2019 pooled median129 sales
August 2022 median32 sales
August 2023 median6 sales
Jan 1–Sep 16, 2026 median61 sales
WHAT THE SALES SHOW
An announcement jump.
A retreat before streaming.
The 30 days after the August 23, 2019 announcement had a $525 median (65 sales), versus $350 (37 sales) beforehand: +50.0%. The 90-day comparison was +27.6%, so the size of the observed move depends on the window.
The highest monthly median in the captured history was $1,517 in May 2021 (22 sales), well before the show. The highest individual sale was instead $2,307 on September 23, 2022, after the debut. That unannotated sale remains included; a high price alone is not an exclusion reason.
The May 2022 first-trailer comparison was −5.4%; the July trailer comparison was −8.6%; and the streaming-debut comparison was −12.0%. The debut windows each contain 36 sales. Softening was visible before the show arrived.
The August 2023 median was 44.0% below the release-month median. Its six sales support only a limited one-month follow-up. Partial 2026 was 23.7% below the selected pre-announcement baseline.
02 / CATALYST BY CATALYST
What changed around each event?
Median prices and recorded volumes in the 30 calendar days before and after each date. Event-day sales are excluded. Overlapping windows are not independent effects.
| Milestone | Before median | After median | Price change | Volume change |
|---|---|---|---|---|
1 Disney+ series announced at D23 ↗2019-08-23 | $35037 sales | $52565 sales | +50.0% | +75.7% |
2 Tatiana Maslany casting reported ↗2020-09-17 | $55022 sales | $65021 sales | +18.2% | -4.5% |
3 | $60025 sales | $697.5020 sales | +16.3% | -20.0% |
4 Disney+ Day first look ↗2021-11-12 | $1,16015 sales | $1,00026 sales | -13.8% | +73.3% |
5 She-Hulk (2022) #1 published ↗2022-01-19 | $1,16921 sales | $1,18418 sales | +1.3% | -14.3% |
6 First full trailer released ↗2022-05-17 | $97523 sales | $92226 sales | -5.4% | +13.0% |
7 Comic-Con trailer released ↗2022-07-23 | $77722 sales | $71041 sales | -8.6% | +86.4% |
8 Disney+ series streaming debut ↗2022-08-18 | $72036 sales | $633.5036 sales | -12.0% | 0.0% |
Samples below five transactions are flagged. Percentage changes are descriptive and do not establish causation. Monthly medians preserve timing because all 72 months in 2018–2023 have at least five recorded sales. Every selected event has at least five observations on both sides of its 30-day comparison. Ninety-day sensitivity comparisons are retained; five is an editorial warning threshold, not a significance test.
03 / THE LONG VIEW
The long view puts the cycle in perspective.
The 25 supplied GPA annual summaries cover 2002–2026, backed by 2,809 transaction rows. The shaded area is the detailed 2018–2023 window. The 2026 summary is partial; annual averages are not monthly medians.
Annual averages reproduce GPA’s rounded summaries and differ from the medians above. The capture year is partial.
Does a longer window change the picture?
Ninety-day sensitivity check. Each cell shows the pooled median and transaction count; event day is excluded.
| Milestone | Before | After | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Series announced | $352 (74) | $449 (139) | +27.6% |
| Casting report | $475 (65) | $625 (68) | +31.6% |
| Cast confirmed | $625 (66) | $780 (73) | +24.8% |
| First look | $1,166 (45) | $1,125 (66) | -3.5% |
| Comic relaunch | $1,124.5 (66) | $1,075 (55) | -4.4% |
| First trailer | $1,000 (56) | $799 (87) | -20.1% |
| SDCC trailer | $918 (73) | $650 (97) | -29.2% |
| Streaming debut | $779 (83) | $600 (79) | -23.0% |
The comic relaunch comparison changes sign across windows. Longer windows trade timing precision for more observations and overlap more news.
RESEARCH NOTES
Traceable data.
Defined comparisons.
Recorded transactions, documented exclusions, and sourced events.
Capture audit
GPAnalysis ↗ · 2809 captured rows · 2809 eligible rows · 1544 plotted rows. Capture scope: lifetime. All 25 listed annual summaries have matching transaction counts in the user-supplied capture (2002–2026). Category confirmed by the user; source browser selection was not independently inspected. Lifetime means all years listed in this capture, not all market transactions.
Method selection
Monthly medians preserve timing because all 72 months in 2018–2023 have at least five recorded sales. Every selected event has at least five observations on both sides of its 30-day comparison. Ninety-day sensitivity comparisons are retained; five is an editorial warning threshold, not a significance test.
Identity and provenance
The user identified The Savage She-Hulk #1 (Marvel, 1980), CGC 9.8 Universal. The original file spells Universal as “Universial”; the display spelling is corrected without changing the capture. Marvel’s issue listing supplies book context. No independent distinction between newsstand/direct distribution or other unrecorded edition attributes is inferred.
Capture reconciliation
All 25 annual counts, highs and lows match the supplied transaction rows. No row has substantive annotation, and no row was removed. Repeated certificate numbers remain separate recorded sales. For 2020, the mean of displayed whole-dollar prices is $499.5036, while GPA’s supplied annual average is $499; all other years round to the supplied annual average. The difference is preserved and flagged, not corrected. Display precision could explain it, but underlying unrounded amounts were not supplied. The annual chart uses the supplied $499; event comparisons use transaction medians.
Comparison windows
The baseline pools February–July 2019, six full months before the announcement month. August 2022 and August 2023 are single calendar months; the latter has six sales and should not stand for a whole year. Latest pools January 1–September 16, 2026 inclusive (61 sales). These windows have deliberately different lengths; medians pool transactions rather than average monthly medians. The current year is incomplete.
Event windows exclude the event date and use 30 calendar days on each side. Ninety-day sensitivity results appear in the sensitivity table and in analysis.json. Windows overlap, especially the summer 2022 trailers and debut, so their changes cannot be added or treated as independent effects. Monthly medians sit on the 15th for display. All 72 detailed-chart months have at least five sales; this threshold does not establish significance.
Interpretation
The 2022 comic relaunch is a separate publishing catalyst, not evidence of a television-only effect. The timeline spans the pandemic period, but no market index is used and no amount of the movement is assigned to broader collecting conditions. The selected baseline is not an intrinsic value or forecast.
Historical event sources
- Disney+ press; event date corroborated by TIME: Disney+ series announced at D232019-08-23 · Panel occurred August 23; Disney press page is dated August 24. Contemporaneous date corroboration: https://time.com/5660460/marvel-she-hulk-ms-marvel-moon-knight/ . Development announcement, not release.
- TheWrap: Tatiana Maslany casting reported2020-09-17 · Contemporaneous reporting date, crediting Deadline; distinct from later official confirmation.
- The Walt Disney Company: Investor Day: Maslany officially confirmed2020-12-10 · December 10 presentation transcript, page 73, confirms Maslany, Tim Roth and Mark Ruffalo. Earlier casting reports already circulated.
- Disney+ press: Disney+ Day first look2021-11-12 · First look in the Marvel Studios Disney+ Day special; distinct from the May 2022 full trailer.
- Marvel: She-Hulk (2022) #1 published2022-01-19 · New Rainbow Rowell series; publishing context for the character, not a reprint or sale of the 1980 issue studied.
- Marvel: First full trailer released2022-05-17 · May 17 trailer announcement originally advertised August 17. Actual streaming debut moved to August 18.
- Marvel: Comic-Con trailer released2022-07-23 · July 23 Hall H trailer. Its advertised August 17 date was superseded; its event windows overlap the debut windows.
- Marvel series page: Disney+ series streaming debut2022-08-18 · Actual first-episode release, not the originally announced August 17 date or a red-carpet premiere.
Prices are nominal GPA-displayed dollars, not inflation-adjusted. Fees, currency normalization, and individual listings have not been independently audited. Counts are recorded transactions, not unique physical copies or total-market volume. Timing alone does not establish cause; no broad-market control is applied. Certified Comic Shop Research · 2026-09-16.